Loving Canada means being honest about it

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 30/06/2017 (3030 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

On Canada Day this year, Confederation turns 150. It’s a big, round number, and those who remember the heady patriotism of 1967 could be forgiven for wondering why this year’s celebrations aren’t being met with the same fervour.

It may be because of a growing recognition that, for Canadians, loving one’s history should also mean coming to terms with it.

Recent years have seen a number of weighty anniversaries. In 2012, Canada marked the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812, the only time we have been invaded by the United States. And since 2015, there have been reflections on and remembrances of other nation-forging moments from the First World War, as the centenaries of those events pass. In 2016, we marked the 100th anniversary of women getting the right to vote (in Western Canada, anyway; it wasn’t nationwide until 1919).

But it’s worth noting, Canada’s celebrations of itself can also be fraught with doubt and self-reflection, and perhaps that’s a genuine Canadian strength.

Consider that in 1992, as Canada hit 125 years as a nation, the country was lurching towards a constitutional crisis that saw the Charlottetown Accord touted as a way to include Quebec. Its failure to be ratified was seen by some in Quebec as a rejection and fuelled nationalists pushing for a 1995 referendum on Quebec separating from Canada.

Canadians have many reasons to celebrate our accomplishments as a nation — the creation of peacekeeping troops; literary voices from novelist Margaret Atwood to Quebec playwright Michel Tremblay to award-winning indigenous writer Thomas King; Olympic victories in hockey stretching back to 1920 (ahem, Winnipeg Falcons); as well as the fact that for months we had an astronaut in orbit who put Canada on the world stage. Those things are just the tip of the iceberg.

Canada regularly places in the top 10 on lists of the best places in the world in which to live. We’ve built a society that is the envy of many in the international community.

But celebrating Canada and celebrating Confederation aren’t the same thing. Post-Confederation Canada has done plenty of horrible things as a nation, only some of which have become part of the national discussion through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. There are also shameful episodes in our history such as the treatment of Chinese workers during the building of the national railway, the internment of Japanese citizens during the Second World War and the destruction of Halifax’s black neighbourhood of Africville in the 1960s, to name a few.

There is no single lesson to be drawn from crises of national identity — does Canada include Quebec? Are we a good country, a strong one? Are we honouring the treaties our country was built on? — but rather an ongoing evolution. The Canada of today isn’t the same as the one of 1992 or 1967 or 1867. It’s not the same as the one invaded by the United States. It’s certainly far, far different from the nations that were sovereign over these lands for thousands of years.

But we are founded on those peoples and events. If we’re honest about what has been done to build and create Canada, we may find it’s the process of addressing who we want to be as a nation that is more important than any single answer.

Confederation was a solution to the problems of its day; Canada is still a work in progress.