For the Canadian nation to save itself from euthanization by liberal multiculturalism, it needs to see itself for what it really is - reactionary, traditionalist, illiberal, and martial.
Magisterial piece. Not much else to say, only that watching Comrade Chow lead a procession of cretins with their mindless "land acknowledgement" incantations during Toronto's Remembrance Day Ceremony crystallized in my mind the complete and utter decay of virtually institution of note in this country. That fat, wretched HR-tard LARPing as a soldier you linked to shouldn't even be allowed to clean the toilets in the Highlanders' armoury, much less serve in it. I *suppose* that's a good thing if any of us fears the military might be used against us by a future Liberal/NDP regime, as they wouldn't last five minutes against highly skilled bushmen in the Canadian shield. But against the low-T and nonbinary folx at Yonge and Bloor? Absolutely.
Where to go from here? I don't place much stock in Poilievre, but, I suppose, better than nothing. Who knows, there may be a backbencher elected from some rural Alberta or Saskatchewan riding that may surprise us and go onto greater things. I think part of the change has to be generational: I approve of Trump's emerging cabinet of young 40-somethings, many with military backgrounds. Maybe some of the veterans of Afghanistan might find it in themselves to take up a battle once more, only for this country and not a neo-con war machine. They may look at their kids and say, fuck this, I have to do *something*.
As a librarian, it's the older histories I'm trying to collect and become aware of to help counter the fetid dreck that university presses are churning out. Ted Barris, for one, has written wonderful histories of Canadian involvement in The Dam Busters raid, the Great Escape, and many other pivotal battles. I suspect as well that Pierre Berton's histories might also still prove worthwhile, and there *is* an emerging, non-orthodox community of scholars emerging online and in smaller presses; a recent work called Grave Injustice, put the lie to the residential school genocide hoax, but getting books like that past the far-left gatekeepers of academia and librarianship will take some work (the latter also an increasingly decayed profession I'm afraid).
I do agree with your assessment of the "emerging right" online community: not enough Matt Taibbi, too much Ezra Levant (although he has done some good) and other shameless grifters. Unfortunately we just don't, as yet, produce talent on par with a Rogan or some other figure. But, gotta start somewhere...
Ezra Levant and Rebel News were at the top of my mind when I disparaged the alt-media in Canada. It isn’t only their ideological stance, it’s their presentation. It’s hokey, inauthentic, and comes off as very weak.
The Canadian Forces are in a truly deplorable state. The troon whose picture I included is, sadly, representative. When you see them in public, they’re invariably fat, shambling disgraces to the uniform. Morale is clearly in the toilet. In large part this is due to political interference by the Liberal Party, who have forced Woke down the military’s throats, while using sex scandals to purge the officer corps of traditionalists.
Poilievre will prove to be a huge disappointment, and everyone knows it. What you suggest - a movement of Millennial and Gen-X Afghan War vets - may be just the ticket. A party of serious men, implacably opposed to everything the Liberals stand for, with the steel to do so openly, and the willingness to unabashedly embrace Canada’s traditional nature and, most importantly, unapologetically represent the interests of the Canadian people, would be galvanizing if headed up by a charismatic leader.
You saying that takes me back to the days of Preston Manning and the Reform Party. He and the party did shift and invigorate Canadian "conservatism" somewhat from its Red Tory doldrums, which ultimately produced the Harper ministry that, all things considered, may have been the best in my adult lifetime.
But yes, a new movement has to be absolutely, one hundred-percent unapologetically masculine, stern, focused, disciplined, and fire-breathing to the extent that it must sidestep and undermine all gatekeeping institutions in this country: media, academia, NGO's, public sector unions, etc.
I don't disagree, but I have to laugh when I remember Manning and the party being called Nazis and that earnest, shaky, squeaky voice in Parliament trying to make itself heard. Speaking of earnest, it was Manning's father Ernst that was apparently the father whose "sins" Preston was paying for.
I think this is my second reading of this essay, and unlike some institutions I don't really need three readings. I will send it along to family members who are still eligible for British passports.
A a senior student I had a ninety-six year old patient who was a veteran of the Boer War and WW1. He had pictures of his regiment from WW1 (and his late wife) with him in his hospital bed, and had been living on his own in an apartment before admission to the Shaughnessy (Veterans) Hospital. These people were tough. The BC government of course broke faith and morphed the promised permanent veterans' establishment into BCWCH.
Five years ago we had a family reunion (near you in Toronto) and visited the marker of my grandfather's brother, Lang, who was killed in the last month of WW1.
I wish that you had access to a wider audience. Despite attendance at various political meetings through Covid, I share your concerns about the apparent presumptive Conservative resurgence.
Yes, Levant is close to the only game in town. Which is part of the problem.
It isn't so much a matter of money, as of outlook, style, rhetoric, etc. And it isn't only journalism I'm talking about, either, though of course that is also important.
Poilievre is an opportunist. He’s hoping to take advantage of Trudeau’s unpopularity to lever himself into power, but once there he won’t do anything notably different - at least not if his actions and policy preferences to date are anything to go by.
Very likely he will be the next prime minister, and there will a great sense of national relief at having ousted the despised Trudeau. Then there will be an unravelling into disillusionment as it is realized that he is really no different.
In the aftermath, there will be room for a true leader to arise.
It sounds like the same game plan here in the United States, carried out by the very same tribe of filthy communist. God Bless Canada, home of the last real sport on the planet.
I don’t even think he’ll provide much in the way of breathing space, tbh. He’ll likely leave the Liberal Party QuaNGOs in place, such as the human rights tribunals, which will continue to happily terrorize the Canadian population; and he’ll continue shovelling Indians into the country as fast as they can be flown in.
Agreed. I think he's a transitional figure, at best. He might halt the decline, for a bit, but he's a lifelong political striver who has benefitted from the current system.
The soft effete liberal Canada is completely foreign to my experience growing up on the wind blasted prairies.
