Oh, Canada
A nation erases its culture— and suffers the consequences
In the American psyche, there are some nations and cultures that still can capture our imagination, and then there are those who do not. China, Great Britain, Italy, Russia and Japan, for example, all possess a legacy of centuries or even millennia of great empires, profound literature, distinct languages, and indigenous cultures inseparable from their core nationhood. Britain, in particular, maintains a special standing in our collective mind as the mother country, the nation from which our own language, traditions and political system all descend. However, our neighbor to the north, Canada, despite sharing a 5,525-mile border, the longest in the world, and sharing a mother country in Great Britain, belongs distinctly in the latter category. And recently, Canada’s weaknesses have burst into the American news cycle in a most ugly manner.
Last week, just as it appeared that a trade agreement between the United States and Canada was imminent, the Canadian government abruptly and shockingly walked away from the negotiations, unleashing a trade war certain to rattle both economies. In a statement defending the escalation, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, the successor to the ludicrously unqualified nepo baby Justin Trudeau, claimed his government walked away from “a bad deal” that “asked too much, and offered too little” and “compromises Canada’s sovereignty and… key industries.” In short, at least according to Canada’s prime minister, the United States, under the Trump administration is nothing less than a big bully mercilessly devouring a weaker nation out of pure spite and malice. And Canadian citizens, who were already pressuring Carney to kill any trade agreement with Washington, are in lockstep with the government. In fact, according to one survey by the Angus Reid Institute, 76% of Canadians believed the prime minister made the correct decision to walk away.
I am not here to discuss the finer details of international trade—that matter is for lawyers and economists to decipher. Neither am I associated with any of the Detroit automakers whose business model has long relied on frictionless transit across the Ambassador Bridge linking the two North American nations. Furthermore, I do not wish for any Canadian, let alone any American, to lose their jobs over a trade war whose main culprit appears to be Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick—a trade war I sincerely wish had been averted. My biggest concern with Canada is not the trade balance, but what appears to be the nation’s slow-burning self-destruction.
And it all comes down to Canada’s origin story, or rather, lack of it.
The first devolution of power from Britain to the territory now known as Canada occurred in 1867, when the provinces of Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick formed Canadian Confederation, a self-governing colony still fully integrated into the British Empire. Over the subsequent decades, provinces such as Manitoba and British Columbia also joined this dominion, with the final piece, Newfoundland, not incorporated until 1949. In fact, before 1931 and the passage of the Statute of Westminster in London, Canada was entirely a British overseas territory, not a sovereign nation in any form. Unlike the United States or essentially every other country around the globe, there was no seminal, heroic event where Canada earned its right to exist as a nation. Instead, Canadian ‘independence’ was merely the outcome of a series of parliamentary procedures. No wonder so few Americans know this history, because there is simply nothing interesting to discuss.
By and large, for a century after the original confederation, Canadian identity, despite the Francophone minority in Quebec, was entirely an offshoot of British imperial identity, albeit with a distinctly Scottish flair. This identity, I believe, is best exemplified by this scene in the 1968 World War II film The Devil’s Brigade, where the Canadian units make their dramatic entrance wearing distinctly British uniforms and accompanied by a marching band with bagpipes blowing a powerful rendition of Scotland the Brave.
Today, such pageantry is a thing of the past. In the words of our friend Justin Trudeau, delivered to The New York Times shortly after his first electoral victory in 2015, Canada has become the world’s “first post-national state” where there is “no core identity” and “no mainstream.” Instead, Trudeau continues, Canada is a nation of “shared values– openness, respect, compassion, willingness to work hard, to be there for each other, to search for equality and justice.” Worse, with the trade war in full swing, Canadian identity is gravitating ever closer to one in direct opposition to the United States.
Sounds lovely, doesn’t it?
Essentially, Trudeau’s philosophy is a rejection of any notion of Canada as a nation who can be proud of its history and its distinctly Canadian identity, Canada is instead merely a political entity controlling a vast geographic zone, where anyone and anything from anywhere can be considered Canadian so long as one practices respect, compassion, or whatever Kumbaya Trudeau decides to pull out of his rear at any given moment. This dreadful policy, introduced by Justin’s father Pierre Trudeau as prime minister in 1971, is known as Multiculturalism, is an explicit rejection of the famed American Melting Pot model. In America, no matter where in the world our ancestors came from, everyone is required to abide by the values of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. This philosophy is best exemplified by Theodore Roosevelt’s 1915 speech regarding “hyphenated Americans” and warning that “The only man who is a good American is the man who is an American and nothing else.”
Such clear parameters of what it means to be Canadian are unfortunately absent north of the border.
Unlike the United States, where the Continental Army fought a brutal, eight-year war of independence, or Europe, where modern national identities are the manifestation of a primordial past, Canada’s corresponding identity is entirely void of such robust foundations. Today, the identity of Canada’s past has been entirely erased by Canada’s political elite. While I feel no ill will towards the Canadian people, the same cannot be said for Canada’s leaders, especially Justin Trudeau. Unfortunately, Canada is a dying nation, and it is the utmost responsibility of the United States to ensure that such national seppuku stays north of the border.
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