Great piece... unless you are talking hockey. Then it's on. You want to describe a Canadian to anyone? Take them to a Game 7. THAT is Canada. We will do ANYTHING (homicide is considered a 2 minute minor in overtime) to help our team. Until it is over, then what happens? Everyone lines up and shakes hands. The conversations between guys (and girls now) that would have bloodied each other 35 seconds before... are genuine. Congratulations and condolences offered and accepted with grace. THAT RIGHT THERE is Canada.
If only Canadians gave 1/10th as much of a shit about... our standard of living, democracy, security, international standing, economy, law and order, incentive structure, medical care, institutional capacity, government corruption, or physical infrastructure... as we do about a game where literally nothing matters on the outcome, then maybe we would be in a better place than we are now.
KRM you have described our national values superbly . However National Canadian values set a collective baseline but personal values determine how individual Canadians embody or challenge those ideals. Individuals interpret and prioritize values differently. Some emphasize family and community over national ideals. Others may prioritize financial success, religious beliefs, or individual freedom. Personal experiences like immigration, indigenous heritage, rural vs urban life etc may shape how values are lived every day. In short, Canadian values are both personal and national and sometimes a tug of war between the individual and the collective and between government and citizens. Many politicians in the last number of years have prioritized their personal reelection over upholding and fighting for the National values that you so eloquently mentioned.
I've had a path very similar to the author, except that I come from France instead of the US and haven't renounced my French citizenship (hedging my bets).
Granted I've only lived in the GTA, so I have a bit less of an overview of other provinces (though I visited a handful).
My sense is that Canadians, as noted elsewhere, a way more prone to define themselves in opposition to Americans, than being able and willing to clearly lay-out a very uniquely Canadian identity.
The most prominent traits I've noticed in Canadian is a lack of directness (hiding being the proverbial politeness) and a tendency to criticize people behind their backs. Also, it is a very risk-averse culture.
The above two traits personally bother me: French people are incredibly direct, although less bombastic and in your face than Americans and also much less risk-averse, and I certainly see myself reflected in those qualities.
But after 20 years of living here, I can't say that I've noticed a uniquely Canadian identity and perhaps that is a function of living in the GTA, where the proportion of immigrants is higher and therefore the "Canadian Identity" tends to be a little diluted, and the things that are considered uniquely Canadian (hockey, etc.) do not interest me.
I think Canada is better understood as a cultural offshoot of the Brits, when it comes to cultural and character traits, rather than in opposition to Americans. It's a culture that quietly gets things done, reliable and trustworthy, but that doesn't like to make waves (or at least used to until recently), unlike the US and to a lesser extend France, who love to promote their own brand of exceptionalism.
But I can't help but feel that this has been seriously eroded in recent years, in part because of the Trudeau-era hammering of the slogan that "Canada is a post-national state". Even in a short 20 years of being here, I have noticed a marked difference.
Maybe that's why some of us feel a bit orphaned these days, longing for a Canada that is slipping away.
I've never not felt welcome in the west. In fact, if it were solely up to me, I'd be living in Calgary already. I feel much closer to it than the GTA, mainly because I grew up in the mountains and they're sorely missed here in Southern Ontario.
AM, I live in Calgary - have all my life - but I have spent a noticeable amount of time in The Big Smoke (a reference to Toronto by columnist Alan Fotheringham many, many years ago). I think that you are quite correct in seeing the very large immigrant proportion of the GTA as masking what is rather obvious to many of we outside of that environment.
Oh, and I agree with NotoriousSceptic that you are certainly welcome here in the West.
I never lived in QC, but I have been to Quebec many, many times and have relatives there so yes, I have.
And while they're lovely people they tend to be a little deluded about their place within the country and the larger world.
I've had more than once arguments about the "purity" of their language, and when I inevitably point out that Quebecois French is really "Franglais" with many english words customarily used, even when a perfectly serviceable French word exists, and they insist that they don't, it points out to either disingenuousness or downright ignorance.
I think Canadians are inside the bubble of their values, so we can't see them. Thanks for clearly laying out Canadian values, although it is funny that someone from the USA has to explain it.
This piece reads like a maple flavoured Hallmark card, and it accidentally proves the very point it wants to deny. The traits listed here, civility, non partisanship, deference to authority, collaboration over competition, are not values. They are manners. They are behavioural preferences. They are the thin procedural habits of a society that long ago shed any shared account of what a good life is and replaced it with norms that keep people from upsetting one another. A value is a claim about what humans ought to be. None of this comes close.
The language learning example makes the problem obvious. Neighbours encouraging an anglophone’s French is kindness. It is friendliness. It is hospitality. But hospitality is not a national creed. It does not tell you anything about the ends a society pursues or the virtues it tries to cultivate. Treating bilingualism as a core “value” is equally confused. It is a policy instrument, a credentialing pathway, and a symbolic gesture toward unity. It is not a moral conviction. No one learns a second language because they believe it completes their character. They do it because the system rewards it.
The same applies to Grey Cup camaraderie and the whole catalogue of polite, friction-free interactions. These are atmospheres, not principles. They reveal a society that is very good at reducing tension and very poor at articulating purpose. You cannot extract a moral identity from friendliness at a football party or from the fact that Canadians dislike loud political conflict. That is not a value. That is a temperament. It is the social equivalent of keeping the volume low so no one has to raise their voice.