My childhood was cracking cold and endless winters. Hockey in old wooden barns colder than a witch’s tit. It was tending to cattle, ice fishing and chopping wood. It was hard drinking and foul mouthed men in curling rinks that were so cloudy with cigarette smoke you couldn’t even see inside. It was Don Cherry calling out Euros for being soft pussies for wearing a visor
It was beer gardens in the summer surrounded by large leather faced farmers that could squash a hornet in their bare hands. Baseball in some dusty field and pure cold lakes on hot summer days.
I don’t remember when this all changed when we became the waiting room for the world’s refuse. When everywhere feels like an airport at best and a foreign bazaar at worst but we are sadder for it.
Spot on. I'm a backwoods Ontario kid myself but this scans. Hunting lodges, winter camping, ice fishing. Hard crusty old guys chomping cigars as they barked orders across a drill square. Swinging out over old ropes onto sun-dappled lakes on magical summer days.
Stompin Tom Connor once remarked that time was, you knew exactly which town the tour bus was approaching just by looking out the window - they all had something unique about them. Then they all started to look the same. Same franchises, same signs. Everything got standardized, the rough edges were sanded away.
What a beautiful description of what was also my experience growing up except I was in the mountains not on the prairies. I think it start to change in the 90's and by the time the 00's were coming to an end the Canada I knew was already gone. There are still little pockets in small towns here and there but yep, mostly all disappeared.
I am not a Canadian, but I have always admired the men who fought at the Vilmy Ridge, the ill-fated Dieppe Raid, and the Canadian 3rd Division at Juno Beach and Caen. That was the Canada I thought I knew. In comparison, today's Canada seems to be just another European socialist country somewhere out there.
Spot on. As for Europe there are many versions of it beyond "London-Paris-Berlin" that seems to comprise "Europe" in ost commentators' minds. Even inside the prison of EU/NATO/ A Europe un-woke, illiberal, austere and tough as nails.
I've actually never been to London or Berlin, though I've been to Paris many times. Paris is a shithole. Though it wasn't always … the degeneration was very fast.
The real Europe in any case is found outside of the metropoles.
"The real Europe in any case is found outside of the metropoles." Absolutely true, though it is specifically in the capitals that the Hegemon & its mini-me Israel concentrate most of their attention. ie the "embassies" (quotes here because the US embassies look like fortresses these days) , the Soros institutes, the NGOs, the American PR companies whose sole job is news censorship, etc. The further the distance from the capitals the freer and more normal life is, except in the UK and Germany due to their 'special relationships'. Interestingly both countries (and Netherlands also) have very little true counytryside, nor wild countryside - unlike the rest of Europe. Clearly it is easier to dominate urbanised populations.
I suspect that, given the MAGAquake, we can anticipate a Continental MEGAquake. Governments that have been propped up the America, overtly and covertly, are going to find the legs kicked out from under them.
Today's Canada is the Globohomo's retirement center. Just this week it refused to disclose names of 900 Waffen SS survivors who still reside there, fearing for their safety. You can't make that shit up.
And if there's almost a thousand of them there in 2024, imagine how many managed to die peacefully in their beds by now.
The history book club I'm a part of took a break from ancient history this past year to focus on the history of our country; we read two books by Stephen Bown called "The Company" on the history of the Hudson Bay Company and the Fur Trade, and "Dominion" on the building of the railway and the formation of the country. Despite being more tied into Canadian history than most, it was still eye opening.
The men who explored and founded this country did incredible things; wintering in a shack on the shores of the Hudson Bay with a vague hope that a boat will show up 8 months from now. Walking and canoeing across unmapped wilderness. Building a railway where it makes no logistical sense to do so, and building a country on the back of that.
Canadians have been treated maliciously by the organizations that have downplayed this part of our history and replaced it by uninspiring mess that most people know. It's malicious towards the Indigenous people of this country as well, reducing them to a conquered people mistreated by evil white "settlers" that we remind of their conquest in each land acknowledgement, instead of the alternate path that could have treated them as a founding partner in the great ventures that made this country.
Somehow, a nation that once did great and adventurous things has been reduced to a small and inward looking place. We need to find a way to reverse that. I'm more optimistic of Poilievre than you, at least that I think he authentically gets what is wrong with the country, although whether he or anyone currently on the scene has the ability to reverse it over the near future is probably too big of an ask.
IMHO, Canada needs to see itself as more than just a story of,by, and for Canadians; in funding, declaring, and defending its cultural historical nationhood it can be a beacon example to the world…
Nope neighbor to the east, your today country isn't the same Canada I crossed on the ALCAN back in the day. The Mountie I knew that used to drive his official assigned vehicle across the border to bring back American Bourbon for his mommy "duty free" is long gone. As is the little old Lady in Lloydminster that asked me to bring a big crate of home canned tomatoes to her daughter who'd moved to Alaska that, when I was long passed customs and give it to the daughter I found was full of Canadian whisky. Thirty eleven other stories I could tell but...
Canuks, used to be, law abiding? Yep, long as they didn't get caught.
Crossing the border in 2008 was interesting. When I read the customs regulations, it appeared that a number of food items were prohibited, including potatoes, presumably because of the potato blight and famine in the US. However, when I declared my shotgun, they forgot about all that. As to the shotgun, all they wanted was their $25 fee and didn't even ask to see it. However, I did get harassed regarding where I was going, how long I was staying in Canada and how much money I had.
I am a veteran of the CF who has lost brothers in arms to the violence of foreigners; and yet it has been several years since I have worn a poppy. The "performstiveness" you describe is precisely why. To steal a line from Sam Hyde - seeing Trudeau wear a poppy is like seeing your mother ride a Harley, naked.
Top notch! I have always felt the Canadians to be my closest cousins. I look forward to the day when you all may be free of the curse/spell that has befallen your land. The truckers were an inspiration to me. The fire is still there. It gladdens my heart when I think of the American who joined Canadian regiments in both world wars to get into the fight early. The story of the Canadians who fought in Vietnam needs to be told more. They were true warriors who crossed the border the other way when many others went North to hide.
