Posted on 10/28/2005 3:00:35 PM PDT by Fair Go
The Sickness of Canadian Anti-Americanism By Jamie Glazov FrontPageMagazine.com | March 7, 2003
Canadian anti-Americanism has always been a perfect reflection of the pathological nature of anti-Americanism as a whole. Indeed, in Canada, where I am a citizen and have grown up most of my life, anti-Americanism has literally defined the national identity and culture of this country – and in the most repulsive and embarrassing ways.
Today, Canadian anti-Americanism is preventing our present Liberal government from giving full-hearted support to the U.S. against Saddam Hussein. The Canadian leadership would rather exhibit its “independence” of the Americans than to confront a brutal dictator who equals Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot in their monstrosity.
This reality explains why Mark Kingwell’s recent column “What distinguishes us from Americans,” in Canada’s national newspaper, the National Post, infuriated me as immensely as it did.
Kingwell defends the reality that much of Canadian identity has been built on Canada defining itself in opposition to the United States. He writes, “I have never understood why this is considered inadequate or feeble. If you were the only dissenter in a room holding a dozen people, standing up and saying `I’m not the same as you’ would be a clear mark of moral courage.”
Really?
Suppose this scenario occurs during the Second World War and the other eleven people want to stop Hitler in his tracks and to prevent the Nazification of the world and the mass genocide of Jews. Would exhibiting your “independence” for the sake of fulfilling your little-brother complex be a mark of “moral courage”?
Many Canadian nationalists think so.
The analogy I use above perfectly suits the embarrassing and immoral behaviour of Canadian nationalists throughout the Cold War, especially under the leadership of Pierre Trudeau, when anti-Americanism was seen as being more cutting-edge than confronting and fighting the genocidal Soviet regime.
This psychic illness is founded on Canada’s desperate desire to be “different” than the Americans -- a result of Canada being built on the “counter-revolution.” When the British colonies revolted against their masters in 1776, Canadians became the first anti-Americans. Canada is based on anti-Americanism. Without anti-Americanism -- as one author has quipped -- Canada would cease to exist.
While Kingwell conspicuously avoids the issue of how bearing the mark of “moral courage” translated into many Canadian nationalists engaging in Gulag denial during the Cold War, the historical record stands firmly in place: the Soviet regime was an expansionist and totalitarian regime that exterminated millions of its own people. Consequently, as the de-classified documents from the Soviet archives now prove, the Canadian nationalists who demonized the United States, and exonerated the Soviet Union, in the Cold War, for the sake of anti-Americanism, were completely wrong.
Yet no apologies are forthcoming.
But at least we now understand why Canadian “nationalist” writers and historians, such as John Warnock, Donald Creighton, and James Minifie, wrote interpretations and histories about the Cold War that demonized the U.S. and left names such as Joseph Stalin in the footnotes.
As a Russian émigré, I am not humoured by Kingwell’s assault on historical memory; I am not humoured by Gulag denial just as a Jewish person wouldn’t be humoured by Holocaust denial.
While I was engaged in my doctoral studies in history at York University in Toronto, I would confront many of my colleagues about this issue. Why, I asked them, were they reluctant to face the errors of Canadian nationalists vis-à-vis the Cold War? Were they not aware of how the documents from the former Soviet archives were discrediting almost everything Canadian nationalists had said about the Cold War? My colleagues’ favourite response was to shrug their shoulders and to dismiss my arguments as being too “hung up” on “the past.” The Cold War “was over,” they told me, and it was silly to chase down “old ghosts”. My “obsession” with the Soviet archives, they patiently explained to me, was analogous to “necrophilia.” And these were historians.
The only historical necrophilia they supported, it seems, was the variety that found more sins of American foreign policy and capitalism -- not of socialism.
Kingwell thinks it is a badge of “moral courage” to stand up to the Americans. How about during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962, when Prime Minister John Diefenbaker refused to put Canadian forces on an increased level of alert (Defcon 3) in order to show that he wouldn’t be “pushed around” by President John Kennedy? Since Canada had a bilateral defence alliance with the United States for the defence of the North American continent, Diefenbaker’s inaction left an enormous gap in continental defence.
There is nothing “moral” about Canadian anti-Americanism. And nothing logical either. I have always found it humorous how Canadians look down at Americans for loving themselves “too much”, but how they simultaneously swell with a distorted form of patriotic pride at being unlike and better than Americans. Canadian nationalists also always pride themselves on their politically-correct tolerance and "multi-culturalism" while engaging in anti-Americanism -- a disposition, as sociologist Paul Hollander has demonstrated, that is directly related with racism, sexism, and anti-Semitism.
In Canada, of course, it has always been legitimate to be a bigot, as long as it involves hating Americans.
Kingwell refers to how little Americans know about us. He explains that “American ignorance is a staple of our richly ironic strain of humour.” Really? I never found anything slightly “rich” in this humour at all. Growing up in Canada, I was always greatly entertained by the endless and smug complaining about how "stupid" Americans are because of their ignorance about Canada. Let’s be serious: why would Americans in Los Angeles and New York City need to know anything about Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, or about anything else Canadian?
Kingwell ends his essay by saying that Canadians sometimes wish the U.S. “had a little more of what makes us great.” Uh, sorry, but a little bit more of what exactly? Perhaps, instead, it would be wiser for us to focus on giving up on clinging to the ingredients of our “moral courage”, which includes the joke of bilingualism – English Canada’s last pretence of possessing any unique characteristics whatsoever. Let’s admit it, without bilingualism, English Canadians would no longer be able to say, "We’re not like those Americans," without someone else rejoining: "Oh? And how is that?" And there will be no answer, because there will be nothing to say.
