A Not So Multicultural Hotel

NP:

The federal government will unveil Tuesday a new guide for immigrants just arriving in Canada that emphasizes the country’s relationship with the Queen of England, the role of the Canadian Forces and the marriage customs that newcomers should consider forbidden.

Hmm. Queen of England, eh? Apparently it isn't just the immigrants who need citizenship training. There is no such person or position as the Queen of England. The sovereign state of England ceased to exist in 1707. Elizabeth II is the Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. She is also the Queen of Canada. It is in that latter capacity that an immigrant swears allegiance to Her Majesty, not as the monarch of another country, but of this country. 

It is one of those sly bits of republican subterfuge to imply that the Queen is not the Queen of Canada, but some alien impostor that the current government is attempting to foist upon Canadians. There was a monarchy in Canada before there was a Canada. What held this nation together in its early years was not allegiance to a new abstraction called Canada, to whom people had not yet had the time to form an attachment, but to the Crown. Up until about World War I the typical English Canada, and even a few French Canadians, thought of themselves as subjects of the Crown first and foremost. A sense of Canadianess came later.

This is important not simply as a history lesson, but as an expression of national identity. For all the many faults that can be cited against the current Tory government, on the question of national identity they have been unusually sound, a fact confirmed by the announcement of this new citizenship guide. Emphasizing the monarchy isn't just a fetish for aging WASPs or obsessives anglophiles. It is part of our national identity. Even its suppose foreignness is a vital part of Canadianism. Canada developed within a wider community of nations today called the Commonwealth. The monarchy is a reminder of that fact.

Reminders are vital in a nation. Without memory there is no identity. Without history there is no nation. Traditional symbols and the military serve as powerful identity markers. The military is not, strictly speaking, an existential necessity for us. Canada borders exact one country (I'm ignoring Greenland) which has not been noticeable hostile toward our interests in about a century. Only in the paranoid fantasies of the far Left is the United States plotting to annex Canada. No doubt an arrangement could be made, albeit it would likely annoy the Americans, to practically hand over defense of Canadian soil to the Pentagon. It would save Canada a few billions which could be spent on more popular social programs.

Yet we don't and we shouldn't. Our military is an expression of national identity and sovereignty. We do not conceive of ourselves as Luxembourg with better hockey players. We are a serious nation that should accept its obligations as a creditable, though not a major, force in international affairs. Funding a military, albeit a fairly modest one as we currently have, is a sign of seriousness. The allocation of large sums, and the willingness of thousands of Canadians to risk life and limb in the service of the country, an expression that we take ourselves and our country as an earnest and noble endeavour. 

In the long years of Liberal rule, under the Jacobin Paul Hellyer and the peacenik Pierre Trudeau, our military was regarded as a faint embarrassment. At best it might be used for social experimentation. It continued to exist, in no small part, because large numbers of veterans from the two great wars of the twentieth century were still alive. Just as Trudeau refused to fully declare a republic, knowing that legions of monarchists would stop his constitutional reforms, so the presence of millions of Canadian vets ensure that we retained some kind of a fighting force. The memory of Canadian valour was too potent even for the Trudeaupians.

The current Conservative government, which two years ago also returned the terms Royal Canadian Air Force and Royal Canadian Navy, should be congratulated for these positive reinforcements of Canadian identity. For too long Canada has been sold to Canadians as a social welfare scheme, not a viable and proud nation state. A commitment to history and the military is a clean step away from that sordid approach. 

Comments

[nomdeblog]

“For too long Canada has been sold to Canadians as a social welfare scheme, not a viable and proud nation state.”

John Manley, one of the last sane Liberals, put it this way regarding our insufficient budgets to defend our sovereignty: “Canadians are like the guy at a group table in a restaurant who goes to the washroom when the bill arrives.”