Sorry, I forgot to add this to my initial response. Your essay got me on a rabbit trail about the RCMP and the hunt for Albert Johnson. It also got me deep into reading about the Legion of Frontiersmen. If you ever are looking for other topics to write about, I’d love to read anything you write on topics like those.
1. I think we can agree Canada's founding Anglo culture came from Upper Canada, but only a small portion the 30,000 odd UELs ended up in Upper Canada, which was only constituted in 1791. Moreover the Family Compact that governed as a pseudo-aristocracy until the Rebellion of 1837 had more in common with the British aristocracy or officer class than the UELs.
The majority of Upper Canada's anglo settlers came from the US: Upstate NY, southern New England and Pennsylvania. These "Late Loyalists" were required to swear oaths to the Crown and many weren't considered loyal. Nonetheless by the War of 1812 they vastly outnumbered UELs and the small settlements of Irish or Scots.
My point here is that while there was a "Britannic" elite until the Rebellion, thereafter the character of the colony changed and was dominated by the American emigrés and their founding cultures. These included New England Puritans and Pennsylvania Quakers. The mix of these two cultures contributed to the decline of martial virtues and the rise of "nice lady" politics that has ultimately fallen victim to the Liberal's multicultural atomization/divide and conquer policies. We did not get sufficient number of Scots-Irish settled and prospering until much later in the 19th century, which has not been good for our longevity as a martial people.
2. Your point about "Peace, Order and Good Government" vs. "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness" is well taken. It's maybe worth mentioning that POGG were just a bunch of florid rhetoric tossed in by the Imperial drafters, as was their custom in the mid 19th century. Canadians didn't draft the British North America Act (I realize the arg could be directed at LLPH but at least it was drafted by Americans).
One area you are quite right is in the degree of centralization. The principal difference between the BNA and US Constitution is that in Canada residual (ie. non-enumerated) powers explicitly fall to the Federal Govt. Whereas the opposite is true (implicitly) in America: they fall to the States (subject to Federal Paramountcy - a legal doctrine as it is). Unlike the States negotiating Union and preserving their prerogatives, Canada's Constitution was foisted on it by Imperial Parliament (which retained control until 1931 for foreign affairs, 1952 for judicial appeals, and 1982 for constitutional amendments). There was no negotiation between the Provinces/Regions and I believe this has come back over the centuries to haunt the Canadian experiment over and over again.
3. Lastly your points about a huge wilderness yet to be conquered is, I think, fantastic. Most of Canada is empty wasteland. We lack the technological economies of scale to exploit it currently. However that will change. I think your comment about Martian colonization is another understated point. Who better indeed. To quote Stan Rogers elegiac to the Bluenose, "She is always best under full press. Hard over as she'll lay." Scratch the surface of Anglo-French Canada and you'll find that.
Excellent context, particularly as regards the pernicious influence of Puritans. They've been a curse on the land since the Mayflower, frankly, and were a curse on England before that.
My own ancestral background is from those late emigres, though they weren't Puritans - they entered the US originally as Hessians in the employ of the Crown, but came north for land.
Much of this formative history is completely unknown in Canada … including to me, frankly. I've picked up a bit here and there, know more than the average Canadian I think, but I'm no scholar of the subject.
Me neither, and it IS amazing how little work has been done to synthesize any scholarship on Canadian migrations as it relates to ethnogenesis ESPECIALLY given how much hand wringing there is (or used to be) about Canadian identity!
I didn't even learn about the "Late Loyalists" (American's seeking free Crown land grants) until I read Colin Woodard's American nations where he briefly mentions Canada.
I totally agree with what you are saying but I disagree with your solution. The Canadians, like all western Europeans, need artists, poets, writers, musicians, etc. You need people who are adept at images, gestures and sounds in time. You need wealthy individuals to encourage such people to develop their craft. Going the way of technology won't do it because technology is a tool and can be used in anyway at all. Cultural identity must be ingrained at an early age and there must be initiation into a brotherhood. Ideally, you need fraternities, and people capable of understanding the techniques of cultural/spiritual transmission.
I love the imagery of the cold tip of the spear. Formed by disaffected rurals. AB & SK most likely. I submit we need the Grand Project - the Cold Tip of the Spear.
Well, the trouble with creating myths is that they take thousands of years to develop. Myths, like your friend Anglo-Saxon says, were about real people, or a composite of individuals amalgamated into an archetype in a prehistoric time of verbal transmission where men believed in gods at a more innocent level than modernists. We have objectified our innocent belief into oblivion.
Christianity separated spirit from the flesh, so to speak. Therefore, we need to reconnect with our psychic blood, to the stories that survive the test of time, that inspire boys and men. Scruton writes about this. You don't just memorize or read something, you move with the gods and heroes through ritual and initiation that emotionally connects you to the ancestors.
Carter, I did not know you until you wrote this...rousing, righteous and rigorous history of Canada, my adopted land of which I have become very tired indeed. You're absolutely correct: we must find it in ourselves to fight or we will simply die with a whimper...
Only 3 comments so far? For a masterpiece that had my heart singing with vindication and I am Greek, NOT Canadian, but had the privilege of living there for 14 formative years. Canada, a place where roads stop, where you can die without at least some wilderness skills not 100 miles from the border. The haunting quietude.
Compare and contrast this magnificent essay with the rag that calls itself Canadian Patriot , that poses as 'historical' and which sets out to prove that Canada's destiny is to be part of the United States....
I don't think I've come across Canadian Patriot, but I'm already not a fan if that's what it advocates.
One thing I'll say about Greece - much nicer weather! I'm hoping to spend a few months there at some point, doing a sort of pilgrimage of classical sites.
