Canada's Panamerica Identity

[lio45]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

ARGH... this type of shit drives me crazy.

How is healthcare a thing that people FEEL day to day? It's not something that WPG and TO share in common. Sure, the bills are comparable. But it's not some HUGE, unique "Canadian" thing to go to a hospital when hurt and not worry about it. It's the norm for all of the developed world, even in the States for those with good insurance.

To me, it's like saying.. "Uh, duh... they both need oxygen. They're totes the same."

Oh, healthcare's the same. Yeah, great. We should be the same fucking country then, let's go celebrate.



No. People in Winnipeg are left-wing and prairie folk. People in Minneapolis are the same. Neither would have much time for a flaming homosexual from Cabbagetown, and both would be uncomfortable and react politely when dealing with a Reform/Republican idiot from further west.

I guess I need sarcasm tags...

[SignalHillHiker]

Oh, thank GOD. I missed it completely, no surprise. But I was shocked that such a post was from you.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

Well, if you're correct, they still teach us in school that it's a non-existent hybrid of all the different leaves.

In schools on your rock? Well, I wouldn't expect them to know any better over there, I am pretty sure it's outside the range of all native North American maple species.

If you want to be picky, you could maybe try to argue that the leaf on the flag could pass off as a parasitic Norway maple leaf... but no

[ciudad_del_norte]

God this forum is hard to follow sometimes. Somebody says they live somewhere unique and everybody freaks out and tells them it's bs because Canada's all the same*

Somebody else says they feel more at home in other parts of Canada than across the border and suddenly Alberta is pretty much Montana.

We're also pretty quick to acknowledge differences in Canada if it makes us feel better than the ROC**. But god forbid it implies another part of the country might be better for something, then it's just ridiculous because we are all the effing same!!***



*QC and NL exuded
** context dependant
*** except when you are worse

[niwell]

I'm in Calgary at the moment and if urban form is discounted, it feels far more similar to Toronto than pretty much anywhere in the US (which is close enough as it is). Including places like, Buffalo for instance.

Sarcasm aside, things like healthcare and school systems do make a difference in culture.

I'm a huge proponent of recognizing the strong regionalism in Canada but it gets a bit out of hand sometimes. We know that Nfld is a special snowflake, but there are still country-wide cultural similarities.

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

Why the hell would Winnipeg ever be MORE similar to Toronto than Minneapolis? WHY would anyone ever expect that to be the case? It flies against logic AND reality.

Erm, no, it doesn't. At all. But then again, you think St. John's is more like Boston than Toronto. I mean, St. John's and Boston are so utterly unalike in just about every way you can think of, save, perhaps, for the odd clapboard streetscape, that it's confounding that anyone would make such a claim, but you seem to want to. So what's the point in trying to argue that Canadian commonalities supercede north-south cross-border ones when you are so impervious to reason?

But here I go again: you're preventing me from working, you know.

While there undoubtedly are prairie sensibilities that certain subsets of the populations in Winnipeg and Minneapolis share that a Torontonian would find foreign, they're overshadowed by the other things.

In a working class neighbourhood in Minneapolis you'll have numerous families with kids in the military and all that that entails: sons injured or killed in Iraq, uncles killed, maimed or otherwise injured in any of the other foreign excursions of the past forty years, other family members or neighbours who've lost sons and uncles in Vietnam. Poor and working class neighbourhoods in American cities are the main breeding grounds for the U.S. military, along with rural areas.

There will be a high school with security guards and metal detectors, and the general tenor of academic life in the area will reflect that. But there will be several kids with special athletic ability who will have dreams of college careers followed by the prospect of the lottery of the NBA, NFL or MLB. They will be fawned over and celebrated as local heroes.

People will have grim medical conditions because they've lost their jobs and health insurance. They will be frighteningly obese. Etc. All of these things will form a backdrop to life in the neighbourhood and will invariably come up in conversation.

The academic neighbourhood will be next to one of the top universities in the world. The left-wing pseudo-anarcho types will be outnumbered and overshadowed by the douchey fraternities and the feverish athletic atmosphere, perhaps best characterized by the fact that the coach of the football team makes a million dollars or more a year.

