Being Canadian

Let me start this with a bit of a twist. When I was a kid, I was home with the flu. So I watched a lot of TV. I stumbled across a Disney ‘documentary’ about Canada, and thought this would be enlightening. It was not. This was a story crafted by Hollywood writers who had never cracked a book about Canada, had never visited Canada, and could not probably locate Canada on a map of the world. They may have met a Canadian, but didn’t know it, because we look like Americans, except we were polite.

So, as the Disney version unfolds, they spent a lot of time showing acres of uncontrolled forests and, surprisingly, a problem with wild boars, which apparently were a huge problem for us. Thank God we had the Mounties, who pursued the wild boars on horseback, bedecked in full red official parade gear.

Keep in mind, I was already in kind of a flu haze, so the concept of wild boars and Mounties in full dress uniform in my backyard was just the kind of hallucination only idiots in Hollywood could produce, between suntanning and surfing.

Later in life, I went to Epcot Centre in Florida, and couldn’t wait to see the Canadian pavilion. Yikes! Did your research team watch Nanook of the North movies and Dudley Dooright cartoons? Damn, I’m Canadian, and I wouldn’t go to this backward country, based on the giant stuffed grizzly bear in full attack mode at the entrance, even with several animatronic Mounties in full parade uniform nearby saying, “Sorry,” and “G’Day” and interject “Ay” several times in each sentence: “I’d like a Two-four, Ay, and a bag of those fake Canadian bacon onion rings, Ay. Thanks, G’day.”

To drive the point home, on a car trip to Florida we stopped at a diner in Ohio. The couple next overheard us, and volunteered: “You’re just like us … we should take that border away and make us one big country!”

And I said, “And we’ll call that country ‘Canada’!” He looked puzzled, and slowly said, “No-o-o.” He didn’t get it, but I laughed for miles after that.

The point here is that Americans don’t understand Canadians. Don’t need to, don’t care to. We can’t blame them, since they’ve been schooled with information from Disney and the zombie lies of their new president.

THE NEW US (ACCORDING TO THE US)
Okay, granted, the American electorate did not know what it was getting into by electing Trump. I’m sure that taking over Canada and making it a state was not on the top of their ‘To Do’ list when they voted. [Also having a multibillionaire in charge of their personal information did not come up during the campaign.]

So, how do you take over Canada? First, start a trade war. Second, go back to the lies of Trump’s first term, and talk about the rough time Canadians have, how our health care is a disaster, and how we desperately need the help of the US, who will make all our problems go away. In a weird turn, he talks a lot about how the US is ‘subsidizing’ Canada. I’m sure Trudeau’s people are scrutinizing our bank accounts to locate those subsidies.

BETRAYAL
Canadians watched the US election because, let’s face it, what they do affects us. But we did not see this coming. What do you do when your friendly neighbour becomes an aggressive foreign power?

Trump, and Trump alone, with his crew of lackeys who, traditionally, will be systematically fired on the whim of the oligarch, has also fired a shot across the bow toward Canada. There’s no rhyme or reason for this, but remember that Americans have learned nothing about us from information supplied by Americans who know nothing about us.

So, where do we stand? I equate it to this: Your spouse is having an affair. That’s the betrayal. There’s only a few ways to deal with this. You bounce your spouse out of the house, or you try to engage in conversation to try to work things out.

ANY GOOD FROM THIS?
One Times reader said that Trump has done more to boost Canadian nationalism than World War Two. Too true. Using the betrayal analogy, we are hurt. Regardless of where we go from here, our relationship with the US will have changed forever. The trust is broken, and it’s a hard path back.Canadians have rallied, as we have not done for years. We didn’t care about wild boars and fulldress Mounties, but we care greatly about us. What we actually are. Americans do not know that we are not wanna-be Americans. We are different in so many ways. And we are showing it now.

Canadians are cancelling vacations to US states in droves. This, so far, has cost billions of dollars in American tourist economy. Our stores are flagging Canadian products, so we can choose non-American goods. We are checking labels to find out where our food comes from.

Years ago in a column, I suggested that all our products should declare their origin. I believe this should be a federal regulation. Trouble, at the time, was that many labels said, “Imported by …” with no note of its origin. Some say, “Packaged for …”. Same deal.

This time around, I found a simple website: https://madeinca.ca/ which lists 100 per cent Canadianowned businesses. Scan the list. Local outlets also appear here, like Sprague Foods and Reid’s Dairy. The site also notes Canadian franchises, such as McDonald’s which is a US company, but owned by a Canadian franchisee.

This is just a start, and it will make a difference. Already, American inflation is rising, and the Canadian dollar is strengthening. Average Americans and economists are backing us, and warning their fellow citizens that Trump’s impulsive moves will be hurting them very soon. The president’s purge of key civil servants— moved to the unemployment list—is also feeling its effect on the American population.

HOCKEY TIME
I have to admit I laughed when I saw the first video clip of the American anthem being booed. But this is not right. Especially considering the number of Canadians who ended up on US teams, and that we are Canadians, so we don’t tend to engage in schoolyard antics.

We can be proud; we can even be fierce; we don’t even need to be polite. We just need to stand for what we are. And we are not American, and never will be.

countymag@bellnet.ca