Greece has some of the highest mountains in Europe with Alpine weather to match - and ski slopes, believe it or not. Google Mt. Grammos and Zagarochoria for a quick look - very beautiful. The country consists of 'highlands and islands' ie Balkans and sea. Please get in touch when you do decide!
Canadian Patriot is better known as Matthew Ehret online, it will make your hair stand on end. He has written lots of Canadian history 'books' available for free at his site. Not to mention his regurgitation of Greek philosophy......
I am a Canadian , i enjoyed and was ( to some extent ) inspired by this essay . A great many of us are well aware of what the liberal patty are up to and we can't wait until the opportunity arises to banish them from this planet . A great many of us admire the trumpster and we hope that this new American dream will in some way rub off on us. An example is being sent by our American friends of how to cleanse a nation and reestablish its destiny. I believe you are right in saying we need to reestablish the mores of our past . A great read and thankyou !
You know my feelings about space and Mars, won't bother repeating them. But this article was very pleasing to read, to be honest I see myself not as an Anglo-Saxon (c'est impossible), I'm a Franco-Celte, and I love the ferocity of our people, the savagery of Canadians and Quebecois, a people who didn't flee from danger but flew towards it.
To me, whenever Americans talk about conquering or annexing Canada I must admit I bristle and I view the notion with the utmost disdain. I detest the idea.
Canada/Quebec has always outproduced and out-performed in manufacturing and in war, and we've always been more European, more Anglo-Saxon, more Celtic and more French than America to my mind and this is something that fills me with pride.
I hate the leaf, and am glad to see you championing our Red Ensign. In my view the British Empire is at an end, so I'd prefer if we attached ourselves to a French Empire, as Quebec wishes to. I see more potential there, and more joy in such a thing, but I see us as the most integral part of such an Empire. The film-capital of France is Quebec, the cultural centre is Quebec and the producer of the best novels in the Francosphere is Quebec.
That said, Anglo-Canada's Asian connections and independent spirit combined with the sheer Celtique Savagery of Quebec and its Euro & Franco-African and Franco-Asian connections combined could make Canada a force if we were just to allow ourselves to become unchained and to force out the bureaucrats currently strangling the very life from us.
Yet we'd also need to remigrate, focus on ourselves and our resources and get back on the gold-standard and we'd be the leading economy.
Rather than joining some other empire, I would rather that Canada truly starts living for itself. That is part of what I was trying to communicate here … that the reactionary essence of the country is not intrinsically linked to a foreign empire, but something that stands on its own.
"To me, whenever Americans talk about conquering or annexing Canada I must admit I bristle and I view the notion with the utmost disdain. I detest the idea."
Bros, THIS American doesn't want to annex Canada. We have enough problems of our own. But I'd gladly trade you New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut for Alberta and BC ... :-D
lol non merci, we don’t want ‘em (NY, Massa & Connecticut I mean). Honestly, I think Canada & US work better separately as I said and Alberta & BC are crucial to Canada. You guys can have southern Ontario though.
Brilliant analytical history of Canada, JC of B. I learned SO much that I never knew before.
One comment in passing. You said (of the British): "British forces pushed as far south as Washington, DC ... which they burned to the ground."
You don't suppose we might get them to come back and do it again, do you? I'd wager the red states would likely foot the bill. And they'd have to bring a LOT more torches...🤪
Sadly, the British have their own problems. Once America gets its house in order, it might consider returning the favor and liberating the British from their own native oppression…
Whoa! Now THERE'S a new concept---America invades Britain (250 years after...). The question is whether Britain hates its own government enough to welcome an amphibious landing in Cornwall (for liberation, of course...🤪). We could hire a Patton impersonater to wade ashore and declare "I have returned!" (I know, Patton would have cringed at doing a "MacArthur"...)
It'd be interesting to see, personally, I wouldn't bet the farm on it...🤔
Well they didn't "push" as far south as Washington. In fact the seasoned troops that the Empire diverted from the Peninsular war in 1813 and 1814 were caught up around Lake George and Lake Champlain and never made it further south.
The reference to burning DC and the WH is ofc correct. But this was done amphibiously by sailing up the Potomac.
Almost nothing was accomplished by the War of 1812. Americans refused to cross into a foreign country to fight (witness Stephen Renssaeler' ill-fated attempt to cross the Niagara River). The Canadians took Detroit with a ruse that would would have made Hannibal blush, but were eventually kicked out and pushed out - fighting a rearguard action to the current city of London, Ontario.
In the end the remoteness and wilderness was as much an advantage as a disadvantage.
Meanwhile American privateers were terrorizing British shipping. In the end the British had the upper hand in the land war, but the Americans were getting the better of them in the naval war. It was a draw. So everyone agreed to call it off and go back to status quo antebellum.
Magisterial piece. Not much else to say, only that watching Comrade Chow lead a procession of cretins with their mindless "land acknowledgement" incantations during Toronto's Remembrance Day Ceremony crystallized in my mind the complete and utter decay of virtually institution of note in this country. That fat, wretched HR-tard LARPing as a soldier you linked to shouldn't even be allowed to clean the toilets in the Highlanders' armoury, much less serve in it. I *suppose* that's a good thing if any of us fears the military might be used against us by a future Liberal/NDP regime, as they wouldn't last five minutes against highly skilled bushmen in the Canadian shield. But against the low-T and nonbinary folx at Yonge and Bloor? Absolutely.
Where to go from here? I don't place much stock in Poilievre, but, I suppose, better than nothing. Who knows, there may be a backbencher elected from some rural Alberta or Saskatchewan riding that may surprise us and go onto greater things. I think part of the change has to be generational: I approve of Trump's emerging cabinet of young 40-somethings, many with military backgrounds. Maybe some of the veterans of Afghanistan might find it in themselves to take up a battle once more, only for this country and not a neo-con war machine. They may look at their kids and say, fuck this, I have to do *something*.