The opulent houses on cul-de-sacs next to lakes will be home to upper management types working at the headquarters of Fortune 500 companies that you've heard of like 3M, General Mills, Target and BestBuy, and companies that you haven't heard of but that are major players in the world's second largest economy, like UnitedHealth. There is astounding wealth in Minneapolis.

Winnipeg has, and is, none of these things. But the clincher is probably Prince. And a movie called Purple Rain. Prince and Purple Rain are just about as un-Winnipeg as you can possibly get.

You can't conflate a few granola crunchers in Wolseley with a troup of Chomsky acolytes in Minneapolis into a pat notion that Winnipeg is more like Minneapolis than it is like Toronto, because the evidence against it is overwhelming. And even when lefties in Winnipeg and Minneapolis find common ground on things like a vitriolic hatred of Bush, what's going to happen when the Winnipegger mentions Harper?

Crickets. That is, unless someone from Toronto is there.

To clarify, I'm not suggesting that Winnipeg and Toronto are twin cities (heh...see what I did there?). I'm just stating the bleedin' obvious: the commonalities that impact your life as a Canadian are more important than any north-south similarities are. Which is not to suggest that cross-border friendships or fun nights in bars aren't going to happen. We're speaking in generalities, as ever.

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

a non-existent hybrid of all the different leaves.

canada!

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by rousseau

But the clincher is probably Prince. And a movie called Purple Rain. Prince and Purple Rain are just about as un-Winnipeg as you can possibly get.

this is... very true.

and prince came from/spawned a whole scene in minneapolis, a whole funk/new wave thing that is very non-burton cummings.

[kool maudit]

it is funny how these things play out, or the differing ways in which they grow visible.

i have talked to some swiss friends about it, and it seems like most suisse romande are just about willing to say they have more in common with their neighbors in lyon than their countrymen in basel or zurich, but they do emphasize swiss things like direct democracy (it occupies a similar place in their self-conception as healthcare does in ours).

swiss germans, i find, are less likely to de-emphasize switzerland, and seem very convinced that their country is much more of a united entity and is very unlike germany or austria despite certain appearances.

this reflects both their dominant situation within switzerland and their consequent strong affirmation of regional uniqueness i think, as does the similar trend among english canadians regarding the united states.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

... this reflects both their dominant situation within switzerland and their consequent strong affirmation of regional uniqueness i think, as does the similar trend among english canadians regarding the united states.

Wow, that's very interesting! The parallels are pretty strong with Anglo Canadians there.

Culturally, though, I am pretty sure that, for example, at Christmas, someone from Suisse Romande dating someone from Lyon will experience no "Christmas habits cultural shock" at all...

... while that person, dating instead a fellow countryperson from Zurich, would experience a minor one at least. Which would be of the same scale, and likely identical in fact, as if his/her significant other was a Bavarian instead of a (German) Swiss.

Those are the things that people have in mind when claiming things like "Suisse Romande is culturally closer to Lyon than Zurich".



(Disclaimer, I'm just guessing for what I'm saying above... but as I said earlier in the thread, on our continent, it's exactly like this. For the second Christmas in a row, I'm dating an Anglo. The interesting part is, my ex was American while my current gf is Anglo Canadian. I have observed that the Christmas traditions of the Toronto-Cleveland culture seem to be the same and are somewhat different from what we're used to here, enough to create a mild cultural shock that was completely absent with Québecois exes at Christmas time.)

[lio45]

Originally Posted by niwell

Sarcasm aside, things like healthcare and school systems do make a difference in culture.

School system, yes, they help shape neighborhoods (and, more generally, society)... even though that's minor in the grand scheme of things... but healthcare? Even more minor.

I will admit I don't see it with my weekend retreat in NH as I am still spending most of my time in Canada but I did live continously in California for six months... in the list of all the foreign/exotic/culturally different features of the place compared to home that I've noticed in six months' time of everyday life and everyday interactions, healthcare would be item 50+.

Sure, it might have an impact on job choices, etc. but that's minor compared to the difference that, say, oil makes on a given place's job market.

When you're experiencing the culture of a place that's not home, if you're actually noticing things like healthcare making a visible cultural difference to you, then it proves my (our) point that culturally, your home and that place are extremely similar.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

ARGH... this type of shit drives me crazy.

How is healthcare a thing that people FEEL day to day? It's not something that WPG and TO share in common. Sure, the bills are comparable. But it's not some HUGE, unique "Canadian" thing to go to a hospital when hurt and not worry about it. It's the norm for all of the developed world, even in the States for those with good insurance.

To me, it's like saying.. "Uh, duh... they both need oxygen. They're totes the same."

Oh, healthcare's the same. Yeah, great. We should be the same fucking country then, let's go celebrate.



No. People in Winnipeg are left-wing and prairie folk. People in Minneapolis are the same. Neither would have much time for a flaming homosexual from Cabbagetown, and both would be uncomfortable and react politely when dealing with a Reform/Republican idiot from further west.



Leaf isn't even a maple, really. It's a hybrid that doesn't exist in nature. Has elements of all of the leaves of the 10 different maple species found in each province.

SHH, we are a country with vegetable matter and a destructive rodent as our national symbols. Why would identification with a health care system surprise anyone?

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

Maritimes/New England. Quebec/Vermont. TO/Whatever (TO is an outlier because it's our biggest area, so it has it's own "Canadian" thing going on, it's a world onto itself, like NYC proper). Prairies/Prairies.

.

The places along the border that feel the most different are Quebec-U.S. because of the language (regardless of certain "feel" commonalities with a place like Vermont, that only apply to a narrow band along the border anyway) and also southern Ontario vs. the Buffalo/Detroit areas because of stark demographic and socio-economic differences particular to this region.

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

Ugh... this pan-Canadian thing just doesn't exist. It doesn't. I've lived in every province from here to Winnipeg, and none of them were as same as the other, and none of them were more similar to each other than the Americans due south of them.

Maritimes/New England. Quebec/Vermont. TO/Whatever (TO is an outlier because it's our biggest area, so it has it's own "Canadian" thing going on, it's a world onto itself, like NYC proper). Prairies/Prairies.

They're WAY more similar to what's below them than what's thousands of kilometres across. To me, that's just basic common sense.

Why the hell would Winnipeg ever be MORE similar to Toronto than Minneapolis? WHY would anyone ever expect that to be the case? It flies against logic AND reality.

give me a break. I have lived in Quebec, Ontario, Alberta and BC. The differences are there. No doubt, and Quebec is most different of the bunch. But the similarities are massive, and make no mistake, the east-west similarities are greater for the most part than this illusory north-south axis, the obvious shared characteristics of the hinterlands aside.

Winnipeg is much more like Toronto than Minneapolis.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by FrAnKs

A little less because it's not my country and it's normal ! But overall, I think I would be ''Familliar'' anywhere in North America.

But anyway, I bet you know how politics & mentalities are sometimes different in USA.
Guns, religions (the bible belt), violence, cultural tensions (White vs black) all that stuff ( I don't want to fall into cliches, but this is it )

There is alot more things about Canada that I agree with in general than USA. That is what makes me a Canadian.

Other parts of Canada and Quebec share a familiarity that has a human side for sure but I would posit that much of the feeling of home between the two is primarily "administrative". There is no border, the currency is the same, there is Interac everywhere, there is Tim Hortons everywhere, product labelling is bilingual, you can get CBC and Radio-Canada everywhere, distances and speeds are in km, etc.

It should also be pointed out that all of the francophones on here are bilingual. Those who are not are likely to feel quite differently about such matters.

As for the unilingual anglophones on here who say they'd feel more at home in Chicoutimi than in Minneapolis, I think there is a certain form of "Canadianism" at play that leads them to believe that "language doesn't matter". Simply because it's the Canadian thing to say or feel. It's ingrained in their minds that language shouldn't be a dividing factor among Canadians, simply because that's always been one of the most divisive issues in this country.

Of course, saying it isn't so doesn't necessarily make it so.

Also, this "Canadianism" about language not mattering when it comes to feeling at home in a place isn't the way people anywhere else in the world see things.

It's a bit of custom-made meme just for Canada.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Acajack

The places along the border that feel the most different are Quebec-U.S. because of the language (regardless of certain "feel" commonalities with a place like Vermont, that only apply to a narrow band along the border anyway) and also southern Ontario vs. the Buffalo/Detroit areas because of stark demographic and socio-economic differences particular to this region.

Apparently also Alberta/Montana, it's being pointed out in a recurring manner in these threads.

(I'll defer to the experience of those who know better, as I've never been to Alberta; I've been to Montana and it was pretty much like I expected, and it was what I expect AB to be like too.)

In my opinion all the differences can be traced to the basic fact that the worth and appeal of Alberta-Montana land + climate are really really low in an American context yet decent in a Canadian one.

Also with the NW->SE way the fossil fuel deposits belt lies (AB-SK-ND), from that point of view one might say that ND is actually a better American "match" for AB than MT.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Acajack

... there is Tim Hortons everywhere

That's a peculiar trait that struck me in southeastern Michigan, actually. It's full of Tim Hortons...

Here as soon as you cross the border you strictly leave the land of Tim Hortons and enter the land of Dunkin Donuts.

[ciudad_del_norte]

I've only spent time on either sides of the border in coastal BC and Alberta. I could see an argument for similarities in an around Vancouver. But the idea that Alberta and Montana are similar doesn't make much sense to me. The differences in the Alberta case are even more pronounced by the fact that Alberta has two cities with a larger population than all of Montana, and these two cities are located farther from the border than most Canadian population centres. People still go to Montana but it is significantly more rural and remote in mentality and culture. The reform movement was (is?) quite different in political and historical foundation than Montana's red state leanings.

I get that the US Narrative is easier to grasp, but the need to constantly group regions in with their "US counterpart" to understand Canada is misleading in most cases that I'm familiar with.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

it is funny how these things play out, or the differing ways in which they grow visible.

i have talked to some swiss friends about it, and it seems like most suisse romande are just about willing to say they have more in common with their neighbors in lyon than their countrymen in basel or zurich, but they do emphasize swiss things like direct democracy (it occupies a similar place in their self-conception as healthcare does in ours).

swiss germans, i find, are less likely to de-emphasize switzerland, and seem very convinced that their country is much more of a united entity and is very unlike germany or austria despite certain appearances.

this reflects both their dominant situation within switzerland and their consequent strong affirmation of regional uniqueness i think, as does the similar trend among english canadians regarding the united states.

I was going to post the exact same thing but talking about francophone Belgians, whom I know a bit better than the Swiss. They are also more forthcoming about their similarities with people in northern France.

Like the Swiss as you say, there are things of course that they like and treasure about Belgium itself that they share with the Flemings and not the French (the king of Belgium, a preference for beer over wine, triangular gingerbread-style houses, though in the latter case you can see these in northern France as well).

But the many commonalities with France are not something they eschew either.

"Lille feels totally foreign to me but Antwerp feels just like home. Language don't matter." is not really something the average person in Liège or Namur would say.

[1overcosc]

Interesting that it's the Southern Ontarians on this forum that are the most favouring of east-west over north-south.

Southern Ontario has very weak ties to the parts of the US it borders. Toronto, Ottawa, London, etc. have very little in common with the Great Lakes states. Notably, Eastern Ontario and Northeast New York are worlds apart. In Ogdensburg, NY, which is literally on the Canadian border, most people have no idea that Ottawa is the capital of Canada or that a city called Ottawa even exists, despite the fact that they're less than a hour's drive away. Imagine, not knowing about a city of a million people only 70km from your house!

Whereas the rest of Anglo Canada seems to have stronger cross-border ties. Notably, the Pacific Northwest seems to be have close north-south ties.