The quiet pride in treating elections as an annoyance, in whispering about neighbours who care too much about politics, in applauding imperfect French simply because it avoids embarrassment, all expresses a deeper truth. This is a culture trained to avoid the very things values require. Values demand argument. They demand boundaries. They demand serious commitment. A society that treats disagreement as rudeness and ambition as threat has no room left for actual conviction. It has norms of comfort, not principles of character. That is the difference between a moral tradition and a mood.
So the problem is not that his experiences are wrong. The problem is that nothing he lists answers the only question that matters. What kind of person does Canada believe its citizens should become. If the answer is simply polite, quiet, cooperative, and non demanding, then we have described a behavioural style, not a national ethos. Until Canada can name something deeper than comfort and procedure, it will keep confusing the absence of conflict with the presence of meaning.
This should be further developed and run as a flipping the line piece. Wholeheartedly agree.
Disagreements and combativeness for what is right is what moves a people forwards, because it forces us to negotiate and compromise, and I mean this in the best of ways.
So very well said. Unquestioning compliance, aversion to conflict, discomfort or risk, and deference to authority are NOT values but behaviours, and not good ones when they become dominant.
Fantasic article. Another of the many reasons I subscribe to The Line is Flipping The Line.
To support the author, we raised four kids in a town of 3500 people in SW Alberta, and all four went through our tiny public (Catholic) school's modest French Immersion program (Kindergarten to Grade 8). By the way, we are not Catholic, and we chose the school because of the FI program. That's right, this is in 'redneck' Southern Alberta.
All four of our kids (now adults) are at least functionally bilingual, and two of them spent 3 months in their teens on separate exchanges in rural France, where they attended French schools and lived with unilingual French families (who also reciprocally sent their own kids to live with our family for 3 months to give them the chance to learn English and experience Canadian living).
The upshot, and source of pride for our small town's French Immersion teachers? Both of our kids adjusted quickly to speaking French at home and school while on their exchange trips, and in fact were complimented regularly by their teachers and fellow students on their fluency. Both of our kids ended up dreaming in French by the end of our trip.
Just in case some readers think our family has a French background, I'll dispell that notion - I am a third generation unilingual English speaker, and my wife is similarly unilingual from Dutch immigrant parents. We put our kids in FI to give them a chance to experience another language and taste a different cultural experience through that ability to function in that language. We would have enrolled them in Spanish or another language if that had been offered.
Again, bravo to The Line and the author for this excellent Line Flip!
It's probably not surprising that it takes a (former) foreigner to define Canadian values more clearly than Canadian-born people -- after all, you deliberately chose this country rather than those who grew up here (I guess an analogy might be religious converts), and you even adopted the British spelling of "mum".
But I was struck how many of the values articulated were defined in opposition to the US -- I grew up believing in a certain smugness about how Canadians were not like those gun-loving rugged individualists down south. This article didn't have the smugness, just sincere admiration, but it still defined Canadians as how we are not like Americans, rather than a statement of values (many of which we might share with them!). Maybe that's unavoidable for a country with such a shared culture with a large neighbour though.
I compared with the US because that 1. That was the context of the podcast and 2. It's the culture I grew up in, but I tried to define it as a comparison rather than a simplistic not the US. I agree that there are a lot of shared "Western Values."
Matt, I live in Calgary and I can tell you that we have many, many individualists in this area. Gun toting, not so much - different laws, right? But, I will tell you that many, many folks hereabouts (rural vernacular adequate for you?) understand that guns are tools to accomplish particular tasks [no, not killing, you fools].
My point is that many folks in Canada are, oh, shall we say, somewhat collectivists whereas, yes, we do have a lot of individualists as well.
As for your assertion that the column defined Canadians as not being Americans, I do not agree with you. Mr. Friedman grew up in America so he noted differences when he arrived (and since, I suppose) but the same would be true for someone who came from, say, France or Germany or China. You have a set of notions with which you grew up and when you arrive you see differences. That does not mean the differences arise solely because they are not your former home. It means that the differences are different for our own Canadian reasons.
So, yes, we are not America but we are also not China, not Egypt, not France, not Scotland, etc. If a Scotsman came and noted the differences here as compared to where he was born we would not decry our "lack of culture" as being defined solely by reference to Scotland. We are simply different than "wherever" because we are not "wherever" we are "here."
I admire the author's patriotism, and the fact he has lived and worked in multiple provinces, made the effort to learn French, enjoys the CFL and most of all, dropped his US citizenship to commit completely to his new home (and also not file US tax returns, presumably). He represents a small minority and should be cloned.
The majority of students who attend French immersion do not qualify for a DELF, let alone a Certificat de l'Office de la Langue Francaise. Being conversant in many languages is the norm in Europe. Most people reading this aren't. Our PM isn't, the poster-boy for the two solitudes.
I can only assume he did not line up for a bus, in winter, in East Montreal. Civility is cultural, a remnant of a Canada past, and not a constant in the post-nation state. Furthermore, politeness is a form of hostility, as perfected by the Brits. Do not be fooled by the smiles.
Our politics are, unfortunately, increasingly partisan. The collision of ideologies produces a train wreck, and that is where we are.
To me most of the “Canada has no values” discussion is a reaction to the Trudeau era explicit characterization of Canadian history as settler-colonial genocide.