As a librarian, it's the older histories I'm trying to collect and become aware of to help counter the fetid dreck that university presses are churning out. Ted Barris, for one, has written wonderful histories of Canadian involvement in The Dam Busters raid, the Great Escape, and many other pivotal battles. I suspect as well that Pierre Berton's histories might also still prove worthwhile, and there *is* an emerging, non-orthodox community of scholars emerging online and in smaller presses; a recent work called Grave Injustice, put the lie to the residential school genocide hoax, but getting books like that past the far-left gatekeepers of academia and librarianship will take some work (the latter also an increasingly decayed profession I'm afraid).
I do agree with your assessment of the "emerging right" online community: not enough Matt Taibbi, too much Ezra Levant (although he has done some good) and other shameless grifters. Unfortunately we just don't, as yet, produce talent on par with a Rogan or some other figure. But, gotta start somewhere...
Ezra Levant and Rebel News were at the top of my mind when I disparaged the alt-media in Canada. It isn’t only their ideological stance, it’s their presentation. It’s hokey, inauthentic, and comes off as very weak.
The Canadian Forces are in a truly deplorable state. The troon whose picture I included is, sadly, representative. When you see them in public, they’re invariably fat, shambling disgraces to the uniform. Morale is clearly in the toilet. In large part this is due to political interference by the Liberal Party, who have forced Woke down the military’s throats, while using sex scandals to purge the officer corps of traditionalists.
Poilievre will prove to be a huge disappointment, and everyone knows it. What you suggest - a movement of Millennial and Gen-X Afghan War vets - may be just the ticket. A party of serious men, implacably opposed to everything the Liberals stand for, with the steel to do so openly, and the willingness to unabashedly embrace Canada’s traditional nature and, most importantly, unapologetically represent the interests of the Canadian people, would be galvanizing if headed up by a charismatic leader.
You saying that takes me back to the days of Preston Manning and the Reform Party. He and the party did shift and invigorate Canadian "conservatism" somewhat from its Red Tory doldrums, which ultimately produced the Harper ministry that, all things considered, may have been the best in my adult lifetime.
But yes, a new movement has to be absolutely, one hundred-percent unapologetically masculine, stern, focused, disciplined, and fire-breathing to the extent that it must sidestep and undermine all gatekeeping institutions in this country: media, academia, NGO's, public sector unions, etc.
Preston Manning was a bit of a clown, and Harper was positively wooden. Neither had any charisma to speak of.
I don't disagree, but I have to laugh when I remember Manning and the party being called Nazis and that earnest, shaky, squeaky voice in Parliament trying to make itself heard. Speaking of earnest, it was Manning's father Ernst that was apparently the father whose "sins" Preston was paying for.
Good God that voice…
The left has been calling everyone Nazis for decades. It seems finally that it is no longer having the effect it used to.
Sounded like Jimmy Stewart with throat cancer.
Competence and honesty would also be nice to have in our political leaders. I don't believe I've seen any of that in my lifetime.
I think this is my second reading of this essay, and unlike some institutions I don't really need three readings. I will send it along to family members who are still eligible for British passports.
A a senior student I had a ninety-six year old patient who was a veteran of the Boer War and WW1. He had pictures of his regiment from WW1 (and his late wife) with him in his hospital bed, and had been living on his own in an apartment before admission to the Shaughnessy (Veterans) Hospital. These people were tough. The BC government of course broke faith and morphed the promised permanent veterans' establishment into BCWCH.
Five years ago we had a family reunion (near you in Toronto) and visited the marker of my grandfather's brother, Lang, who was killed in the last month of WW1.
I wish that you had access to a wider audience. Despite attendance at various political meetings through Covid, I share your concerns about the apparent presumptive Conservative resurgence.
Merry Christmas,
R
Yes, Levant is close to the only game in town. Which is part of the problem.
It isn't so much a matter of money, as of outlook, style, rhetoric, etc. And it isn't only journalism I'm talking about, either, though of course that is also important.
Don't misunderstand: I am grateful for their presence. Better than nothing.
I just wish they weren't so lame.
Poilievre is an opportunist. He’s hoping to take advantage of Trudeau’s unpopularity to lever himself into power, but once there he won’t do anything notably different - at least not if his actions and policy preferences to date are anything to go by.
Very likely he will be the next prime minister, and there will a great sense of national relief at having ousted the despised Trudeau. Then there will be an unravelling into disillusionment as it is realized that he is really no different.
In the aftermath, there will be room for a true leader to arise.
It sounds like the same game plan here in the United States, carried out by the very same tribe of filthy communist. God Bless Canada, home of the last real sport on the planet.
I don’t even think he’ll provide much in the way of breathing space, tbh. He’ll likely leave the Liberal Party QuaNGOs in place, such as the human rights tribunals, which will continue to happily terrorize the Canadian population; and he’ll continue shovelling Indians into the country as fast as they can be flown in.
Agreed. I think he's a transitional figure, at best. He might halt the decline, for a bit, but he's a lifelong political striver who has benefitted from the current system.
The soft effete liberal Canada is completely foreign to my experience growing up on the wind blasted prairies.
My childhood was cracking cold and endless winters. Hockey in old wooden barns colder than a witch’s tit. It was tending to cattle, ice fishing and chopping wood. It was hard drinking and foul mouthed men in curling rinks that were so cloudy with cigarette smoke you couldn’t even see inside. It was Don Cherry calling out Euros for being soft pussies for wearing a visor
It was beer gardens in the summer surrounded by large leather faced farmers that could squash a hornet in their bare hands. Baseball in some dusty field and pure cold lakes on hot summer days.
I don’t remember when this all changed when we became the waiting room for the world’s refuse. When everywhere feels like an airport at best and a foreign bazaar at worst but we are sadder for it.
Spot on. I'm a backwoods Ontario kid myself but this scans. Hunting lodges, winter camping, ice fishing. Hard crusty old guys chomping cigars as they barked orders across a drill square. Swinging out over old ropes onto sun-dappled lakes on magical summer days.
