The Line's Nice List: Our politics may be broken, but I still trust my fellow Canadian

The sheer remoteness of our land and the brutality of our weather forces us to trust one another.

We at The Line are, we admit, often a bit on the grumpy side. But there are wonderful, happy stories worth celebrating, and in the final week before Christmas, we’re going to make a point of lauding some of what’s good in the world right now. That’s right: this is our nice list.

Today: Jen Gerson on where she still finds cause for hope in the future.

By: Jen Gerson

When my fellow co-editor suggested that we try to mitigate some of The Line's bone-deep misanthropy with a week of "nice" columns, it surprised nobody that I struggled the most. Despite Matt Gurney's realism, and his background in history and military conflicts, he is an unreformed Star Trek nerd, and thus retains a fundamentally optimistic outlook on humanity’s future, and on the possibilities of technology to resolve our current issues. 

I don't think that's wrong. I've just always been a bit of a Star Wars nerd. I tend to see technological advance as a mere backdrop to the grand human drama. It can re-set the stage — sometimes dramatically — but we remain, always, ourselves. We are messy, tribal creatures; capable of both altruism and cooperation, and also ruthless and psychopathic competition. Further, we need all of our natures, good and evil, in order to survive and pass the torch of our own flawed condition onward. 

When technology amplifies the worst of ourselves, we run into problems. 

Like many other contributors to The Line, I think the society broadly classed as "The West" is facing a period of relative decline to be brought about by a combination of demographic, economic, and cultural realities which can no longer be avoided. That doesn't mean we're doomed or any such thing, but I am not optimistic about the medium term. I think we're going to struggle with a collective attrition to our quality of life, and that there are no easy macroeconomic fixes on the horizon. 

Parsing through The Line's comments section, I don't think this broader gloominess is widely shared. Most people seem pretty content to blame our political class for Canada's general state of stasis and complacency. Respectfully, I don't think that's correct. 

Certainly, our country — and most Western nations — are suffering from a dearth of leadership talent brought on by a host of broken political incentives that we've allowed to compound over previous decades. If you want to understand the roots of populism, the growing sense that the ruling class can't be trusted to do its job, I would suggest starting here. 

But this is not the cause of our decline. Justin Trudeau did not break Canada. The state of our political class is a symptom of a deeper malaise. Notably, it's in part the consequence of our best and brightest young people seeking more meaningful and profitable vocations outside of public service, leaving the leadership vacuum to be filled by the most venal and narcissistic.

So, yeah, I'm struggling with this assignment. 

But I don't think all is lost or terrible, either. If Canada is "broken," we don't need to look too far abroad to realize it could still be a hell of a lot worse. We're still wealthy, warm and well fed, by comparative and historical standards. We still live in a beautiful, basically functional state filled with abundant natural resources. We may be huffing the fumes of a dying golden age, but damn, what a golden age it was. There's no reason to imagine we can't coast on the fumes comfortably for another generation, or even two. 

And then I began to peruse our comments section and I ran into this by subscriber Patsi Minnes: 

"I just don’t feel the Canadian people have given up, nor have many of those elected at whatever level to office."

And I think that's also correct. Our political class may, indeed, be borked, but if I retain faith in anything, it's in Canadian people as a whole. 

We focus so much on elected leaders that we often forget that the most important subsection of any liberal-democratic society is not found on a ballot. Rather, who we are is rooted in civic society. The spontaneous order that emerges within communities and between neighbourhoods, and among people with like interests and vision; clubs and community groups and volunteer corps — these are not the by-products of democracy. It's the other way around. Civil society is what makes a healthy democracy possible. This is why civil organizations are either banned or co-opted by fascist and authoritarian states. Anything that divides loyalty from the unitary nation or party is perceived as a threat. 

A democracy, by contrast, is fundamentally pluralistic, filled with citizens who maintain numerous affiliations to family, religions, hobbies, careers and social clubs. 

I still think our civil society remains strong. 

Perhaps you disagree with me. Perhaps COVID has shaken your faith in your fellow citizen. 

I don't think that it should. 

A pandemic is uniquely corrosive to a society like ours, and the way that we dealt with it — by isolating ourselves from one another and commanding most of our citizens to stay home and do nothing — was an error. It forgot the lessons of history, that resilience can be found during the worst crisis, so long as citizens feel the common pull of necessity and sacrifice. From the Blitz to Leningrad, to what we are now seeing in Ukraine, societies often pull together and re-create a collective identity when facing peril and existential crisis. 

COVID took that away from us, and our politics and society are fraying as a result. But that does not mean such a state of disunity is permanent or irreversible. The pandemic was initially best controlled by authoritarian regimes like China. The necessity for isolation and idleness ensured that COVID found our weak collective underbelly; liberal democracies that cannot band together in times of mortal peril.

Well, there may yet be other opportunities. From famine and cold, to inflation and disruption of trade, I fear we aren't going to have any shortage of opportunities to demonstrate our collective mettle. And I think, when tested again, as we surely will be, we may yet find that our civil society, our streets, towns, and cities, may prove to be more able to organize and work together than we dare imagine. You may not agree with, or even like, your neighbour — but if a true disaster ever comes to your door, I bet you might be surprised by who turns up with hot food, cold water, a hammer, or a shovel. Because when things get really bad, humans start to understand that their true protection against privation lies not in their own vaults and bunkers, but rather in their connections to other people. This is an understanding that Canadians, I think, retain. Perhaps better than any other wealthy nation on earth. 

The sheer remoteness of our land and the brutality of our weather forces us to trust one another — to help strangers tow their cars out of snow banks, to clear each others' sidewalks, and to take the unlucky into our own homes. We all have stories like this. Of fellow citizens helping us out, as they might hope to be helped in turn. 

I have little faith in the direction of the world, or the wisdom of our leaders. But I do retain my faith in you, my fellow citizen, and in us, and in our ability to look out for one another. 

The future is going to get weird. The answers and solutions aren't going to come from prime ministers or premiers and I have stopped looking for leadership there. Instead, I would turn our attention to the best among our neighbours, family and friends. 

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The Line is Canada’s last, best hope for irreverent commentary. We reject bullshit. We love lively writing. Please consider supporting us by subscribing. Follow us on Twitter @the_lineca. Fight with us on Facebook. Pitch us something: lineeditor@protonmail.com