Even the author is guilty of it here to some extent. The values listed are pretty weak. What about “hacking civilization out of a bleak northern climate”? For most of Canadian history that would be a core value and distinguishing cultural element. But we can’t celebrate that one anymore, because it’s dismissive of the cultures that were here before.
(I think it can be modified, personally — early settling of Canada was as much a partnership between Indigenous and settlers as it was a conquering, and both cultures can share and celebrate the “overcoming northern climate adversity” value. But this is an explicit rejection of oppressor/oppressed dichotomies so it’s out of fashion in academia, for now.)
Thank you Jason for a well written and heartfelt piece. I have attended a swearing in ceremony and you're right, it was very moving to see the joy on the faces of those about to become Canadians. As a native born Canadian your article made me feel good!
Thank you for that perspective Jason. The Justin Trudeau years have done immense damage to the Canadian psyche. Tearing down our traditional values and symbols, telling us our heritage was genocidal and racist, replacing Terry Fox and Vimy Ridge with squirrels, nuts and other meaningless trash. His drive towards some sort of "post-national", gender neutral, valueless national history that we should turn away in shame is something that needs to be completely thrown out - with a vengeance. We're better than that. We're better than all the Trudeau crap. Maybe we can unite around some of the values that Jason elucidates, or around facing a common enemy who wants to make us disappear in much the same way as Trudeau did. Hopefully we can find the leadership to make that happen.
Alirght, I'll bite on this... Have you been to Alberta? Which of these values listed do you think Albertans don't have compared to the rest of the country?
Bilingualism is seen as a nice to have in Alberta, but it isn't seen as crucial to the country. Civility isn't present in the politics. The province is very polarized and Albertans care less about harmony. It's more of a "my happiness is more important than yours" kind of place.
Well, Joanne, that would be "a few million people" out of a population of five million here so that is pretty significant.
As for me, I don't agree that "Civility isn't present in the politics" here any more than in other places in this country, now. I expect that pretty much most provinces have the "ins" who are resented by the "outs" and the "ins" typically warn their base about those evil "outs." Pretty universal I think.
I hate to break it to you, but you aren't a Canadian. You are a Canadian citizen and a model immigrant. And you are from a very similar culture, so you can easily fit in and pass. Kudos to you. But people coming here now as adults are and always will be people of the culture they came from.
Wow, I hate this. We’re a nation of immigrants and immigrants are Canadians. I will stay civil, but in my opinion this “you’re not Canadian unless born here” is an absolutely awful view.
What's the alternative? You could say "after 30 years" and we could discuss it, even if I would disagree. But "Canadian" = ”Canadian citizen" is absurd and mere cant. If you believe that, then you believe:
- there was no such thing as a Canadian until 1947
- if the US annexed Canada then, immediately, nobody would be Canadian
- if the Liberals extended citizenship to everyone in the world, then everyone in the world would be Canadian.
In fact, literally every Canadian (by any definition) has a much richer and much narrower definition of "Canadian" in their heads than simple paperwork. It's just that, being Canadian, we don't like to talk about it.
These kinds of glib, black or white statements are utterly retarded.
Everybody is different and finding ways to fit in in their own way. The idea that you can even measure what makes one more or less Canadian makes no sense and by your definition, I'm pretty sure the author would be more Canadian than most.
I do think that there is a degree of conforming to one's country of choice and its customs that is required for immigration to be a positive force. But is Patel the family physician with with a thriving business and desire to blend in any less Canadian because of his thick accent and different religious beliefs?
That is a perfect example. In the US, Patel would be an American as soon as he got his citizenship. And in Canada, he is a Canadian - in my eyes at least. But here in the Ottawa Quebec frontier area, IMO 90% would disagree.
To paraphrase Ronnie Reagan “you can move to France but you will not be a Frenchman. you can move to Greece but you will not be a Greek. But anyone in the world can move to the USA and be an American.” At one time the same could be said of Canada even if it took a generation. But that ended when Trudeau the Greater replaced the melting pot with the tossed salad model of Canadianhood
His pronounced accent and different religious beliefs are markers of the fact that he brings to a different, ie not Canadian, culture. Of course he isn't Canadian.
As for "glib" and "black and white", literally no definition is more so than the claim that "Canadian" is identical to "Canadian citizen". The fact that that claim is trivially easy to refute is what makes it cant.
For those in the back: what makes Patel more Canadian than many born and bred is his desire to fit it and make a go of a life here. Who cares if he worships Krishna or speaks funny?
It's an entirely different case from the TFW who comes here to work at Tims and get lots of free stuff. But then again, in that case, who is to blame? The third-world guy who's taking advantage of what's being offered? Or should it be the government that allowed this kind of unvetted immigration to happen?
Groypers love to put all immigrants in the same basket, but I got news for you: we're not all made equal, some of us want a normal, productive life and give back to our communities and I'd argue that we're likely the majority. Yes there are abusers of the system, that doesn't mean you should paint everybody with the same brush.
Hi might be a model immigrant whom we are happy to have here. My wife is such a person, and I'm not the only one happy to have her here. But neither she nor your hypothetical Mr Patel are Canadians. I'm not talking about "ought": only "is".
