Presidents

Bill Clinton and George W. Bush are appearing in Toronto today in an event billed as “A Conversation with Presidents.” Tickets aren’t cheap (though the word is that the economy is hindering sales and prices have been dropping). Can you imagine the equivalent occurring in the States—“A Conversation with Prime Ministers”? A double bill of Brian Mulroney and Jean Chretien--we’d have to pay to get Americans to come, or offer them free maple syrup, or an autographed photo of Pamela Anderson wearing a mountie uniform. Of course, this begs the question of why Canadians go to such “conversations” in the first place. The business class, it seems, are the ones most interested; perhaps they’re intrigued by these ultimate CEOs and Deciders who have a Rolodex (yes, I know I’m dating myself here) of the well-heeled and well-connected. In contrast, the Canadian Prime Minister rules over a northern country with a GDP of no more than the state of California, and who in their right mind would want to hear the Governor of California? (Ooops, scratch that.) The President of the day is the holder of the one political position—more so than the Prime Minister of Canada—that most influences the success of Canadian enterprises. But ex-Presidents? Paying big bucks to see ex-Presidents? I’m tempted to say, “Canada, get a life.” But I won’t.

Two Canadian Moments

Last night one of my sons, myself and a friend were walking on the sidewalk along a tree-lined street when we came to a 4-way stop at precisely the same time as a car pulled up. We waited for the car to go through the intersection before crossing. The car didn’t move. We didn’t notice at first but, when we did, we waved to him to go, as we were in no hurry; he waved to us to cross, as he was probably in no hurry as well. We smiled and then waved to him to go; he waved to us to cross. We waved to him to go; he waved to us to cross. I don’t know for how long this went on. It was as if we were caught in a “Who’s More Polite?” contest, and damn if we were going to lose! We waved to him to go; he waited and finally drove through the intersection (probably cursing us under his breath). We then strolled across the intersection thinking nothing of it…

Then today I had to cross a street and, not wanting to go where the crosswalks were, which would have been out of my way, I decided to jay-walk. I started across just as a taxi on my side of the street started doing a U turn. The cab completed its turn and ended up facing the opposite direction just as I arrived in the middle of the road and was set to cross in front of him. I waved to him to continue; he waved to me to cross, I waved for him to continue, he waved….Are you detecting a pattern here?

I also don’t know how long this episode lasted either, but when it finally resolved itself, I started laughing outloud. Without any conversations happening, here's what the conversations sounded like:

You go,
No, you go.
Please, I insist, you go.
No no, I'm fine, you go. Please.
Thank you, but please, go ahead.
Thank you, thank you, but you must know by now that I’m Canadian and I am going to stand here forever until the glaciers melt and the seas rise and the sun burns out while I wait for you to go.
Yes, yes, that’s all well and good kind sir, but unfortunately I’m Canadian too, and as you arrived at this intersection before me it’s obvious that you must precede ahead of me and I will wait until the universe expires and all matter returns back into the great void from whence it came.

I have no qualifications for saying how much time Canadians spend being polite with each other, but whatever it is—trust me—it’s too much. Could you imagine how kick-ass this country could be if it’d just stop waiting to let the other guy go? Waiting can’t do much good for the Gross Domestic Product. I don’t know if waiting is tabulated into the measurement by Stats Canada, but it ought to be. GDP? Up here it stands for Great Deeds of Politeness, one after another, after another, after...Mostly I love it, but sometimes you gotta wonder…

Mosiac or Melting Pot

As long as the differences and diversities of mankind exist, democracy must allow for compromise, for accommodation, and for the recognition of differences.

Eugene McCarthy

Lately there’s been a fair amount of talk up here about the duelling metaphors we apply to the issue of immigration: the melting pot or the mosaic. Each is, in its own way, shorthand for all sorts of complex policy issues—from language ability to job skills to the politics of one’s homeland. The argument is getting air time because the current Minister of Immigration wants a greater focus on integration: more melting pot, less mosaic. But since metaphor is far more interesting than the dull prose of policy, let me use the metaphors to suggest that Canada is destined for the mosaic.

A melting pot assumes we lose ourselves, our particular identities, into the larger whole that becomes our new identity. We leave an old self for a newer and shinier edition that many others have also chosen to own and that we will, in theory, come to cherish and honour. My great-grandfather got off the boat speaking only his foreign tongue, his son came of age and “Americanized” the family name and then his son, my father, learned only English and became like any other native-born boy. The goal was to be seen as fully American, to bleed red, white and blue. And that’s what we did. The echoes of the old country were cut from the family tree like a rotten branch.

Canada’s history, however, starts from a different place(see the April 16th blog) than the traditional American hunger for assimilation. Canada talks about the three founding nations of the country. The United States has no such equivalent. It “united” against an enemy—the old country from which it came (and to which Canada remained loyal). While Canada has “the recognition of difference” in its DNA, the United States has unity in its. I can still hear Obama saying--at the first speech where he received national attention--how there aren’t Red States and Blue States but rather the UNITED States. Every day, as a kid in my small elementary school, I recited the Pledge of Allegiance: “…one nation, under God, indivisible.” It’s indoctrination, reminder, and a diagnosis all at once.

For those Canadians who are attracted to the idea of a melting pot, now would be an appropriate time to pause and consider the lessons of the past. The visit last week by the National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations to Rome to meet the Pope is the result of a misguided attempt by Canada to push for the melting pot. Young Aboriginal Canadians were removed from their families, starting in the mid 19th century, and sent to Residential Schools run by the Church under the auspices of the Department of Indian Affairs. A legacy of abuse began, under a policy known as “aggressive assimilation,” that eventually led to both a formal apology to aboriginal Canadians by the government last year as well as the recent visit to the Pope. The goal of the policy was to teach the Indians English, convert them to Catholicism, all in the hopes of what has been called “killing the Indian in the child.”

Canada is still paying for that tragic wounding it inflicted on its native citizens. You cannot create a melting pot out of founding nations. Nations—be they Inuit, Quebecois or Cree—do not yearn to lose their heritage to become part of something new and improved. They do not need to become something other than who they already are.

Canada’s historical mosaic gives it a kind of strength to allow others to enter through its doors and slowly create their Canadian selves. The ability to both sustain one’s heritage and become genuinely Canadian is an immigrant journey that is rare and precious; Europe would give its right hand to figure out what happens here each year. When the 2nd generation goes to school, mixes with others, picks up on the cues in the environment, “Canadian” seeps into their pores of its own accord; most marvellous of all, they understand that their native cultures—Lebanese, Somali, Ukranian—don’t have to seep out. What doesn’t happen of its own accord, however, is the capacity for cultures to appreciate one another and to welcome difference without fear. These things Canada has had to learn, more than most, simply to stay intact. It is a wisdom and a way of being not to be lightly tinkered with.