I agree. In fact, sometimes I get wistful–it seems so quiet and prosperous and safe up there; free health care, no homeless, hardly any crime, great cultural opportunities, etc. But then I think about why my ancestors came down here–they all say that sometimes there’s a spark missing somehow, that the social harmony means a quiet conformity that can rankle like Japan’s, that you can only rise so high or be so ambitious before the whispers start that you’re getting above yourself, etc. No, you can’t fail and end up on the street, but you can’t reach the heights either. My grandmother was fond of saying that she was able to take her daughters, both college-educated, around to see the houses she used to clean when she arrived in the '30s as a maid, and that to her was the American dream.
I don’t think there’s too much patriotism up there, but the amount of flags and maple leaves all over everything gets pretty comical sometimes. But like Jodi said, part of the price of wanting to go your own way in political matters is having a friend go “fine” and continue on their path, leaving you behind.
Recent ad in the Montreal Gazette, from some American green card lottery broker:
And people wonder why we get touchy. Although I’d have to say my present touchiness is in large part directed at the Gazouille’s benighted management, not an entirely uncommon state of affairs.
Excuse me?! Have you seen the US lately? I go down there and there are American flags on everything. On things I have never seen a Canadian flag on. Rows of twenty flagpoles. Flags on subway cars, flags in taxis and restaurant windows, good heavens.
We might put the odd unifolié up from place to place, but I’ve never seen the entire facade of a building draped with an enormous one.
Nothing wrong with this - you can do whatever you like with your flag - but the idea that we’re more in love with ours than you are with yours strikes me as the comical thing.
I don’t necessarily think Mehitabel meant that the Canadian flag is more prevalent in Canada than the US flag in the US, matt. For me, I see the US flag everywhere, and tune it out. However, when I go abroad, Canada is more like the US in that respect than any other country I’ve seen. (The sample size is smaller than I’d like, and confined to a half-dozen countries in northern Europe.)
So, yes. For me, it’s comical to see maple leaves on everything, just as it is comical to see the Stars and Stripes on the side of a snowplow in downtown Minneapolis.
I don’t know, matt, I live on the U.S.-Canada border and I’m pretty sure that Canadian flags are more prevalent on the Canadian side than U.S. flags on the U.S. side. This is especially true in the twin cities of Niagara Falls, where U.S. flags are all but non-existent.
Of course, if you lived in Niagara Falls, New York, you wouldn’t be too proud of your country, either.
Well, NYC has a lot of flags since 9/11–they were put on subway cars and buses after that, and most businesses have a little sign somewhere. It’s more a statement of solidarity and healing than a blatant political endorsement of one party or philosophy or whatever. I don’t know about the rest of the country, though. But in Canada I saw flags seemingly used as decoration a lot–the Busker Festival on the Halifax waterfront had little ones strung as bunting on the ships on exhibit, and they were stuck at odd angles in a lot of the light poles, etc. Even the restaurant I ate it in quiet little Mabou had little plastic flags fluttering on the porch. Maybe it was a “remember what country you’re in”, but it was a little strange to me.
matt_mcl, that green card lottery ad is jerkish, sorry on behalf of my fellow Yank. But it does raise an interesting question. I’m going to start a MPSIMS thread on National Dreams.