Stompin Tom Connor once remarked that time was, you knew exactly which town the tour bus was approaching just by looking out the window - they all had something unique about them. Then they all started to look the same. Same franchises, same signs. Everything got standardized, the rough edges were sanded away.
Canada lost its soul.
What I have never been able to figure out is why Canada is against global warming. Place is colder than Mars on occasion.
What a beautiful description of what was also my experience growing up except I was in the mountains not on the prairies. I think it start to change in the 90's and by the time the 00's were coming to an end the Canada I knew was already gone. There are still little pockets in small towns here and there but yep, mostly all disappeared.
I am not a Canadian, but I have always admired the men who fought at the Vilmy Ridge, the ill-fated Dieppe Raid, and the Canadian 3rd Division at Juno Beach and Caen. That was the Canada I thought I knew. In comparison, today's Canada seems to be just another European socialist country somewhere out there.
Today’s Canada isn’t even really European. It’s a subsidiary branch of GloboHomo Inc.
Spot on. As for Europe there are many versions of it beyond "London-Paris-Berlin" that seems to comprise "Europe" in ost commentators' minds. Even inside the prison of EU/NATO/ A Europe un-woke, illiberal, austere and tough as nails.
I've actually never been to London or Berlin, though I've been to Paris many times. Paris is a shithole. Though it wasn't always … the degeneration was very fast.
The real Europe in any case is found outside of the metropoles.
"The real Europe in any case is found outside of the metropoles." Absolutely true, though it is specifically in the capitals that the Hegemon & its mini-me Israel concentrate most of their attention. ie the "embassies" (quotes here because the US embassies look like fortresses these days) , the Soros institutes, the NGOs, the American PR companies whose sole job is news censorship, etc. The further the distance from the capitals the freer and more normal life is, except in the UK and Germany due to their 'special relationships'. Interestingly both countries (and Netherlands also) have very little true counytryside, nor wild countryside - unlike the rest of Europe. Clearly it is easier to dominate urbanised populations.
I suspect that, given the MAGAquake, we can anticipate a Continental MEGAquake. Governments that have been propped up the America, overtly and covertly, are going to find the legs kicked out from under them.
Today's Canada is the Globohomo's retirement center. Just this week it refused to disclose names of 900 Waffen SS survivors who still reside there, fearing for their safety. You can't make that shit up.
And if there's almost a thousand of them there in 2024, imagine how many managed to die peacefully in their beds by now.
The history book club I'm a part of took a break from ancient history this past year to focus on the history of our country; we read two books by Stephen Bown called "The Company" on the history of the Hudson Bay Company and the Fur Trade, and "Dominion" on the building of the railway and the formation of the country. Despite being more tied into Canadian history than most, it was still eye opening.
The men who explored and founded this country did incredible things; wintering in a shack on the shores of the Hudson Bay with a vague hope that a boat will show up 8 months from now. Walking and canoeing across unmapped wilderness. Building a railway where it makes no logistical sense to do so, and building a country on the back of that.
Canadians have been treated maliciously by the organizations that have downplayed this part of our history and replaced it by uninspiring mess that most people know. It's malicious towards the Indigenous people of this country as well, reducing them to a conquered people mistreated by evil white "settlers" that we remind of their conquest in each land acknowledgement, instead of the alternate path that could have treated them as a founding partner in the great ventures that made this country.
Somehow, a nation that once did great and adventurous things has been reduced to a small and inward looking place. We need to find a way to reverse that. I'm more optimistic of Poilievre than you, at least that I think he authentically gets what is wrong with the country, although whether he or anyone currently on the scene has the ability to reverse it over the near future is probably too big of an ask.
It's the petty smallness of soul of Canada’s mismanagers that has always most offended me about them.
IMHO, Canada needs to see itself as more than just a story of,by, and for Canadians; in funding, declaring, and defending its cultural historical nationhood it can be a beacon example to the world…
Exactly so.
Nope neighbor to the east, your today country isn't the same Canada I crossed on the ALCAN back in the day. The Mountie I knew that used to drive his official assigned vehicle across the border to bring back American Bourbon for his mommy "duty free" is long gone. As is the little old Lady in Lloydminster that asked me to bring a big crate of home canned tomatoes to her daughter who'd moved to Alaska that, when I was long passed customs and give it to the daughter I found was full of Canadian whisky. Thirty eleven other stories I could tell but...
Canuks, used to be, law abiding? Yep, long as they didn't get caught.
& just to be clear, I really liked that Canada!
Where do you think the rum was coming from during Prohibition? ;)
There's law abiding, and then there's law abiding...
I know where the rum was coming from, and as noted, I liked that Canada.
Canada today?
Crossing the border in 2008 was interesting. When I read the customs regulations, it appeared that a number of food items were prohibited, including potatoes, presumably because of the potato blight and famine in the US. However, when I declared my shotgun, they forgot about all that. As to the shotgun, all they wanted was their $25 fee and didn't even ask to see it. However, I did get harassed regarding where I was going, how long I was staying in Canada and how much money I had.
I am a veteran of the CF who has lost brothers in arms to the violence of foreigners; and yet it has been several years since I have worn a poppy. The "performstiveness" you describe is precisely why. To steal a line from Sam Hyde - seeing Trudeau wear a poppy is like seeing your mother ride a Harley, naked.
Thank you for sharing that. It's excruciatingly meaningful coming from a veteran.
Remembrance Day should be a celebration of veterans and serving military, not an opportunity for politicians to jump in front of a camera.
👏💯👏
Top notch! I have always felt the Canadians to be my closest cousins. I look forward to the day when you all may be free of the curse/spell that has befallen your land. The truckers were an inspiration to me. The fire is still there. It gladdens my heart when I think of the American who joined Canadian regiments in both world wars to get into the fight early. The story of the Canadians who fought in Vietnam needs to be told more. They were true warriors who crossed the border the other way when many others went North to hide.
The story of the Canadian Vietnam vets really does need to be told. I hadn't even realized there were so many until I researched this piece.
