Posted on 12/05/2004 8:08:28 AM PST by Dog Gone
I moved to Canada after the 2000 election. Although I did it mainly for career reasons — I got a job whose description read as though it had been written precisely for my rather quirky background and interests — at the time I found it gratifying to joke that I was leaving the United States because of George W. Bush. It felt fine to think of myself as someone who was actually going to make good on the standard election-year threat to leave the country.
Also, I had spent years of my life feeling like I wasn't a typical American and wishing I could be Canadian. I wanted to live in a country that was not a superpower, a country I believe to have made the right choices about fairness, human rights and the social compact.
So I could certainly identify with the disappointed John Kerry supporters who started fantasizing about moving to Canada after Nov. 2. But after nearly four years as an American in the Great White North, I've learned it's not all beer and doughnuts. If you're thinking about coming to Canada, let me give you some advice: Don't.
Although I enjoy my work and have made good friends in Toronto, I've found life as an American expatriate in Canada difficult, frustrating and even painful in ways that have surprised me.
As attractive as living here may be in theory, the reality's something else. For me, it's been one of almost daily confrontation with a powerful anti-Americanism that pervades many aspects of life. When I've mentioned this phenomenon to Canadian friends, they've furrowed their brows sympathetically and said, "Yes, Canadian anti-Americanism can be very subtle." My response is, there's nothing subtle about it.
The anti-Americanism I experience generally takes this form: Canadians bring up "the States" or "Americans" to make comparisons or evaluations that mix a kind of smug contempt with a wariness that alternates between the paranoid and the absurd.
Thus, Canadian media discussion of President Bush's official visit last week focused on the snub implied by his not having visited earlier. The media reported that when he did come, he would not speak to a Parliament that's so hostile it can't be trusted to receive him politely. [Bush did not speak in Parliament.] Coverage of a Canadian athlete caught doping devolves into complaints about how Americans always get away with cheating.
The Blame Canada song from the South Park movie is taken as documentary evidence of Americans' real attitudes toward this country. The ongoing U.S. ban on importing Canadian cattle (after a case of mad cow disease was traced to Alberta) is interpreted as a form of political persecution.
In the wake of 9/11, after the initial shock wore off, it was common to hear some Canadians voice the opinion that Americans had finally gotten what they deserved. The attacks were just deserts for years of interventionist U.S. foreign policy, the increasing inequality between the world's poorest nations and the wealthiest one on Earth, and a generalized arrogance.
I heard similar views expressed after Nov. 2, when Americans were perceived to have revealed their true selves and thus to "deserve" a second Bush term.
Canadians often use metaphors to portray their relationship with the United States. They describe Canada as "sleeping with an elephant." Even when the elephant is at rest, they worry that it may suddenly roll over. They liken Canada to a gawky teen-age girl with a hopeless crush on the handsome and popular boy next door. You know, the one who doesn't even know she exists.
The self-image conveyed in these metaphors is timid and accommodating. Perhaps this is how Canadians see themselves (or would like to be seen), but my experience is that they are extremely aggressive (if somewhat passively so) when it comes to demonstrating their deep ambivalence toward Americans. Take the popular TV show Talking to Americans, which simultaneously showcases Americans' ignorance about Canada and mocks Canadians' unhealthy preoccupation with what Americans really think of them.
Of course, there's often something of the stalker in that gawky teen-age girl, isn't there?
Part of what's irksome about Canadian anti-Americanism and the obsession with the United States is that it seems so corrosive to Canada. Any country that defines itself through a negative ("Canada: We're not the United States") is doomed to an endless and repetitive cycle of hand-wringing and angst. For example, Canadians often point to their system of universal health care as the best example of what it means to be Canadian (because the United States doesn't provide it), but this means that any effort to adjust or reform that system (which is not perfect) precipitates a national identity crisis: To wit, instituting co-payments or private MRI clinics will make Canada too much like the United States.
The rush to make comparisons sometimes prevents meaningful examination of the very real problems that Canada faces. As a Canadian social advocate once told me, when her compatriots look at their own societal problems, they are often satisfied once they can reassure themselves that they're better off than the United States. As long as there's still more homelessness, racism and income inequality to the south, Canadians can continue to rest easy in their moral superiority.
I felt a strong tug toward the United States when the borders shut for several hours on the afternoon of 9/11, and again after the election this month. Canadian friends were honestly shocked when I, a caricature of a bluestocking blue-stater (I've spent most of my life in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maryland and Wisconsin, with short stays in Washington state and the bluest part of Colorado), said that I would in many ways prefer to live in the United States, and not just because it's home.
They assume that it's better, more comfortable, to be in a place seemingly more in tune with one's own political and philosophical leanings. Right after the election, many asked me if I would now apply for Canadian citizenship.