If we just manage to get over our little brother complex, then maybe we will also one day no longer have to victimize ourselves with those torturous and emotionally-excruciating conversations about Margaret Atwood and Pierre Berton, in which so many Canadians attempt to show their un-American stripes by discussing novels that no human being outside of Canada has ever heard of, nor would ever read under sane circumstances. And we would also be liberated from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, an entity that it takes masochism to tune into, and that wouldn’t survive five minutes if its life depended on the tastes and desires of Canadians themselves.
Indeed, if we purged ourselves of Kingwell’s mark of "moral courage", Canada’s celebration of mediocrity and, more importantly, its exoneration of evil regimes and mass murderers around the world, would finally come to its long-awaited conclusion.
Don't worry. You already have.
prove it.
What! Give information to a Liberal Canute? Better to kiss a cane toad.
Quit running around looking for quotes from crackpots.
I could get the same kind of crap from crackpots stateside
who have it in for the U.S. Remember guys like mcveigh,
muslim terrorists living in michigan and illinois etc. etc.
Canada is not a threat to the united states and it never
was. Canada should be grateful it has the United States
situated next to it and the U.S should be grateful it
has Canada situated next to it.
For every "so often Canadian" speal you come up with I can easily substitute the words with "so often American".
Oh yea in case you forgot Canada has more land mass than
the United States but a population less than the state of
California. I think that should put things into perspective
for you. Canada is basically just like another american
state hanging off the mother country. Think of it as a
huge backyard with inexhaustable natural resources.If you want to rag on someone pick the mexicans, aussies or brits. Last time I checked none of them had much to offer
the U.S (unlike canadian oil and gas for example) other
than illegal immigration, the croc hunter and princess
diana (for all your fluffy tabloids) in that order.
This stuff doesn't outrage the typical white english speaking canadian. BTW....fast becoming a minority. It only makes them laugh and head to the fridge
for another beer.
Nuff Said.
I think you'll have to do a lot better than that. Read any Canadian rag and the anti-American venom that readers spew out and its not hard to see why people would question which side Canadians are on - or at least those who elected the current regime are on. Regime change would probably do wonders for Canada's image - both on the North American continent and abroad.
i think FReeper like you are common on FR, which is very sad.
Face it, you and many others here hate canadians with a passion no matter what. I thought conservatives are suppose to be better than liberals.
Your hatred for canadians and painting us with the same brush is pretty sad.
By and large, that is a fair (and balanced) characterization of Canada.. ;)
Who are you calling a Liberal Commie. Any country stupid enough to import a plague of toxic toads needs a reality check before assuming only a Liberal Commie can sniff out a bullshitter.
often harbor a resentment of the United States and do feel morally superior.
Yeah I get your drift, sort of how the Americans view Mexico and Mexico the Guatamalins..., it must be a north/south viewing thing. I wonder how that works in the southern hemispere... I guess the Southerners look down thier noses at the Northerners down there.
Not the same thing at all. First off, Americans don't feel morally superior to Mexicans, none that I know of anyway. For the most part, we just don't want to live in Mexico or turn America into Mexico. We're sorry for them, but wrecking America (more) is not the solution.
Canada can have all the the Mexicans it wants to admit, I'm sure. Liberal Canadians seem to think wrecking Canada is the solution.
You may find this hard to believe, but many Americans are not nearly so much in awe of the moral stature of Canada as many Canadian are. To us, Canadians are like ordinary White people, only more boring.
Have you ever watched Bill O'reilly on fox?
I watch him enough..you know the O'reilly factor?
Check out all the great things he has to say about
american newspapers....you might be surprised what you
hear. He is very critical of the american press.
You've got enough problems of your own on your side of
the fence without looking north of the border.
I admit the CBC is sickening, they have such a holier than
thou attitude and agenda that they would not survive if
they were not funded by the federal gov't.
Don't be so sure about a regime change doing anything.
The root of the problem in canada (as I said a canadian
problem not an american one) is the french factor and
the liberal gov't mantra of letting "minorities rule
the roost in Canada". This has been a problem since Trudeau
and it does get worse every year. Until you have a leader
from the west who can't speak both languages I would not
expect much to change.
Once again none of this should concern you or any other
american. You have much more serious problems to deal
with in your own country.
Start your education here.
I think O'Reilly said that 80% of the US press is against the war in Iraq. I have watched him and I am aware of problems with the press both in the US and Australia. Here the ABC is probably not much better than the CBC when it comes to leftwing bias. I f you want a quality Australian newspaper look to 'The Australian'. As to what you have said about Pierre Trudeau and his influence on Canadian politics, I have no argument with that. What offends me are some of the extremist, anti-Western, anti-US and its allies, views that are coming out of Canada. Such outburts appease the extremists and put innocent lives at risk. Families being sent home in body bags because some suicide bomber has decided to go to the same restaurant is not a pretty site. In our part of the world, we recently had a case of innocent school girls being aprehended on their way to school and then beheaded. How must one feel when a Canadian Liberal has the audacity to say to you that your country is wrong because it is on the side of the US in the war against terrorism. All the present Canadian Prime Minister does is say that he is for peace and against terrorism while his constituents carry on with the very propaganda that appeases terrorists. Words are cheap.
Oh dear! I hope Roy and HG never go to Canada.
At least you can exterminate cane toads and not be accused of interfering with multiculturalism.
I wonder how much Canada will have to offer the US if solar energy becomes the go. How many invitations has Paul Martin had to GW's ranch in Texas.
There would be no love loss between the Atlantic provinces and Ont/Que.
Is jealousy a sickness.?...
Liberalism is a sickness of envy.. maybe thats the problem..
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