(You know the tune 😊)
Old Macdonald had a farm
E I E I O
and on that farm he made a life
E I E I O
With a bank loan l here and a workforce there,
here a flood, there a fire, everywhere another care,
Old Macdonald settled here
and shaped the countryside
Old Macdonald made the wealth
of Canada though toil,
Old MacDonald fed the crowds
when settling he broke soil,
and Macdonald took a wife
without whom he'd have led no life
Thank Macdonald for our health,
and Mrs. Mac for Canadian wealth
As we approach Canada Day, July 1st, shouldn't Canadians, being the most apologetic nation in history, lower the flag? Isn't keeping it at half-mast (where it's been in some public places for over a year) a flagrantly proud and celebratory act for a country that wallows in supposed past sinfulness? That bright red Maple Leaf is flying too high -- shouldn't it be at quarter-mast?
A National Day is a good time for citizens called privileged to gather in corrective camps for performative self-criticism. (Maoist China had nothing on 21st century Canada, when it comes to competitive apologizing.) If you're European/colonialist/privileged you can't be in public life without apology-training because of the things your ancestors did -- like settling, farming, birthing new natives, working, nation-building, crafting a democracy under rule of law and equal rights ...
Apology-training is mandatory vaccination against patriotism -- and even more compelled than pronouns.
Here is one person's experience in the apology game:
When Queen Elizabeth II inherited the British throne, there were only a handful of countries in the British Commonwealth. Now there are 54. Countries with populations of all races and colours clamour to join, while Canada shrinks from participation in what some call "colonialism".
Britain declared all members of the Commonwealth autonomous in 1926, and Canada joined the structure as a sovereign nation in 1931. Canada had begun life as British North America, and has became progressively more multi-cultural ever since -- a nation of immigrants. We haven't yet repudiated our parentage though, our descent from "the Mother of Parliaments". We've never given up parliamentary democracy, under which political parties are joined by a peace-inducing loyalty to "the Crown". This means that the opposition party in parliament is, although opposing the governing party, nevertheless a loyal opposition under one Crown, which suppresses the "polarizing" aggression we see in political life elsewhere.
Some citizens of Anglo-Saxon background like to celebrate this heritage, as all other cultures in Canada are encouraged to do with theirs -- yet Anglo-Saxon culture is shunned by some as "colonialist". This is ironic, since the Commonwealth originating in Anglo-Saxon (and European Enlightenment) tradition embodies the principles of human rights, gender equality, freedom of expression, sustainable development, and access to health which the "progressive" political classes in Canada now trumpet (although in fact they're a bit shaky of the freedom-of-expression front ...).
Trade, traditions and values, not a formal constitution, holds the Commonwealth together. Members are represented by High Commissioners and the Head of the Commonwealth is not the monarch of Britain. The Commonwealth Charter formalizes the rights-and-freedom values listed above. These things didn't come out of nowhere however. They came through centuries of historical jostling, struggling and philosophizing in Britain, beginning when titled classes whose taxes supported the Crown and its wars demanded power in parliament, and leading to the trading classes who created wealth and industry doing the same, and then the working classes.
This history used to be taught in schools but few current Canadian politicians, voters and commentators seem to know a thing about it. Schools no longer teach it: History is colonialist. Now we have "history by public consultation", which doesn't work well if equally ignorant and biased participants are committed only to advancing their own self-identity tribe. No wealth of commonality in that.
In this atmosphere, Canadians did little to mark in 2022 the longest-ever reign of any British monarch, that of Queen Elizabeth II, who is in fact the most well-known person in the world, and who counter-intuitively became such precisely by not marking territory and asserting self.
Recorded council meetings indicate that Victoria Council plans to create a Welcoming City Committee to accomplish Civic Inclusion Day. They will replace fireworks, music, celebration and the red and white T-Shirts cheerfully worn for the occasion by all ages, ethnicities and occupational groups, with something they consider “modest, family-friendly, multi-cultural and anti-racist” (which is code for anti-white-settler).