I don't intend to do that, because experiencing the anti-Americanism I've described has been instructive: Living in Canada and coping with it has forced me to confront my own feelings about America. And it's helped me discover what I do value about it: its contradictions, its eccentricities, its expansive spirit, all the intensity and opportunity of a deeply flawed, widely inconsistent, but always interesting country.
Perhaps I am a typical American, after all.
Jacobson is an American medical sociologist living in Toronto.
Thank you for that insightful comment. The leftie press is just like the energizer bunny and keeps on tickin'and spewing out the saaame old rubbbish.
Geez, thin skinned liberal. As a native New Yorker, I lived in the People's Republic of Massachusetts. The residents (called "Massholes" by residents of every bordering state) have a very similar "sleeping with the elephant" issue with New York. It's a shame the way they focus on every way in which they come up short when compared to NYers. Did they celebrate the Patriots' superiority to the Giants, or the Celtics' superiority to the Knicks? No, they focussed on the Red Sox, who were then plainly inferior to the Yankees. I will admit I am glad I wasn't there ths fall. But even now that they are champions, they focus on A-Rod, not their own victory.
They proclaim themselves the "Hub of the Atlantic," a name which seems better fit to New York. Or London. Or Paris. Or Lisbon. Or Lagos, Nigeria. It's a very pretty town. But it's simply a small town compared to New York. Big deal. They even named a three-story wharf, "The World Trade Center." SO rather than focus on "We're pretty," or "you can walk on our streets," or "a taste of Europe in America," or "Hey, we KEPT some of our historical buildings," they compare themselves to New York in the only way they will certainly objectively lose: size. NAd instead turned all their local boosterism and civic pride into hating New York.
But you know what? I lived with it. I even enjoyed it, taking it as a compliment. Massachusetts and New York will always be politically aligned (unfortunately, for ill). They will always visit each others cities. They will always be two states as close to each other as North Dakota and South Dakota. And when the World Trade Center (the real one) came down, many Bostonians actually sincerely routed for the Yankees to win the World Series.
Of course, the Yankees haven't won since. But maybe that's what it took for the curse to be broken: Boston lost its inferiority complex.
However, those that are the avowed socialist seem to never change - much like the left in the USA - seems to be sickness they can't overcome.
what makes you think america wants you to return or maintain your citizenship?
>> They describe Canada as "sleeping with an elephant." <<
The funny thing (and it's funny because I never even thought of "Democrats" or "Republicans") is that my mental image was that of an ass sleeping next to a Republican.
>> They describe Canada as "sleeping with an elephant." <<
The funny thing (and it's funny because I never even thought of "Democrats" or "Republicans") is that my mental image was that of an ass sleeping next to an elephant.
NOW I make the Freudian slip.
there is a good article at the top of this thread that describes the widespread anti-americanism in cantada. you may want to read it.
"beer and doughnuts"
MMMMMMMMMM, truly a much better combo than one might think!
And, what was Bali's foreign policy that had the terrorists blow up one of their hotels & murder 100+ people?
Canada has been hiding behind the security skirt of America for years.
Europe has tried repeatedly to ban imports of American beef because of such scares that America "has mad cows".
good for you, LOC1!
...and some Canadians kill good guys as well...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1294816/posts
...pithy, and they have no b#lls.
Maybe one day we'll see an article in the Comical detailing that "anti-Zionism" really is "anti-Semitism".
The attack on Bali targeted Australian tourists because Australia was partnering with the United States in the war in Iraq.
Sort of makes it clear that the terrorists see it as "You are with us or against us" too.
Just ask Spain. Their voters panicked and switched sides.
Quit trying to analyze it. The Canadian /American relationship has nothing to do with envy or power. It is all about trying to figure out who and what we are. Over the past 30 years, our strong inherited cultural ties to Great Britain were severed in order to appease Quebecers. The Liberals tried to create a new Canadian identity based on tolerance, multi-culturalism, inclusion and extensive cradle to grave social programs managed by an ever expanding Federal bureaucracy. This exercise if failing miserably. Many of the misguided see America and Americans marching to a different drumbeat and must somehow rationalize why. The weakkneed and faint of heart "Blame America" while the inverse is true south of the border. It must make Bin-Laden and his followers tickled pink to see the rifts his actions have created amongst traditional allies as they try to figure out "what the hell happened"?. The sooner we all become one nation the better for all of us. If we are not Americans then what the hell are we, cultural orphans?
Because if they don't misovercomplicatate it, they can't claim that there is no way you can understand (so they have to explain it to you).
It is just another symptom of the disease.
Yes, thank you. My question was rhetorical.
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