LILLEY: Be a proud Canadian for Canada's sake, not due to Trump

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I’m sipping an Americano as I write this, not a Canadiano.

It’s what I drink all the time. It’s a coffee that is stronger than a regular brew but weaker than straight espresso.

There is a push by Kicking Horse Cafe in Invermere, B.C., to show your national pride, to respond to Donald Trump by having cafes across the country switch their menu offerings from Americanos to Canadianos.

Look, I’m all in favour of national pride, but then again, I always have been.

What is bothering me is that so many Canadians have only recently discovered their national pride.

It wasn’t that long ago that we were hearing people refer to this country as Turtle Island, they would put out statements or make speeches using the term “so-called Canada.” The idea that Canada did not exist, or was illegitimate, was very much in vogue.

We’ve gone from that being the zeitgeist among far too many people trying to shape our culture, to everyone screaming about beavers, geese and waving the flag.

If you recall, the idea of waving the flag was considered divisive and triggering just a couple of years ago.

For some, it was the Freedom Convoy that made them feel anger at seeing the Canadian flag, for others like Megan Ball Rigden, it was Canada’s own complicated colonial history that had her hesitant to embrace the red and white.

“I don’t think I would be waving one myself regardless of the convoy, quite frankly,” Rigden said to the Canadian Press in 2022.

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We’ve torn down statues in this country, we have renamed public squares and streets. In Toronto, we are taking historical names off of public schools as we try to erase Macdonald, Ryerson, and Dundas.

We’ve been described by our own prime minister as a genocidal state — something I’ve never agreed with — but how can you be proud of being part of a genocidal state?

Recall that just after he was elected as PM in 2015, Justin Trudeau gave his first big interview to the New York Times and told us that there was nothing special about Canada.

We were a post-national state with no core identity, he said.

Now, that’s not how most Canadians felt.

While our political and cultural leadership in Canada was busy running the country down, most of us still thought this place was worthwhile.
And yet a poll from the Angus Reid INstitute in December showing that just 34% of us said we were very proud of being Canadian. Well, Angus Reid asked that question again this month, and it now finds that 44% of us say we are very proud to be Canadian.

What’s the difference?

Donald Trump.

Think about that.

The boost in people saying they are proud to be Canadian only came about after Trump started talking about Canada becoming the 51st state.

We should have been proud of being Canadian before Trump, not because of Trump.

Canada, as a nation, is an amazing country.

We have a history of innovation in medicine from insulin to inventing the pacemaker or developing pablum for infants. We invented the telephone, the pager, the walkie-talkie and, of course, the Blackberry.

We invented time zones, were key to the development of radio, television and the internet.

In culture, Canadians have flourished in music, television, stage, and film.

We have an incredibly diverse and beautiful landscape. Each time I visit another region of the country, the beauty is simply breathtaking. There are regional cultures that are unique and distinct and that doesn’t just mean Quebec.

While too often Quebec is seen as it’s own culture and English Canada is simply an appendage of the United States, that isn’t true.  We have national and regional variances in how we speak the English language that separate us from the Americans, Brits, Aussies and Kiwis that we share this language with.

Bottom line, as Canadians, we have a lot to be proud of.

It shouldn’t take being angry at a threat from a foreign leader for that pride to emerge. We should be proud to be Canadians, not just as Trudeau would say, because we are “not Americans.”

Vive le Canada!