If you expect people not to make any distinction between cultural belonging and legal citizenship, expect them to start wanting to close the doors on legal citizenship. The historical bargain on immigration had always been (pre-Trudeau sr) that the native-born get to preserve what they value about the culture and people who *chose* to come join it do their best to fit in but understand only their children will totally belong. Reversing that might have worked with smaller numbers of foreign-born, but keeping that attitude with 30% of population immigrants requires a sort of untenable belief in the universality of the things that makes Canada great (and people arrogantly believing what they think is basic decency is a cultural universal rather than an aspect of culture).
If the cultures of places people are trying to leave from are supposed to be placed on even footing with the pre-existing culture (or people are forced to pretend to truly believe the polite lie people radically change their attitudes in adulthood), people will just say no thanks.
in my experience, that is much more an American trait, to go along to get along, as opposed to confronting ... anything. there are many examples.
As mentioned earlier I, and many of my Canadian peers, were coached to "go along to get along" in an American company, rather than confront "shocking" realities. They preferred to kick them down the road.
I came here as a twenty-four year old, almost fifty years ago. I am more proudly Canadian than I ever was a citizen of my birthplace. I served our country in uniform and on two UN missions overseas. For you to diminish my Canadian identity is disgraceful.
No, any more than I am asking Britannicus to prove his assertions. Let's take it as read that my parents were born in Canada, as were 3 of my grandparents. And I'm saying that Canadian identity is different from citizenship paperwork.
He's a mere upstart if he wants to play that kind of game. The most recent new Canadian in my family was my great-great-grandfather, a Presbyterian minister who came from Scotland to settle and do missionary work in Ontario. The older part of the family include Empire Loyalists who were driven out of New York State after the American Revolution.
Would it also be "disgraceful" to acknowledge that someone adopted as a 24 year-old doesn't have the same relationship to their adoptive parents as people do to families they were raised by? People reject for culture what they'd readily accept for personal relationships (i.e., that the formative years are different), and to do that, what constitutes cultural belonging has to be made shallower.
They don't do that for all cultures. Few would claim that a Canadian who moved to Japan in his twenties could ever actually be Japanese. It's only certain cultures (and nations) whose existence is denied.
So…. devil’s advocate here: what does “I’m from Canada” mean? Is there an approximate age cut-off? Are there certain cultural benchmarks? I think many who are “from Canada” by your definition would want to know what it means to fit in easily and pass.
Was the British identity changed by Churchill, or born of his words? Was Neville Chamberlain the right avatar for the British character?
What is missed, and especially by Ross Douthat, is the fact that a country without a leader who understands it, can articulate it, marshal it's power, is not, de facto, a country without a culture, a distinct character. Such leaders seem to be very rare.
In addition, America's studied, seeming deliberate , ignorance of Canada (any country not America, lol) is established, and makes any writer with American bias less likely to be a useful or objective observer.
It's time to examine American stereotypes, almost "tics", regarding the Canadian character. We could start with the caricature of "politeness."
Three counterpoints to consider:
First, when I and many of my Canadian peers were raised to senior leadership in a huge American partnership, many of us were coached to be less direct (what we thought was being clear.) We were too upsetting for the strategy discussion and needed to introduce less "shocking" ideas for change, in less "shocking" ways.
Second, did anyone hear the words of the US coach of the Canadian national soccer team when that orange McDonald's garbage can started talking about the 51st state? Its worth a listen; he thinks we're an aggressive people, not polite.
We conducted millions of customer surveys on both sides of the border and a curious stat appears every time: Canadians mark products and services with lower scores by roughly 20% across the board. We have higher standards for both products and execution, and we're not shy about it.
I think measuring our leaders by whether they can understand, articulate, and marshal the power of our national cultural strengths is good. More pressure to do better at that is very, very necessary. But they don't own it, make it, or create it. They may be able to influence it, but only a bit. To find it one must look elsewhere.
Here's maybe a clue:
Many times I was dismayed by the American orientation to, worship of, and inevitable backlash about designated "heroes." They seem to need them, or don't know how to manage without them. It's pervasive, cyclical, destructive, wasteful, and a nightmare for the chosen, whether they were complicit or not. We don't really do that here.
One is oriented internally, the other is external. One is about the self, the other is about the system we need. One aligns with hero worship, the other is about results.
There's a lot of marketing effort about the super-duperness of the US constitution but one could easily measure it as inferior to many, many others.
One is the constitution of a 2nd world theocracy, and the other is not.
Great piece... unless you are talking hockey. Then it's on. You want to describe a Canadian to anyone? Take them to a Game 7. THAT is Canada. We will do ANYTHING (homicide is considered a 2 minute minor in overtime) to help our team. Until it is over, then what happens? Everyone lines up and shakes hands. The conversations between guys (and girls now) that would have bloodied each other 35 seconds before... are genuine. Congratulations and condolences offered and accepted with grace. THAT RIGHT THERE is Canada.
If only Canadians gave 1/10th as much of a shit about... our standard of living, democracy, security, international standing, economy, law and order, incentive structure, medical care, institutional capacity, government corruption, or physical infrastructure... as we do about a game where literally nothing matters on the outcome, then maybe we would be in a better place than we are now.
We sure love those bread and circuses though.
