CANADA IS THE WORLD'S BURGHER KING---WE ARE HERE TO SERVE YOU, NOT US

Did you notice how the Canadian media described Governor-General Michaelle Jean’s tearful message to Haiti in the wake of this most devastating earthquake? They spoke of the earthquake as “the worst disaster to strike her homeland in two centuries.” Her “homeland”. Wait a second. This amazing lady of great accomplishment has spent 79% of her life as a Canadian citizen, and the PC press refers to Haiti, which she left as an 11 year old, as her “homeland”.

This is the legacy of almost four decades of Official Multiculturalism. Foreign-born Canadians are able to regard another country as their home, and the media collaborates in the project. It is interesting that while the Governor- General was pressured to drop her dual citizenship---she had a French passport as well---she nonetheless can be granted a dual emotional loyalty. That is Canada in a nutshell. Not only can crowds of New Canadians be seen at international soccer matches in Toronto or Vancouver cheering against Canada and waving the flag of their former country, even the Head of State can signal that her primary affections lie elsewhere in a public fashion. Or at least that is how the media frames it.
The Americans have a constitutional provision that requires their head of state to be American-born. The fact that Canadians don’t have a similar rule speaks volumes about the difference between our respective political cultures. While the United States is fragmenting along ethnic fault lines like Canada, at least there is a strong residual commitment to the concept of cohesion. The ideal of America as a melting pot still prevails, notwithstanding the reality of cultural balkanization that is unfolding nearly everywhere. Canadians have no such luck. Our political class not only disregards the importance of breaking done ethnic solitudes, it encourages them. Ethnic enclaves---that is Canada-speak for ‘ghettos’---are multiplying in number and strength in the nation’s major urban centres. A phenomena which our state broadcaster, the tax-payer funded CBC, finds reason to celebrate, even going so far as to claim, in numerous commentaries, that native-born Canadians have no right to “impose” Canadian core values on newcomers. After all, in the words of one protagonist of chaos, Canada is no longer “this white European place” where the citizens of European ancestry born and raised here have a right to set the rules. It is amazing what just 15%-18% of the population can dictate if it has the advantage of cohesion, state patronage and a vocal leadership that has no difficulty in obtaining a CBC microphone.

It is no wonder that the slogan judged by the National Post to be the most appropriate for the country on July 1, 2008 was “Canada---Home to the World”. It is no wonder that 7 of the 11 members of the Standing Committee on Immigration are foreign-born. It is no wonder that our Head of State was born in a foreign land. The message clearly is, “come in and make yourself at home” because fundamentally, the “homeowners” are to be regarded as squatters or provisional custodians. The message is that somehow, Canadian citizenship is everyone’s birth right, and that the purpose of Canada is not to serve the Canadians who live here but the Canadians who just arrived or hope to arrive. A club where anyone can claim club privileges without deference to club rules or club tradition.

Canada is the world’s Burgher King. We are here to serve you, not us. And the sick thing is, a great many Canadians are proud of that. “Canada—doormat to the world”.

Now that is a slogan that fits.

Tim Murray,
January16/09