All aboot Canada
The other night I watched a documentary movie called 'Souvineer of Canada'. It's the creation of an excellent Canadian author named Douglas Coupland. He's the guy who coined such phrases as 'Generation X' (in the early 90s book of the same name) and 'McJob', among others. The doco was his artistic statement of what he feels it means to be a Canadian. Part of the film documented his project called 'Canada House' where he filled an old government house with all sorts of Canadian paraphanalia including a big blow-up picture of one-legged runner Terry Fox's sock, a Wayne Gretzky poster, hockey sticks etc. (The contents of the house were transferred to a London art gallery before the house was demolished.) The film was a timely introduction to Canadian culture for a newbie like myself. The only down side to the film was that Coupland wasn't the best narrator and appeared a bit aloof and superior. I guess it's ok though because he is a genius.
I know very little 'aboot' Canada. It's Canada day today so I bought three different newpapers to try to piece together what the state of the nation is. Like Australia, Canada is a very young country and it has *lots* of space. People are friendly and optimistic. Perhaps because people have it so good it is a slighly hedonistic country and many people are politically apathetic. I've seen very little of the country so I can't really comment on what the different regions are like. Economically though I understand the Western provinces are on fire while the eastern ones are suffering. Canada is officially bilingual and everything is written in English and French. The predominantly French province of Quebec has threatened succession on a number of occasions. Canada seems safer than the US because there aren't as many guns arounds in the general populace and crime rates are lower. Canada also has fewer fundamentalist Christians than the US. Canada's indigenous population were treated terribly by the whiteman but unlike Australian Aboriginals they do have the benefit of treaties.
In general, Canada is a very progressive, freedom-loving and open-mined society. This is reflected in the generous immigration policy, lax attitudes to marijuana and legalised gay marriages. They did just voted in a Conservative government but the PM doesn't appear to be as nasty as John Howard.
I've found some interesting statistics in an article in McCleans magazine which is the major current affairs magazine. The stats are from a big national poll, that was last done 30 yrs ago, in order to trend Canadian's attitudes to various topics.
Here are a few figures:
63% of Canadians say recreational marijuana use is okay.
61% of Canadians approve of, or accept the idea of gay couples adopting children.
40% of Canadians believe there is no one ideal family model.
90% of Canadians value 'freedom' most of all (83% said family, 51% said a rewarding career)
The American author Mark Twain was a prolific travel writer. I think I remember reading some quote of his that referred to the purpose of travel. It was something about *experiencing* for yourself in order to test your own preconceived ideas of a place as well as those thrust at you by others. I'll certainly be forcing myself to experience as much as I can before economic reality and 'resonsibility' catches up with me.
MG
I know very little 'aboot' Canada. It's Canada day today so I bought three different newpapers to try to piece together what the state of the nation is. Like Australia, Canada is a very young country and it has *lots* of space. People are friendly and optimistic. Perhaps because people have it so good it is a slighly hedonistic country and many people are politically apathetic. I've seen very little of the country so I can't really comment on what the different regions are like. Economically though I understand the Western provinces are on fire while the eastern ones are suffering. Canada is officially bilingual and everything is written in English and French. The predominantly French province of Quebec has threatened succession on a number of occasions. Canada seems safer than the US because there aren't as many guns arounds in the general populace and crime rates are lower. Canada also has fewer fundamentalist Christians than the US. Canada's indigenous population were treated terribly by the whiteman but unlike Australian Aboriginals they do have the benefit of treaties.
In general, Canada is a very progressive, freedom-loving and open-mined society. This is reflected in the generous immigration policy, lax attitudes to marijuana and legalised gay marriages. They did just voted in a Conservative government but the PM doesn't appear to be as nasty as John Howard.
I've found some interesting statistics in an article in McCleans magazine which is the major current affairs magazine. The stats are from a big national poll, that was last done 30 yrs ago, in order to trend Canadian's attitudes to various topics.
Here are a few figures:
63% of Canadians say recreational marijuana use is okay.
61% of Canadians approve of, or accept the idea of gay couples adopting children.
40% of Canadians believe there is no one ideal family model.
90% of Canadians value 'freedom' most of all (83% said family, 51% said a rewarding career)
The American author Mark Twain was a prolific travel writer. I think I remember reading some quote of his that referred to the purpose of travel. It was something about *experiencing* for yourself in order to test your own preconceived ideas of a place as well as those thrust at you by others. I'll certainly be forcing myself to experience as much as I can before economic reality and 'resonsibility' catches up with me.
MG
posted by Matt G at 7:18 PM
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