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Canada Day: Another good reason to despise liberals


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Canada Day, brought to you by the ministry of propaganda. Love Canada. It's the cool thing to do!

A young guy working on my latest reno mentioned Canada day last week, and how he was looking forward to it. It's such a huge, important holiday, after all. And everyone parties. I suppose, come to think of it, that if you're relatively young that IS what Canada Day has become. Courtesy of government propaganda. Your government using your money to change your mind about who you are. The kids I know now are always excited because Canada Day means parties, music, face-painting and fireworks, along with a lot more. Why, it's like the Fourth of July, only without the blue (though people consume a lot of Blue).

I grew up without Canada Day. Dominion Day was a sleepy holiday that I personally paid little attention to. It was after school was out for the summer anyway, so big deal. Occasionally the Lions club or someone might do some fireworks, but it was really no big deal. There were no big events, nobody held parties that I know of, and it was a sort of Victoria Day kind of holiday. People were glad of a day off work but that was about it. We looked down on the Americans and they're ridiculous, obnoxious patriotism. We could only shake our heads at their flag waving and garish celebrations on the Fourth of July. We had more dignity and maturity than that.

In 1982 there were 8 people in the House of Commons when a Quebecer, as ignorant and uncaring about Canadian history as almost all Quebecers, rose and proposed renaming Dominion Day to Canada Day (which Andrew Cohen called a term of 'crushing banality'). These private members bills require unanimous consent, and there is always a government MP whose job it is to simply say "Nay" when the speaker calls out. That day he was silent (A Quebecer?). The bill passed in five minutes and that was that. Oh the Mulroney Tories were angry afterwards, but now the bill had become a cause celebre in Quebec, and the Tories had a huge base of support in Quebec they didn't want to tick off. Fighting the bill or reversing it after it had passed, would have expended political capital, and the Mulroney tories were as much a group of political whores and panderers as ever existed, so they let it go.

I'm not sure at which point thereafter the government decided to launch a huge propaganda campaign to use Canada Day as a club against separatists. I believe it was Jean Chretien who did it, though. Anyway, one day tens of millions, even hundreds of millions was found and spread across the country for festivals and celebrations. Huge parties and fireworks celebrations were everywhere, and propaganda commercials were all over the media. Year after year Canada Day became a huge government sponsored orgy of celebration that encouraged American style patriotism and flag waving, all in the name of combating separatism.

"Remember children, if you're not eagerly waving your flag then you're not a good Canadian!"

I see all these people with their flag-waving patriotism and just shake my head. They've drunk the kool-aid, but you can't really blame them. The kool-aid dispenser has been pumping it out for twenty years now. They've gotten used to the taste. I never drank it, though. Maybe I was just too cynical to buy the propaganda ministry's message (maybe because I couldn't care less if Quebec left).

BTW, for those of you who have never even heard the term, we are still a Dominion, even though, in deference to Quebec, the government stopped using the title Dominion of Canada decades ago. The term was coined by Sir Leonard Tilley and accepted by all the fathers of confederation as the new name for Canada (as opposed to a Kingdom of Republic). It comes from the 72nd psoalm "He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth."

It's still nice to have a holiday, though, even if I'll never be a flag waver.

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So what you're saying is, because the Conservatives failed in their job, we can now thank the great people of Quebec for ridding us of that idiotic name which most people associated as being a grocery story for a holiday (you know like celebrating the day of some dead royal...Victoria Day) and giving us Canada Day.

Thank You Quebec!!!

Merci mes amis...

Edited by Rick
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Guest Peeves

So what you're saying is, because the Conservatives failed in their job, we can now thank the great people of Quebec for ridding us of that idiotic name which most people associated as being a grocery story for a holiday (you know like celebrating the day of some dead royal...Victoria Day) and giving us Canada Day.

Thank You Quebec!!!

Merci mes amis...

I would like a list of those "great people of Quebec",

Vive le Québec libre

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Same to you! From a proud member of The Dominion Of Canada! ;)

Happy Dominion Day!!!

Well, I am not Canadian, but I prefer the initial name.

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So what you're saying is, because the Conservatives failed in their job, we can now thank the great people of Quebec for ridding us of that idiotic name which most people associated as being a grocery story for a holiday (you know like celebrating the day of some dead royal...Victoria Day) and giving us Canada Day.

Thank You Quebec!!!

Merci mes amis...

Thank you, Rick, for so amply demonstrating that ignorance I spoke above. Knowing and caring nothing about Canada's history, you eagerly seized upon whatever the TV commercials told you you ought to feel and did so with the mindless enthusiasm one expects of the uneducated and unsophisticated.

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Thank you, Rick, for so amply demonstrating that ignorance I spoke above. Knowing and caring nothing about Canada's history, you eagerly seized upon whatever the TV commercials told you you ought to feel and did so with the mindless enthusiasm one expects of the uneducated and unsophisticated.

Argus buddy, if I'm waving any Canadian flag today it will only be one that's upside down.

And it will be flown that way until such day as this country removes the scum currently in power

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Argus buddy, if I'm waving any Canadian flag today it will only be one that's upside down.

And it will be flown that way until such day as this country removes the scum currently in power

We don't have any party better suited to rule Canada at this moment so I guess you will wait a looooooooooooong time... :D

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.... Year after year Canada Day became a huge government sponsored orgy of celebration that encouraged American style patriotism and flag waving....

They've drunk the kool-aid, but you can't really blame them. The kool-aid dispenser

Irony noted...and it wasn't Kool-Aid...it was Flavor Aid.