Of course, it rather flies in the face of the usual narrative about Vietnam, which is why no one wants to talk about it.
Sorry, I forgot to add this to my initial response. Your essay got me on a rabbit trail about the RCMP and the hunt for Albert Johnson. It also got me deep into reading about the Legion of Frontiersmen. If you ever are looking for other topics to write about, I’d love to read anything you write on topics like those.
Never heard of those. Sounds interesting.
I had no idea it was so many! A few hundred at most? I was blown away. There is a warrior spirit in the Anglo-Saxon blood.
Another fantastic piece I'll be reposting on X.
A few thoughts.
1. I think we can agree Canada's founding Anglo culture came from Upper Canada, but only a small portion the 30,000 odd UELs ended up in Upper Canada, which was only constituted in 1791. Moreover the Family Compact that governed as a pseudo-aristocracy until the Rebellion of 1837 had more in common with the British aristocracy or officer class than the UELs.
The majority of Upper Canada's anglo settlers came from the US: Upstate NY, southern New England and Pennsylvania. These "Late Loyalists" were required to swear oaths to the Crown and many weren't considered loyal. Nonetheless by the War of 1812 they vastly outnumbered UELs and the small settlements of Irish or Scots.
My point here is that while there was a "Britannic" elite until the Rebellion, thereafter the character of the colony changed and was dominated by the American emigrés and their founding cultures. These included New England Puritans and Pennsylvania Quakers. The mix of these two cultures contributed to the decline of martial virtues and the rise of "nice lady" politics that has ultimately fallen victim to the Liberal's multicultural atomization/divide and conquer policies. We did not get sufficient number of Scots-Irish settled and prospering until much later in the 19th century, which has not been good for our longevity as a martial people.
2. Your point about "Peace, Order and Good Government" vs. "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness" is well taken. It's maybe worth mentioning that POGG were just a bunch of florid rhetoric tossed in by the Imperial drafters, as was their custom in the mid 19th century. Canadians didn't draft the British North America Act (I realize the arg could be directed at LLPH but at least it was drafted by Americans).
One area you are quite right is in the degree of centralization. The principal difference between the BNA and US Constitution is that in Canada residual (ie. non-enumerated) powers explicitly fall to the Federal Govt. Whereas the opposite is true (implicitly) in America: they fall to the States (subject to Federal Paramountcy - a legal doctrine as it is). Unlike the States negotiating Union and preserving their prerogatives, Canada's Constitution was foisted on it by Imperial Parliament (which retained control until 1931 for foreign affairs, 1952 for judicial appeals, and 1982 for constitutional amendments). There was no negotiation between the Provinces/Regions and I believe this has come back over the centuries to haunt the Canadian experiment over and over again.
3. Lastly your points about a huge wilderness yet to be conquered is, I think, fantastic. Most of Canada is empty wasteland. We lack the technological economies of scale to exploit it currently. However that will change. I think your comment about Martian colonization is another understated point. Who better indeed. To quote Stan Rogers elegiac to the Bluenose, "She is always best under full press. Hard over as she'll lay." Scratch the surface of Anglo-French Canada and you'll find that.
Excellent context, particularly as regards the pernicious influence of Puritans. They've been a curse on the land since the Mayflower, frankly, and were a curse on England before that.
My own ancestral background is from those late emigres, though they weren't Puritans - they entered the US originally as Hessians in the employ of the Crown, but came north for land.
Much of this formative history is completely unknown in Canada … including to me, frankly. I've picked up a bit here and there, know more than the average Canadian I think, but I'm no scholar of the subject.
Me neither, and it IS amazing how little work has been done to synthesize any scholarship on Canadian migrations as it relates to ethnogenesis ESPECIALLY given how much hand wringing there is (or used to be) about Canadian identity!
I didn't even learn about the "Late Loyalists" (American's seeking free Crown land grants) until I read Colin Woodard's American nations where he briefly mentions Canada.
I totally agree with what you are saying but I disagree with your solution. The Canadians, like all western Europeans, need artists, poets, writers, musicians, etc. You need people who are adept at images, gestures and sounds in time. You need wealthy individuals to encourage such people to develop their craft. Going the way of technology won't do it because technology is a tool and can be used in anyway at all. Cultural identity must be ingrained at an early age and there must be initiation into a brotherhood. Ideally, you need fraternities, and people capable of understanding the techniques of cultural/spiritual transmission.
Very good article. Thanks.
What do you think I was getting at with the discussion of developing a proper national mythology? Obviously this is a task for the poets.
I love the imagery of the cold tip of the spear. Formed by disaffected rurals. AB & SK most likely. I submit we need the Grand Project - the Cold Tip of the Spear.
Well, the trouble with creating myths is that they take thousands of years to develop. Myths, like your friend Anglo-Saxon says, were about real people, or a composite of individuals amalgamated into an archetype in a prehistoric time of verbal transmission where men believed in gods at a more innocent level than modernists. We have objectified our innocent belief into oblivion.
Christianity separated spirit from the flesh, so to speak. Therefore, we need to reconnect with our psychic blood, to the stories that survive the test of time, that inspire boys and men. Scruton writes about this. You don't just memorize or read something, you move with the gods and heroes through ritual and initiation that emotionally connects you to the ancestors.
Carter, I did not know you until you wrote this...rousing, righteous and rigorous history of Canada, my adopted land of which I have become very tired indeed. You're absolutely correct: we must find it in ourselves to fight or we will simply die with a whimper...
“Canada contributed Celine Dion and Stan Rogers.” Don’t overlook Leonard Cohen and Gordon Lightfoot!
Only 3 comments so far? For a masterpiece that had my heart singing with vindication and I am Greek, NOT Canadian, but had the privilege of living there for 14 formative years. Canada, a place where roads stop, where you can die without at least some wilderness skills not 100 miles from the border. The haunting quietude.
