Canada
Plenty to Celebrate on Canada Day
Canada Day happened almost two weeks ago. People across the country gathered for concerts, barbecues, fireworks and parties.
But what exactly are we celebrating on Canada Day?
There’s a lot worth celebrating about Canada, of course. We played an important role in defeating the tyranny of Nazism and fascism. We’ve been a place of safety for people fleeing conflicts in countries ranging from Ireland to Ukraine to Hungary to Vietnam to Syria. We’ve created scientific innovations ranging from the electron microscope to insulin treatments. We have a rich cultural legacy in everything from art to music to TV and film.
All those things are a part of Canada, of course, but there are other elements of the country worth celebrating on Canada Day. Our bonds of family and friendship, those moments in all of our lives when we share in joy or comfort each other in times of despair, are Canada too. People enriching Canadian culture with their own contributions, from Ukrainian shumka dancers to African-inspired hip hop, are also Canada. Celebrations of important holidays from Christmas to Hanukkah to Ramadan are Canada.
The ways we’ve supported each other, from helping Quebec in the devastating 1990s ice storms to Eastern Canadian farmers sending hay to help their Western colleagues hammered by drought to the 2003 Rocks For Toronto concert helping Toronto’s economy recover from the SARS epidemic to different parts of the country sending people and equipment like trucks and waterbombers to help each other fight the wildfires, are all Canada.
A lot of these things might not seem like much on their own, but taken together they’re just as important as any of the ‘big’ things worth recognizing about the country. They also reflect some of the smaller ways that Canada’s contributed to the world, from John Diefenbaker’s early opposition to South African apartheid to the millions of dollars Terry Fox runs have raised for cancer research.
In short, there are as many things to celebrate on Canada Day as there are people who will celebrate it.
None of this means forgetting or ignoring the darker side of our history, from large-scale abuses and violence against Indigenous people and Canadians descended from ‘enemy’ countries during the World Wars like Japan, Ukraine and Germany to individual acts of racism and hate, too many of which happen every day in Canada.
What it does mean is that celebrating or criticizing Canada doesn’t have to be a binary choice. I often consider myself ‘patriotic, but not uncritically so’. My patriotism and pride in being Canadian are what’s motivated a lot of my writings and actions over the years. I’ve studied a lot of our history, including its ugly parts, to try and explain a lot of the long-standing issues we have in Canada and why they need to change.
I obviously can’t fix everything by myself, but hopefully I can make Canada better in my own small way… And help make Canada Day further worth celebrating.
Originally published at https://www.stalbertgazette.com on July 1, 2024.
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