KRM you have described our national values superbly . However National Canadian values set a collective baseline but personal values determine how individual Canadians embody or challenge those ideals. Individuals interpret and prioritize values differently. Some emphasize family and community over national ideals. Others may prioritize financial success, religious beliefs, or individual freedom. Personal experiences like immigration, indigenous heritage, rural vs urban life etc may shape how values are lived every day. In short, Canadian values are both personal and national and sometimes a tug of war between the individual and the collective and between government and citizens. Many politicians in the last number of years have prioritized their personal reelection over upholding and fighting for the National values that you so eloquently mentioned.
The Game 7 analogy is bang on
I've had a path very similar to the author, except that I come from France instead of the US and haven't renounced my French citizenship (hedging my bets).
Granted I've only lived in the GTA, so I have a bit less of an overview of other provinces (though I visited a handful).
My sense is that Canadians, as noted elsewhere, a way more prone to define themselves in opposition to Americans, than being able and willing to clearly lay-out a very uniquely Canadian identity.
The most prominent traits I've noticed in Canadian is a lack of directness (hiding being the proverbial politeness) and a tendency to criticize people behind their backs. Also, it is a very risk-averse culture.
The above two traits personally bother me: French people are incredibly direct, although less bombastic and in your face than Americans and also much less risk-averse, and I certainly see myself reflected in those qualities.
But after 20 years of living here, I can't say that I've noticed a uniquely Canadian identity and perhaps that is a function of living in the GTA, where the proportion of immigrants is higher and therefore the "Canadian Identity" tends to be a little diluted, and the things that are considered uniquely Canadian (hockey, etc.) do not interest me.
I think Canada is better understood as a cultural offshoot of the Brits, when it comes to cultural and character traits, rather than in opposition to Americans. It's a culture that quietly gets things done, reliable and trustworthy, but that doesn't like to make waves (or at least used to until recently), unlike the US and to a lesser extend France, who love to promote their own brand of exceptionalism.
But I can't help but feel that this has been seriously eroded in recent years, in part because of the Trudeau-era hammering of the slogan that "Canada is a post-national state". Even in a short 20 years of being here, I have noticed a marked difference.
Maybe that's why some of us feel a bit orphaned these days, longing for a Canada that is slipping away.
People like you with your clarity of thinking are welcome to western Canada, at least by me.
I've never not felt welcome in the west. In fact, if it were solely up to me, I'd be living in Calgary already. I feel much closer to it than the GTA, mainly because I grew up in the mountains and they're sorely missed here in Southern Ontario.
AM, I live in Calgary - have all my life - but I have spent a noticeable amount of time in The Big Smoke (a reference to Toronto by columnist Alan Fotheringham many, many years ago). I think that you are quite correct in seeing the very large immigrant proportion of the GTA as masking what is rather obvious to many of we outside of that environment.
Oh, and I agree with NotoriousSceptic that you are certainly welcome here in the West.
Just wondering if you’ve had much interaction with Canada’s primarily French-speaking population?
I never lived in QC, but I have been to Quebec many, many times and have relatives there so yes, I have.
And while they're lovely people they tend to be a little deluded about their place within the country and the larger world.
I've had more than once arguments about the "purity" of their language, and when I inevitably point out that Quebecois French is really "Franglais" with many english words customarily used, even when a perfectly serviceable French word exists, and they insist that they don't, it points out to either disingenuousness or downright ignorance.
I think Canadians are inside the bubble of their values, so we can't see them. Thanks for clearly laying out Canadian values, although it is funny that someone from the USA has to explain it.
John, also living in the correct city.
This piece reads like a maple flavoured Hallmark card, and it accidentally proves the very point it wants to deny. The traits listed here, civility, non partisanship, deference to authority, collaboration over competition, are not values. They are manners. They are behavioural preferences. They are the thin procedural habits of a society that long ago shed any shared account of what a good life is and replaced it with norms that keep people from upsetting one another. A value is a claim about what humans ought to be. None of this comes close.
The language learning example makes the problem obvious. Neighbours encouraging an anglophone’s French is kindness. It is friendliness. It is hospitality. But hospitality is not a national creed. It does not tell you anything about the ends a society pursues or the virtues it tries to cultivate. Treating bilingualism as a core “value” is equally confused. It is a policy instrument, a credentialing pathway, and a symbolic gesture toward unity. It is not a moral conviction. No one learns a second language because they believe it completes their character. They do it because the system rewards it.
The same applies to Grey Cup camaraderie and the whole catalogue of polite, friction-free interactions. These are atmospheres, not principles. They reveal a society that is very good at reducing tension and very poor at articulating purpose. You cannot extract a moral identity from friendliness at a football party or from the fact that Canadians dislike loud political conflict. That is not a value. That is a temperament. It is the social equivalent of keeping the volume low so no one has to raise their voice.
The quiet pride in treating elections as an annoyance, in whispering about neighbours who care too much about politics, in applauding imperfect French simply because it avoids embarrassment, all expresses a deeper truth. This is a culture trained to avoid the very things values require. Values demand argument. They demand boundaries. They demand serious commitment. A society that treats disagreement as rudeness and ambition as threat has no room left for actual conviction. It has norms of comfort, not principles of character. That is the difference between a moral tradition and a mood.
So the problem is not that his experiences are wrong. The problem is that nothing he lists answers the only question that matters. What kind of person does Canada believe its citizens should become. If the answer is simply polite, quiet, cooperative, and non demanding, then we have described a behavioural style, not a national ethos. Until Canada can name something deeper than comfort and procedure, it will keep confusing the absence of conflict with the presence of meaning.
