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| Subject: Well... | |
Author: Ed Harris (London) | [ Next Thread |
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] Date Posted: 23:35:03 01/26/05 Wed In reply to: Andrew(Canada) 's message, "sorry steph..." on 19:23:31 01/26/05 Wed I disagree. New Zealanders and Australians can still integrate pretty well into British society, but Canadians and South Africans seem very alien to us now: but no more than Americans. Given that Canadians in Britain are often mistaken for Americans, any attempt to play on the 'otherness' of Americans will also affect Canadians. Most Brits think that Canadians are Yanks who speak slowly. I'm not saying that it is right, just that it is so. Moreover, the 13 colonies did not rebel against the King in the 1770s, just parliament. That's why the Declaration had to have to many references to the evil of George III., because they had to convince a sceptical public that total separation was justified, rather than merely political independence, such as was enjoyed in Rhode Island, Massachussets etc. [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> Subject: just because its that way... | |
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Author: Andrew(Canada) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 23:50:21 01/26/05 Wed well, just because Britain sees Canada and the US as one and the same doesn't mean its so. many Canadians here are originally from Britain, with a few Aussies and Kiwis mixed in. my family hails from Cambridge, Manchester, and Durban, South Africa. i am only a second generation Canadian. as well, going on how someone speaks is a pretty poor measure of what they are like. Canadians may speak more like Americans, but they think along the same lines as other Commonwealth citizens. many people in the US, however, do not think the same way that we do. Canada and the Commonwealth have similar cultures, and we definitely see ourselves more like Britain than the US. i blame poor schooling/the media(on both sides) for portraying Canadians in the manner you speak of. we are really very much the same. my main point was that based on culture, society, and government, not what your accent sounds like, is why we are similar to each other and the US is not. i realise Ed you probably dont think this way, im just trying to explain my stance on the issue. i think its so hilarious sometimes how four countries who are inherently very similar and from a common history treat each other like they are complete strangers. political correctness gone mad if you ask me. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Oh, I agree... | |
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Author: Ed Harris (London) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 00:19:42 01/27/05 Thu I am the first to leap up and shout at people on the telly who say that Michael J Fox or Dan Ackroyd, for example, are American. I am also keen to point out to Brits that Chris Plummer or Mike Myers, whom they assume are just British, are in fact Canadian, as this reinforces the impression that we're not that different. On the other hand, to continue with the idea of celebrities as examples, the most Canadian-sounding actor whom we know is John Lithgow, who is in fact from New York or somewhere equally ghastly. I think that he sounds more like Lloyd Grossman than Paul Martin, but so long as the majority are unable to get it right, you're going to have problems convincing the British public (although not me!) that Canadians are more like us than they are like Americans. As you say, one's accent is not a reliable indicator of character, but as a superficial way of judging people it is pretty much the easiest and most convincing. Can you tell the difference between the accents of a Frenchman and a Luxembourger? Or a German and an Austrian? I can because I speak French and German, but most people - in Canada too - can not. Similarly, while the inability to distinguish Canadians from Americans may not be excusable, it is certainly understandable. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: true... | |
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Author: Andrew(Canada) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 00:24:45 01/27/05 Thu i agree with your statements, and I hope before the FC is started there is a programme to educate citizens of each country and disspell silly stereotypes. if they stereotypes are removed, I feel people in all four countries would be more receptive to the idea. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Agreed | |
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Author: Brent Cameron [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 01:39:11 01/28/05 Fri Ed: Could not agree more. And that makes the whole situation all the more lamentable. Not to cast dispersions on any other Commonwealth nation, but we may be the only ones outside the Mother Country who actually had to fight a war to remain "British." Moreover, we should not really forget who wanted to end our status. Yes, Aussie, I am not forgetting your account of WWII, but to compare your experience to ours in 1812, the Imperial Japanese forces would have had to occupied the State of Victoria AND burned the City of Sydney to the ground. Ontario was occupied, and Toronto was put to the torch. To those who want to understand why Canucks have some conflicted feelings about the US, please research the accounts of the United Empire Loyalists and the experiences of Canadians during the War of 1812. Then think about Dubya's vow to bring democracy to the Big Blue Marble, and the fact that the thing that separates us from the likes of him is not an ocean, but an imaginary line... [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Good grief! | |
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Author: Ed Harris (London) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 02:20:27 01/28/05 Fri Two people who agree with me! I must write this down in my diary as a unique event... or perhaps emigrate to Canada, since the best I've managed in Blighty is one person. In one respect, though, you're wrong. There's another people out there in the world who fought a war to remain British: the British South Africans. Indeed, we fought a couple of wars, although admittedly the first one was a farce which lasted for a few minutes at Majuba Hill, and as such was a skirmish rather than a war. We call it the First Boer War, they call it the First War of Independence: in reality, it was a rather pointless battle. There is another similarity between British South Africans and Canadians: we are both the only former colonies with a significant non-British community - in the case of South Africa, the Brits were and are a minority community. In Canada, you are a majority but by a small margin. This has always served to reinforce our Britishness, because - perhaps regrettably - people tend to define themselves by what they are not. We are not Boers, you are not French. (I here include 'African' South Africans on the British side of the ledger, since they supported us against the Boers, for the same reasons for which Turkeys do not vote for Christmas.) In this context, though, there is an important difference: in the end, we lost in South Africa owing purely to demographics: there were more Boers, and they just bided their time until Britain's weakness gave them their opporunity to establish the barmy, fundamentalist Christian, racist state which we had fought a war to prevent. In Canada, you are strong enough to stand up for yourselves against the occasionally deranged Quebecoix without military assistance from Britain (and if anyone contends my definition of the Quebecoix as deranged, then I refer you to their language laws). It is for this reason, in my opinion, for which British Canadians and British South Africans are the most loyal of all the descendents of British colonists: unlike the Australians and New Zealanders - indeed, unlike in Britain itself - there has always been a hostile internal bloc which serves to remind us where we came from and who we are. South Africa, though, as I have stated, is now a dead loss: we must pray that Canada does not go the same way through fear of offending its minority community. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Point taken, Ed | |
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Author: Brent (Canada) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 13:44:37 01/28/05 Fri [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |