My Country Right And Wrong

Here's a little post-mortem on Canada's sesquicentennial.  In the middle of the Canada 150 celebrations, there has also been some dissatisfaction. Indigenous people have been at best nonplussed by the celebration. That's understandable, and it's left thoughtful non-native Canadians in a quandary about how to - and whether to - celebrate.

This article by Professor Idris Elbakri explains it pretty well, acknowledging Canada's faults while also revelling in successes. Ultimately it calls the country a work in progress. You could call that a cop-out, since it's essentially saying we've been bad, but I'm sure we'll get better, so yay us!

Reading about the anniversary from liberal intelligentsia, I found similar sentiments, once I dug through the too-cool-for-school detachment. I also found a few descriptions of the 150 celebrations as having fizzled out. I didn’t really think so; I’m taking that as further evidence that modern media is slowly making us all disappear up our own intellectual asses. Anyway, the interesting point people brought up was that much of what Canadians today value about their country dates back only to the sixties, with our tolerant, friendly, health-carey country built on top of a staid, kind of backwards country.

Now I know Canadian conservatives bristle at the idea that liberal/Trudeau values are Canadian values, but that's not really the argument I'm making here. For instance, the old Canada wasn't a leading proponent of free trade. And the new focus on individual rights is hardly a liberal monopoly; see Diefenbaker and his Bill of Rights.

This is an interesting line of thought. During the War of 1812 bicentenary I mentioned Canada's problem with having an origin story that doesn't mesh with today's values (it was essentially one of blind loyalty over freedom.) But this takes it much farther. It is essentially saying that we've built an entirely new country over top of the old one. And this new vision of Canada is only maybe fifty years old. It still isn't entirely concrete, nor has its actions caught up with its principles, as with the treatment of indigenous people.

So this is a fairly positive idea in the end. The idea of an unfinished country holds out hope that traditional patterns can change, and we won't necessarily rotary the cycle of abuse forever.

But ultimately, this is about the most Canadian thing I've seen in this oh-so-Canadian year: hand-wringing over whether it's okay to celebrate, followed by a grudging admission that yes, I guess it's okay as long as we don't get too full of ourselves. And then that most stereotypical of slogans. Canada: It's a Work In Progress. I say we get that translated into Latin and start etching it on our coins right now.