This should be further developed and run as a flipping the line piece. Wholeheartedly agree.
Disagreements and combativeness for what is right is what moves a people forwards, because it forces us to negotiate and compromise, and I mean this in the best of ways.
So very well said. Unquestioning compliance, aversion to conflict, discomfort or risk, and deference to authority are NOT values but behaviours, and not good ones when they become dominant.
Fantasic article. Another of the many reasons I subscribe to The Line is Flipping The Line.
To support the author, we raised four kids in a town of 3500 people in SW Alberta, and all four went through our tiny public (Catholic) school's modest French Immersion program (Kindergarten to Grade 8). By the way, we are not Catholic, and we chose the school because of the FI program. That's right, this is in 'redneck' Southern Alberta.
All four of our kids (now adults) are at least functionally bilingual, and two of them spent 3 months in their teens on separate exchanges in rural France, where they attended French schools and lived with unilingual French families (who also reciprocally sent their own kids to live with our family for 3 months to give them the chance to learn English and experience Canadian living).
The upshot, and source of pride for our small town's French Immersion teachers? Both of our kids adjusted quickly to speaking French at home and school while on their exchange trips, and in fact were complimented regularly by their teachers and fellow students on their fluency. Both of our kids ended up dreaming in French by the end of our trip.
Just in case some readers think our family has a French background, I'll dispell that notion - I am a third generation unilingual English speaker, and my wife is similarly unilingual from Dutch immigrant parents. We put our kids in FI to give them a chance to experience another language and taste a different cultural experience through that ability to function in that language. We would have enrolled them in Spanish or another language if that had been offered.
Again, bravo to The Line and the author for this excellent Line Flip!
Our 3 grandkids are in Spanish immersion in Calgary. We attend their concerts regularly.
It's probably not surprising that it takes a (former) foreigner to define Canadian values more clearly than Canadian-born people -- after all, you deliberately chose this country rather than those who grew up here (I guess an analogy might be religious converts), and you even adopted the British spelling of "mum".
But I was struck how many of the values articulated were defined in opposition to the US -- I grew up believing in a certain smugness about how Canadians were not like those gun-loving rugged individualists down south. This article didn't have the smugness, just sincere admiration, but it still defined Canadians as how we are not like Americans, rather than a statement of values (many of which we might share with them!). Maybe that's unavoidable for a country with such a shared culture with a large neighbour though.
I compared with the US because that 1. That was the context of the podcast and 2. It's the culture I grew up in, but I tried to define it as a comparison rather than a simplistic not the US. I agree that there are a lot of shared "Western Values."
Sleeping with an elephant.
Matt, I live in Calgary and I can tell you that we have many, many individualists in this area. Gun toting, not so much - different laws, right? But, I will tell you that many, many folks hereabouts (rural vernacular adequate for you?) understand that guns are tools to accomplish particular tasks [no, not killing, you fools].
My point is that many folks in Canada are, oh, shall we say, somewhat collectivists whereas, yes, we do have a lot of individualists as well.
As for your assertion that the column defined Canadians as not being Americans, I do not agree with you. Mr. Friedman grew up in America so he noted differences when he arrived (and since, I suppose) but the same would be true for someone who came from, say, France or Germany or China. You have a set of notions with which you grew up and when you arrive you see differences. That does not mean the differences arise solely because they are not your former home. It means that the differences are different for our own Canadian reasons.
So, yes, we are not America but we are also not China, not Egypt, not France, not Scotland, etc. If a Scotsman came and noted the differences here as compared to where he was born we would not decry our "lack of culture" as being defined solely by reference to Scotland. We are simply different than "wherever" because we are not "wherever" we are "here."
Spoken like a true anglophone.
Touché!
I admire the author's patriotism, and the fact he has lived and worked in multiple provinces, made the effort to learn French, enjoys the CFL and most of all, dropped his US citizenship to commit completely to his new home (and also not file US tax returns, presumably). He represents a small minority and should be cloned.
The majority of students who attend French immersion do not qualify for a DELF, let alone a Certificat de l'Office de la Langue Francaise. Being conversant in many languages is the norm in Europe. Most people reading this aren't. Our PM isn't, the poster-boy for the two solitudes.
I can only assume he did not line up for a bus, in winter, in East Montreal. Civility is cultural, a remnant of a Canada past, and not a constant in the post-nation state. Furthermore, politeness is a form of hostility, as perfected by the Brits. Do not be fooled by the smiles.
Our politics are, unfortunately, increasingly partisan. The collision of ideologies produces a train wreck, and that is where we are.
I didn't take the bus much in Montreal, but I did live in Pointe-Saint-Charles. I have a lot of experience waiting for OC Transpo though. :)
I sum up Canadian values thusly: Don't get too excited. Winter is coming.
To me most of the “Canada has no values” discussion is a reaction to the Trudeau era explicit characterization of Canadian history as settler-colonial genocide.
Even the author is guilty of it here to some extent. The values listed are pretty weak. What about “hacking civilization out of a bleak northern climate”? For most of Canadian history that would be a core value and distinguishing cultural element. But we can’t celebrate that one anymore, because it’s dismissive of the cultures that were here before.