There will be, in this form of celebration, a moment of silence for “reflection”. (That'll be fun.) And it will be another chance to ideologically lower the flag. Is there any other country in the world as addicted as Canada to lowering their flag? Half-mast is Canada's favourite position -- as if afraid to stand upright and be counted, as a flag-pole. Does being serially half-mast suggest half-full or half-empty? The heads of some of our decision makers seem fully empty.
There will of course be no fireworks allowed in this anti-celebration (too bright, too festive) – except the verbal fireworks in the opinion columns of course, among independently thinking patriotic types.
So what can citizens do when their city hates their country? They can hold their own Canada Day parties -- real parties -- picnics in the parks, beaches and gardens with flags flying, such as the group of friends shown below did in Victoria BC in 2021.
US News and World Report, in its “Best Countries Report” for 2021, ranks Canada number one for “quality of life, social purpose, good job market”, being corruption-free and “caring about human rights and social justice”. (The Report is based on a survey of 20,000 global citizens.) Some may question lining countries up in a popularity contest, yet comparisons do focus minds on what a country's characteristic are. For Canadians, this report gives us a moment not to be ruled by resentments and obsession with the negative.
Of course, one salient Canadian characteristic is our apology addiction. We insist on apologizing because we have a top-rated country, seemingly embarrassed at our very successes. Is our latest version of being “committed to social justice” a need to encourage minority groups to criticize and complain? Does “Pride” month in Canada take pride in self-abasement?
Commentators have got into the irritating habit of adding “systemic” to every noun, such as the noun “racism”. The rest of the world doesn't consider Canada racist. (Maybe they've looked at our Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which most Canadians seem not to have.)
That the Constitution forbids racism doesn't mean everybody actually likes everybody else. Liking and hating are emotions, and you can't legislate emotion. People feel what they feel; we can only demand that rights be equal and speech non-hurtful, which Canada attempts through robust anti-hate-speech laws. Of course, many people don't mind seeing white people spoken of hurtfully – even most of the white people. Even having built from our founding colonies the nation deemed most civilized in the world, they accept “anti-colonialism” barbs, but maybe this suggests moral advantage: you can absorb insult when you feel relatively unassailable.
We already know we have the grandest landscapes, longest coastline, biggest lakes and rivers, most fertile prairies on Earth. We have exciting wildlife, theatrical weather. We fall down though in taking care of the environment, conservation-wise, and we aren't as humane as we should be about animal welfare. But to fellow humans ... well: stop complaining, humans! Get out on Canada Day and celebrate your good fortune in living here.
Historically we've been “systemic” in the ways that count: easy-going, fair-minded, hardy and self-sufficient, a nation of strong women, hard workers, caring parents. Our ancestors dealt with hardship without demanding all manner of mental-health disability handouts. But we don't begrudge help now to the growing percentage of the population that does want it – that's part of the Canadian way, the way of tolerance.
The capital city of my province however, finds the whole country guilty of ... something. Something “colonial”. Boycott Canada Day, demands City Council! Most Canadians won't, however. We're too much like our national animal, the beaver: carrying on regardless. It's interesting that the beaver is our symbol. In a world of nations that adopt bears, wolves and eagles, totems of predatory violence, we chose the beaver, an inventive, hard-working, home-building river-shaping creature that works in teams. The houses beavers build out of branches they harvest are architecturally elaborate, meant for family life. They even have baby-beaver play rooms. Beavers keep their offspring safe, and each generation learns from the one before. They live in colonies (sorry!) and ecologists are realizing that it's beavers that have kept our native woods alive and our water table high enough for agriculture, through their river-damming industriousness.
Yes, there's a definite fellow-feeling between Canadians and Castor canadensis. From Castor we've learned Systemic Beavering. Beavers like peace and social order, they like to live-and-let-live and get on with whatever role in the community is theirs. Probably, if another beaver gets too aggressively critical, they just swim away. A good idea, on Canada Day. Let's systemically celebrate that.
