From Foaming Beer To QuExit To C10: It's No Longer Your Parents' Canada

Canadian comedian Russell Peters was a guest recently on the podcast of author/ psychiatrist/ Woke bête noir Jordan B. Peterson, a fellow Canadian. Peters, who has lived in the United States for the past 15 years, professed a  longing to return to Canada (21:50)

It’s not uncommon. Many Canadians, relocated to the U.S., long to fall back into the arms of the comfy Canada they knew. Red Green jokes, TIFF, hockey, Canadian Tire and, naturally, the health-care system. Especially the health care system.

So I find it distressing to break it to Russell and the ex-pats that the genial Canada they pine for no longer exists. We’ll save the health care discussion for next week (Teaser: it’s been irreparably broken by Covid-19). But the land of humility, Vimy Ridge, Knowlton Nash and free annual check-ups is a dim  memory.

Need a single example of how Canada has changed? Observe the “cold one after a run” froth raised by progressive zanies on social media over CPC leader Erin O’Toole’s tweet that his wife gave him beer after a run. Even people as docile as my old media colleague Evan Solomon of CTV wondered aloud about the sexism of this gesture. That was one of the milder outbursts.

Really? We are reduced to third-generation feminist virtue signalling for idiots? Now ask, when has any media type asked Trudeau if he & WE icon Sophie Gregoire— whom he’s often campaigned with— are separated, who he lives with, why are they not together? And why she’s living free in a federal building outside Ottawa?

As I say, it’s not Mr. Dressup any longer. Even for those who’ve only been away a decade, Canada will be unrecognizable. The cultural drift of government, media, entertainment and even education being practiced at the federal, provincial and local level has made Peters’ fond memories a postcard from your grandma. Critical Race Theory tops the charts at school now.

Here are a few more  things Russell might not remember growing up in Toronto in the 1990s. 

Item 1: The son of a prime minister whose entire oeuvre in office was predicated on official bilingualism to placate Quebec has told the province that if they want to hoist anchor and declare themselves a unilingual nation it’s okay with him and his party. Fill yer’ boots. Or remplir vos bottins.

Taking advantage of the chaos he’s sown with his Covid-19 vaccine disaster (you know it’s a disaster by how hard his minions defend it on social media) Justin the ethics king has told the one province that is not party to the federal constitution that it can amend said constitution if he gets a Liberal majority this summer.

His remarks did not address whether the nine provinces and three territories who are signatories might go about amending the document to suit their own needs. One doesn’t need a fertile imagination to see Alberta, the town pump of equalization, having a wish list of its own, including, but not limited to, the right to ship its resources across provincial borders.

It might also surprise Russell that Albertans and other Westerners are no longer resentful of Quebec getting all it can from obsequious federal politicians so long as they too can avail themselves of the bounty while remaining under the maple leaf flag. And if Quebec wants to sail off into a QuExit sunset, so be it. Just saying.

Item 2: This might interest Russell a little more. His podcast partner Peterson has raised the spectre that Trudeau’s new communications Bill C-10, being artfully mangled by ardent enviro guy Stephane Guilbeault, might be a tad intrusive on free speech. Peterson suggested that, as he has more followers now than CBC, will he now be subject to approval by the CRTC?

The government has come down a bit from that limb but still wants its hands on every form of communication it can stifle, manipulate, censor, invalidate etc. to achieve its SJW mandate. Excuse the exasperation, but which Trudeaupian policy rollout inspires confidence that this bumbling Book Club could get its hands on free speech and not leave it mortally injured in a ditch outside Coaticook? 

As Rex Murphy wrote, “What 21st-century government, aware of speech and thought control in the great and cruel totalitarian governments of the past century, and their cruel brethren of the 21st — Communist China, sinister North Korea, Iran — every tyranny or dictatorship on the globe — would wish to ape and mirror the central characteristic of all such regimes?”

Should he find his way back to Canada Russell will find out exactly who wants to ape the greatest villains of the past 150 years by perp marching anyone who maligns Diversity® . That could be Peters, whose act is predicated on making fun of all Trudeau’s favourite ethnic buddies. I’m sure it’ll go well.

Item 3: Russell will also like being slammed into solitary for three days when he comes home to visit family in Toronto. Despite having no trace of Covid-19 and two vaccinations, he’ll have to shell out $2000 bucks for the pleasure of an airport hotel room and a second test within 72 hours of his arrival.

Should he choose to drive across the U.S. border the routine is pretty much the same. And when he crosses provincial borders in Ontario or New Brunswick he’ll be shaken down by friendly cops who'll pull him over, demanding where in the name of Chrystia Freeland he thinks he’s going? Bet he doesn’t remember that from 15 years ago, either.

There’s more for Russell, especially the Tommy Douglas healthcare fantasy  But till we get to that next week, here’s hoping no one tells him that Tom Hortons is no longer a Canadian company, either.

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster (http://www.notthepublicbroadcaster.com). The best-selling author of Cap In Hand is also a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada's top television sports broadcaster, his new book Personal Account with Tony Comper is now available on http://brucedowbigginbooks.ca/book-personalaccount.aspx