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To the OP: Shut up. Seriously.

This thread just highlights how people who are stuck in the past seriously need to get a life and move on. The rest of the world is progressing and leaving you behind. The "Dominion of Canada" doesn't even exist anymore... you might as well celebrate Soviet Union Day.

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To the OP: Shut up. Seriously.

This thread just highlights how people who are stuck in the past seriously need to get a life and move on. The rest of the world is progressing and leaving you behind. The "Dominion of Canada" doesn't even exist anymore... you might as well celebrate Soviet Union Day.

Uhm, no, I think not. Certainly not at the behest of ignorant rabble for whom history extends no further back than last year's Dancing With the Stars finale.

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To the OP: Shut up. Seriously.

This thread just highlights how people who are stuck in the past seriously need to get a life and move on. The rest of the world is progressing and leaving you behind. The "Dominion of Canada" doesn't even exist anymore... you might as well celebrate Soviet Union Day.

Well said!

Side note here would be that Soviet Union day would be May day (May 1st).

This holiday is still celebrated there and in China and many other countries making it one of the worlds biggest holidays.

Happy Canada day!

WWWTT

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Happy Canada Day,

The Best Country in the world.

Where in this country we don't really care who's flag you fly, who you worship, what is your Hockey team, ....where you can choose your profession, get a decent education, raise and feed your family in relative safety, and key your neibors car for hanging his flag upside down.

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Thank you, Rick, for so amply demonstrating that ignorance I spoke above.

Ignorant, indeed. He can't even separate the perpetual and apolitical Canadian Crown from the temporary government of the day.

That said, there's nothing to say "Dominion of Canada" was ever the official name of this country. The BNA Act 1867 (now Constitution Act 1867) calls the country "One Dominion under the Name of Canada".

Given the general definition of "dominion", plus the fact the Constitution Act 1867 still says Canada is a dominion, Canada remains one. However, it is no longer a "Dominion" per the definition specific to the defunct British Empire. One can thus still rightly say this is the "dominion of Canada" (synonymous with "country of Canada" or "realm of Canada", as in "a dominion called Canada") and "Dominion Day" could therefore still be applicable. However, due to the aforementioned connections the word has with our previous status within the former Empire, it's politically unfashionable to use the term "dominion". I think it's a cool sounding word. But I accept that Canada Day is not going to revert to Dominion Day, likely ever.

[+]

Edited by g_bambino
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Dominion Stores was once a national chain of supermarkets in Canada, which was still known as the Dominion of Canada at the time of the company's founding. The chain was founded in 1919 in Ontario and was later acquired by Argus Corporation.Hmmmmm the plot thickens.....could this be the reason Argus calls it Dominion Day. :lol:

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Uhm, no, I think not. Certainly not at the behest of ignorant rabble for whom history extends no further back than last year's Dancing With the Stars finale.

LOL perhaps you need to learn how to read your own Constitution.

Ignorant, indeed. He can't even separate the perpetual and apolitical Canadian Crown from the temporary government of the day.

That said, there's nothing to say "Dominion of Canada" was ever the official name of this country. The BNA Act 1867 (now Constitution Act 1867) calls the country "One Dominion under the Name of Canada".

Given the general definition of "dominion", plus the fact the Constitution Act 1867 still says Canada is a dominion, Canada remains one. However, it is no longer a "Dominion" per the definition specific to the defunct British Empire. One can thus still rightly say this is the "dominion of Canada" (synonymous with "country of Canada" or "realm of Canada", as in "a dominion called Canada") and "Dominion Day" could therefore still be applicable. However, due to the aforementioned connections the word has with our previous status within the former Empire, it's politically unfashionable to use the term "dominion". I think it's a cool sounding word. But I accept that Canada Day is not going to revert to Dominion Day, likely ever.

[+]

Technically since the constitution defines the name of the country as "Canada"... that's the official name of the country. There is no Dominion of Canada.

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Technically since the constitution defines the name of the country as "Canada"... that's the official name of the country. There is no Dominion of Canada.

Technically you're wrong. Dominion is a more archaic term for country. Specifically a large area of land that is self ruled. Here's the dictionary definition of dominion take special note of numbers four and five.

1. the power or right of governing and controlling; sovereign authority.

2. rule; control; domination.

3. a territory, usually of considerable size, in which a single rulership holds sway.

4. lands or domains subject to sovereignty or control.

5. Government . a territory constituting a self-governing commonwealth and being one of a number of such territories united in a community of nations, or empire: formerly applied to self-governing divisions of the British Empire, as Canada and New Zealand.

ie. read GB's quote you posted.

Whereas Canada is indeed a parliamentary democracy, which is headed by a constitutional monarch, Sovereign or if we really wish to wax archaic a dominus which is precisely where the word dominion is derived. Dominion is quite an apt description ot our nation, as opposed to a republic which adds a far different flavour. It's similar to how the United Kingdom is considered a country, this is somewhat of a redundancy in that Kingdom is again in modern terms synonymous with country. The UK is a Kingdom because it is subject to a monarch, tradtionaly a king. Much like an Earldom is subject to an Earl, a Barony is subject to a Baron, and a Duchy to a Duke. My God it's almost as if there's a pattern, but I just can't quite place it...

Edited by Dave_ON
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Canada Day, brought to you by the ministry of propaganda. Love Canada. It's the cool thing to do!

...

Please explain to us how young people taking pride in their country cheapens your experience.

Edited by na85
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