(I think it can be modified, personally — early settling of Canada was as much a partnership between Indigenous and settlers as it was a conquering, and both cultures can share and celebrate the “overcoming northern climate adversity” value. But this is an explicit rejection of oppressor/oppressed dichotomies so it’s out of fashion in academia, for now.)
Thank you Jason for a well written and heartfelt piece. I have attended a swearing in ceremony and you're right, it was very moving to see the joy on the faces of those about to become Canadians. As a native born Canadian your article made me feel good!
Thank you for that perspective Jason. The Justin Trudeau years have done immense damage to the Canadian psyche. Tearing down our traditional values and symbols, telling us our heritage was genocidal and racist, replacing Terry Fox and Vimy Ridge with squirrels, nuts and other meaningless trash. His drive towards some sort of "post-national", gender neutral, valueless national history that we should turn away in shame is something that needs to be completely thrown out - with a vengeance. We're better than that. We're better than all the Trudeau crap. Maybe we can unite around some of the values that Jason elucidates, or around facing a common enemy who wants to make us disappear in much the same way as Trudeau did. Hopefully we can find the leadership to make that happen.
Beautiful article Jason. Made me feel good.
It's not that Canada doesn't have values, it's that those values aren't national.
Albertans for instance wouldn't recognize most of the authors points about what makes up Canadian values.
Perhaps that is why Alberta seems to be moving slowly but surely away culturally from the rest of Canada?
As an Albertan I wonder what exactly you mean by moving away "culturally"? Which points wouldn't I recognize?
Alirght, I'll bite on this... Have you been to Alberta? Which of these values listed do you think Albertans don't have compared to the rest of the country?
Bilingualism is seen as a nice to have in Alberta, but it isn't seen as crucial to the country. Civility isn't present in the politics. The province is very polarized and Albertans care less about harmony. It's more of a "my happiness is more important than yours" kind of place.
That is an extreme generalization to apply to a few million people.
The column referenced trafficked in generalizations. "Canadians are polite" is a gross generalization.
Well, Joanne, that would be "a few million people" out of a population of five million here so that is pretty significant.
As for me, I don't agree that "Civility isn't present in the politics" here any more than in other places in this country, now. I expect that pretty much most provinces have the "ins" who are resented by the "outs" and the "ins" typically warn their base about those evil "outs." Pretty universal I think.
I hate to break it to you, but you aren't a Canadian. You are a Canadian citizen and a model immigrant. And you are from a very similar culture, so you can easily fit in and pass. Kudos to you. But people coming here now as adults are and always will be people of the culture they came from.
Wow, I hate this. We’re a nation of immigrants and immigrants are Canadians. I will stay civil, but in my opinion this “you’re not Canadian unless born here” is an absolutely awful view.
What's the alternative? You could say "after 30 years" and we could discuss it, even if I would disagree. But "Canadian" = ”Canadian citizen" is absurd and mere cant. If you believe that, then you believe:
- there was no such thing as a Canadian until 1947
- if the US annexed Canada then, immediately, nobody would be Canadian
- if the Liberals extended citizenship to everyone in the world, then everyone in the world would be Canadian.
In fact, literally every Canadian (by any definition) has a much richer and much narrower definition of "Canadian" in their heads than simple paperwork. It's just that, being Canadian, we don't like to talk about it.
These kinds of glib, black or white statements are utterly retarded.
Everybody is different and finding ways to fit in in their own way. The idea that you can even measure what makes one more or less Canadian makes no sense and by your definition, I'm pretty sure the author would be more Canadian than most.
I do think that there is a degree of conforming to one's country of choice and its customs that is required for immigration to be a positive force. But is Patel the family physician with with a thriving business and desire to blend in any less Canadian because of his thick accent and different religious beliefs?
That is a perfect example. In the US, Patel would be an American as soon as he got his citizenship. And in Canada, he is a Canadian - in my eyes at least. But here in the Ottawa Quebec frontier area, IMO 90% would disagree.
To paraphrase Ronnie Reagan “you can move to France but you will not be a Frenchman. you can move to Greece but you will not be a Greek. But anyone in the world can move to the USA and be an American.” At one time the same could be said of Canada even if it took a generation. But that ended when Trudeau the Greater replaced the melting pot with the tossed salad model of Canadianhood
His pronounced accent and different religious beliefs are markers of the fact that he brings to a different, ie not Canadian, culture. Of course he isn't Canadian.
As for "glib" and "black and white", literally no definition is more so than the claim that "Canadian" is identical to "Canadian citizen". The fact that that claim is trivially easy to refute is what makes it cant.
You managed to entirely miss my point. Well done.
For those in the back: what makes Patel more Canadian than many born and bred is his desire to fit it and make a go of a life here. Who cares if he worships Krishna or speaks funny?
It's an entirely different case from the TFW who comes here to work at Tims and get lots of free stuff. But then again, in that case, who is to blame? The third-world guy who's taking advantage of what's being offered? Or should it be the government that allowed this kind of unvetted immigration to happen?
Groypers love to put all immigrants in the same basket, but I got news for you: we're not all made equal, some of us want a normal, productive life and give back to our communities and I'd argue that we're likely the majority. Yes there are abusers of the system, that doesn't mean you should paint everybody with the same brush.
Hi might be a model immigrant whom we are happy to have here. My wife is such a person, and I'm not the only one happy to have her here. But neither she nor your hypothetical Mr Patel are Canadians. I'm not talking about "ought": only "is".