Compare and contrast this magnificent essay with the rag that calls itself Canadian Patriot , that poses as 'historical' and which sets out to prove that Canada's destiny is to be part of the United States....
I don't think I've come across Canadian Patriot, but I'm already not a fan if that's what it advocates.
One thing I'll say about Greece - much nicer weather! I'm hoping to spend a few months there at some point, doing a sort of pilgrimage of classical sites.
Greece has some of the highest mountains in Europe with Alpine weather to match - and ski slopes, believe it or not. Google Mt. Grammos and Zagarochoria for a quick look - very beautiful. The country consists of 'highlands and islands' ie Balkans and sea. Please get in touch when you do decide!
Canadian Patriot is better known as Matthew Ehret online, it will make your hair stand on end. He has written lots of Canadian history 'books' available for free at his site. Not to mention his regurgitation of Greek philosophy......
Ah, yes I'm familiar with Matthew Ehret. I've enjoyed some of his stuff but I sometimes wonder if he's being funded by Beijing.
The Greek landscape is stunning, though I haven't seen it with my own eyes! I hope to soon.
"Canada contributed Celine Dion and Stan Rogers."
And William Shatner and Mike Myers.
Stan Rogers is great.
I am a Canadian , i enjoyed and was ( to some extent ) inspired by this essay . A great many of us are well aware of what the liberal patty are up to and we can't wait until the opportunity arises to banish them from this planet . A great many of us admire the trumpster and we hope that this new American dream will in some way rub off on us. An example is being sent by our American friends of how to cleanse a nation and reestablish its destiny. I believe you are right in saying we need to reestablish the mores of our past . A great read and thankyou !
Trumpism can't be imported directly, obviously. That's one of the core points here.
But that said, we can and should take inspiration from the example!
You know my feelings about space and Mars, won't bother repeating them. But this article was very pleasing to read, to be honest I see myself not as an Anglo-Saxon (c'est impossible), I'm a Franco-Celte, and I love the ferocity of our people, the savagery of Canadians and Quebecois, a people who didn't flee from danger but flew towards it.
To me, whenever Americans talk about conquering or annexing Canada I must admit I bristle and I view the notion with the utmost disdain. I detest the idea.
Canada/Quebec has always outproduced and out-performed in manufacturing and in war, and we've always been more European, more Anglo-Saxon, more Celtic and more French than America to my mind and this is something that fills me with pride.
I hate the leaf, and am glad to see you championing our Red Ensign. In my view the British Empire is at an end, so I'd prefer if we attached ourselves to a French Empire, as Quebec wishes to. I see more potential there, and more joy in such a thing, but I see us as the most integral part of such an Empire. The film-capital of France is Quebec, the cultural centre is Quebec and the producer of the best novels in the Francosphere is Quebec.
That said, Anglo-Canada's Asian connections and independent spirit combined with the sheer Celtique Savagery of Quebec and its Euro & Franco-African and Franco-Asian connections combined could make Canada a force if we were just to allow ourselves to become unchained and to force out the bureaucrats currently strangling the very life from us.
Yet we'd also need to remigrate, focus on ourselves and our resources and get back on the gold-standard and we'd be the leading economy.
Rather than joining some other empire, I would rather that Canada truly starts living for itself. That is part of what I was trying to communicate here … that the reactionary essence of the country is not intrinsically linked to a foreign empire, but something that stands on its own.
That’s also a beautiful sentiment, I quite like it. I think your wish is a really beautiful one, I hope it end up being like you said.
True
"To me, whenever Americans talk about conquering or annexing Canada I must admit I bristle and I view the notion with the utmost disdain. I detest the idea."
Bros, THIS American doesn't want to annex Canada. We have enough problems of our own. But I'd gladly trade you New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut for Alberta and BC ... :-D
You can have Quebec too- it's all yours.
lol non merci, we don’t want ‘em (NY, Massa & Connecticut I mean). Honestly, I think Canada & US work better separately as I said and Alberta & BC are crucial to Canada. You guys can have southern Ontario though.
Agreed
Brilliant analytical history of Canada, JC of B. I learned SO much that I never knew before.
One comment in passing. You said (of the British): "British forces pushed as far south as Washington, DC ... which they burned to the ground."
You don't suppose we might get them to come back and do it again, do you? I'd wager the red states would likely foot the bill. And they'd have to bring a LOT more torches...🤪
Sadly, the British have their own problems. Once America gets its house in order, it might consider returning the favor and liberating the British from their own native oppression…
Whoa! Now THERE'S a new concept---America invades Britain (250 years after...). The question is whether Britain hates its own government enough to welcome an amphibious landing in Cornwall (for liberation, of course...🤪). We could hire a Patton impersonater to wade ashore and declare "I have returned!" (I know, Patton would have cringed at doing a "MacArthur"...)
It'd be interesting to see, personally, I wouldn't bet the farm on it...🤔
Or just starts deniably supplying weapons to local insurgents.
Well they didn't "push" as far south as Washington. In fact the seasoned troops that the Empire diverted from the Peninsular war in 1813 and 1814 were caught up around Lake George and Lake Champlain and never made it further south.
The reference to burning DC and the WH is ofc correct. But this was done amphibiously by sailing up the Potomac.
Almost nothing was accomplished by the War of 1812. Americans refused to cross into a foreign country to fight (witness Stephen Renssaeler' ill-fated attempt to cross the Niagara River). The Canadians took Detroit with a ruse that would would have made Hannibal blush, but were eventually kicked out and pushed out - fighting a rearguard action to the current city of London, Ontario.
In the end the remoteness and wilderness was as much an advantage as a disadvantage.
Meanwhile American privateers were terrorizing British shipping. In the end the British had the upper hand in the land war, but the Americans were getting the better of them in the naval war. It was a draw. So everyone agreed to call it off and go back to status quo antebellum.
There was some privateering going the other way too :)
"A letter of marque came from the King..."
To the scummiest vessel I’d ever seen!