I would like to make a few comments about this country we call home. The words might piss you off. What can I say, freedom of speech.
Some people are saying these days, that Canada is "not a real country". That we are just an accident of history, a vast open stage upon which nothing happens.
We have been really good at navel-gazing. Or at least, we've always been really good at looking down on ourselves, as though it is some kind of virtue. At least, that is what all of our writers and intellectuals have told us all these years.
After all, what is Canada, anyway? What have we got to show for ourselves? What have we ever done in this world?
Well, let's take a look at ourselves.
Canada has the best national parks system in the world. We have the best health care system in the Western Hemisphere, a wealth of natural resources, and a (relatively) small amount of pollution. We are a country defined by our geography, not by our history.
Other countries gave the world the atomic bomb and the arms race. We gave the world Greenpeace.
We have no inner city strife, and no natural enemies. We have inexpensive, world-class universities, world-class literature, arts, and sciences. We standard of living respected and envied by the entire world, a healthy economy, a miniscule crime problem.
Some people in other countries say we are a little boring. Who cares. We are so boring that hundreds of thousands of people are beating at our doors to get in every year, and we welcome them gladly because they can help make the greatest country on the face of the earth even greater. We are so boring that every other country in the world would get down on their knees and thank heaven to have the problems that we have.
We a strong tradition of upholding the principles of the United Nations and of respecting human rights....whether our neighbor to the south likes it or not. But most importantly, we have a tradition of honesty and being able to look at our faults, because in order to grow as a person and as a nation one has to be honest and realistic with oneself. And most of all, a tradition of tolerance...which allows self-centered, self-indulgent, opportunistic bigots and racists the room to spout their drivel, which would be laughed at anywhere else in the world.
As it is laughed at here.
I am one proud Canadian who has had enough.
There is a rising tide of nationalism in this country. And very soon, Canadians are going to take great pleasure in collectively, metaphorically, ramming the Maple Leaf flagpole up Lucien Bouchard's ass.