If you expect people not to make any distinction between cultural belonging and legal citizenship, expect them to start wanting to close the doors on legal citizenship. The historical bargain on immigration had always been (pre-Trudeau sr) that the native-born get to preserve what they value about the culture and people who *chose* to come join it do their best to fit in but understand only their children will totally belong. Reversing that might have worked with smaller numbers of foreign-born, but keeping that attitude with 30% of population immigrants requires a sort of untenable belief in the universality of the things that makes Canada great (and people arrogantly believing what they think is basic decency is a cultural universal rather than an aspect of culture).
If the cultures of places people are trying to leave from are supposed to be placed on even footing with the pre-existing culture (or people are forced to pretend to truly believe the polite lie people radically change their attitudes in adulthood), people will just say no thanks.
Completely agree. And, of course, pretending to believe a polite lie is one of the things Canadians are best at.
in my experience, that is much more an American trait, to go along to get along, as opposed to confronting ... anything. there are many examples.
As mentioned earlier I, and many of my Canadian peers, were coached to "go along to get along" in an American company, rather than confront "shocking" realities. They preferred to kick them down the road.
The original author would disagree with you.
I came here as a twenty-four year old, almost fifty years ago. I am more proudly Canadian than I ever was a citizen of my birthplace. I served our country in uniform and on two UN missions overseas. For you to diminish my Canadian identity is disgraceful.
Why? For you to claim that my identity is a matter of mere paperwork is, in my view, disgraceful.
You're using a pseudonym - want to retract that statement to reduce the irony?
No, any more than I am asking Britannicus to prove his assertions. Let's take it as read that my parents were born in Canada, as were 3 of my grandparents. And I'm saying that Canadian identity is different from citizenship paperwork.
So it’s just New Canadians and Real Canadians then? Sad.
He's a mere upstart if he wants to play that kind of game. The most recent new Canadian in my family was my great-great-grandfather, a Presbyterian minister who came from Scotland to settle and do missionary work in Ontario. The older part of the family include Empire Loyalists who were driven out of New York State after the American Revolution.
Would it also be "disgraceful" to acknowledge that someone adopted as a 24 year-old doesn't have the same relationship to their adoptive parents as people do to families they were raised by? People reject for culture what they'd readily accept for personal relationships (i.e., that the formative years are different), and to do that, what constitutes cultural belonging has to be made shallower.
They don't do that for all cultures. Few would claim that a Canadian who moved to Japan in his twenties could ever actually be Japanese. It's only certain cultures (and nations) whose existence is denied.
That's probably the most un-Canadian sentiment in these comments.
Unfortunately substack nesting makes it hard to know what you are referring to.
He's a Canadian.
So…. devil’s advocate here: what does “I’m from Canada” mean? Is there an approximate age cut-off? Are there certain cultural benchmarks? I think many who are “from Canada” by your definition would want to know what it means to fit in easily and pass.
The age cutoff is under ten. "Fit in" means you don't annoy Canadians. "Pass" means Canadians often think you're Canadian.
Now we’re on the same page. Unannoyably.
Because we're both Canadian.
Was the British identity changed by Churchill, or born of his words? Was Neville Chamberlain the right avatar for the British character?
What is missed, and especially by Ross Douthat, is the fact that a country without a leader who understands it, can articulate it, marshal it's power, is not, de facto, a country without a culture, a distinct character. Such leaders seem to be very rare.
In addition, America's studied, seeming deliberate , ignorance of Canada (any country not America, lol) is established, and makes any writer with American bias less likely to be a useful or objective observer.
It's time to examine American stereotypes, almost "tics", regarding the Canadian character. We could start with the caricature of "politeness."
Three counterpoints to consider:
First, when I and many of my Canadian peers were raised to senior leadership in a huge American partnership, many of us were coached to be less direct (what we thought was being clear.) We were too upsetting for the strategy discussion and needed to introduce less "shocking" ideas for change, in less "shocking" ways.
Second, did anyone hear the words of the US coach of the Canadian national soccer team when that orange McDonald's garbage can started talking about the 51st state? Its worth a listen; he thinks we're an aggressive people, not polite.
We conducted millions of customer surveys on both sides of the border and a curious stat appears every time: Canadians mark products and services with lower scores by roughly 20% across the board. We have higher standards for both products and execution, and we're not shy about it.
I think measuring our leaders by whether they can understand, articulate, and marshal the power of our national cultural strengths is good. More pressure to do better at that is very, very necessary. But they don't own it, make it, or create it. They may be able to influence it, but only a bit. To find it one must look elsewhere.
Here's maybe a clue:
Many times I was dismayed by the American orientation to, worship of, and inevitable backlash about designated "heroes." They seem to need them, or don't know how to manage without them. It's pervasive, cyclical, destructive, wasteful, and a nightmare for the chosen, whether they were complicit or not. We don't really do that here.
The American Declaration of Independence demands "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."
The British North America Act is premised on "Peace, Order, and Good Government."
That's the fundamental distinction between American and Canadian values.
👏👏👏
One is oriented internally, the other is external. One is about the self, the other is about the system we need. One aligns with hero worship, the other is about results.
There's a lot of marketing effort about the super-duperness of the US constitution but one could easily measure it as inferior to many, many others.
One is the constitution of a 2nd world theocracy, and the other is not.