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When I visit friends in Canada, I often meet new people they are acquanited with.
I am always asked about my views on the 2nd amendment (right to bear arms) and that it is such a "strange " right to have when so many die from shootings. Many Canadians hold uber-liberal views that would make the average American Liberal look like a moderate. To me, this view on what is socially and legally acceptable is one of our bigger differences. It's a totally different mentality. I won't sit here and preach what other people should believe in, but it is interesting to hear how different our views are.
That cheese fries and gravy dish you guys have is awesome by the way! Terrible for you though!
I grew up with firearms in our family and getting an Etonia (Eaton Stores house brand name for a Cooey) single .22 long rifle for my 12th birthday that weighed so little your heartrate pulsed the barrel. Owned many long guns over my lifetime with only two handguns in my history. Like Matthew Quigly "I never had much use for 'em."
It's not that Canadians are firearm fearful or rabidly anti-gunners, hoplophobes as commonly derided. It's just that we cannot conflate the 2nd to meaning every individual having access to a firearm primarily designed for other than hunting or sport shooting and the subsequent carrying of same.
That is on us however and should not be questioned with any more severity than a passing curiosity on our part.
'What's yours is yours and ours remains ours regardless' should be enough to satisfy the concerns of all of us.
When I visit friends in Canada, I often meet new people they are acquanited with.
I am always asked about my views on the 2nd amendment (right to bear arms) and that it is such a "strange " right to have when so many die from shootings. Many Canadians hold uber-liberal views that would make the average American Liberal look like a moderate. To me, this view on what is socially and legally acceptable is one of our bigger differences. It's a totally different mentality. I won't sit here and preach what other people should believe in, but it is interesting to hear how different our views are.
That cheese fries and gravy dish you guys have is awesome by the way! Terrible for you though!
Poutine. My son brought me some for supper.
Many of us have long guns for hunting. I have two, myself. Bears, you know.
However, being armed with a handgun is a concept totally foreign to me. What the hell FOR??
It must be poured from an Edinburgh Crystal decanter though lest you risk being snubbed by the Rothschilds at your next soiree.
We could really have some fun with these if we reverted to using the old monikers of Loyalists/Tories and Patriots/Whigs. I can see the glazed look in their eyes now.
It's just really difficult to compare the US and Canada, being that canada's entire population is about the size of California's.. The US just has so many more people and therefore more "pronounced" subcultures.....
I dont think Canada's culture has much global reach honestly.... where as American pop-culture is a staple in global pop-culture, so ppl outside of America are exposed to honey boo boo, real house wives, rap/hip-hop, Jerry Springer, Jersey Shore, etc.... and based off that they think "this is what most of America is like...." When in reality it's just a TV show produced to grab your attention and get high ratings....so everything is exaggerated to the extreme for those ratings and "shock value"....to get u to tune in and watch.... it doesn't represent what the country is like tho lol.
I don't know if I can find the right way to put this, but I think what it boils down to is American Exceptionalism and their fear of its loss. Maybe not with all of them but certainly with many of them and it's those many are the ones that become arrogant and abusive. It's like when that Canadian-raised woman who has become Americanized and Dixiefied now says that USA and its culture are known and consumed and copied in all but the most remote parts of the globe and she wishes it weren't so. She won't (or can't) explain why but she doesn't like America being copied and I wonder how many other Americans don't like it.
Canada comes closer than any other countries do to being most like USA in many ways and I suspect that many Americans might fear that the more Canada (and other countries) become like USA then the less exceptional and superior the USA becomes and the more impotent it will become. What better way is there to maintain the American sense of uniqueness, superiority, potency, elitism and exceptionalism than to denigrate and attempt to demoralize any other country that appears to be matching or even pulling ahead of it? They buck up their own flagging sense of superiority by telling others who are becoming most like them that they're suffering from an inferiority complex.
They'll say demoralizing things like "we don't give you a second thought, we don't ever talk about you, you're invisible to us, you aren't important, you're nothing" and then after thoroughly kicking them to the curb they turn around and say "you have an inferiority complex". (It's interesting to note that these are also the kinds of demoralizing things that impotent angry misogynists, spousal batterers and other domestic abusers and bullies say to their families just before they go ballistic and beat them up to express their virility, their anger and their power over them.)
Just saw this now. Wow. Don't know where to begin.
The reason I said that I wish American culture WAS NOT copied around the world is precisely because I DON'T think that US culture, or the culture of ANY country, is inherently superior or exceptional. But they ARE each unique. When I travel, I want something different, not the same old, same old. I think it's unfortunate that in an increasingly globalized world, individuality and difference seem to be disappearing, not expanding.
Another reason I feel this way is because of what has been evident on this thread. The poster above rightly pointed out that American popular culture not only often portrays distorted, superficial, sensational depictions of particular communities, but allows people outside of the US to believe they're experts on the US (gawd, I know I'm gonna pay for that one).
There. Do I sound like you suggested? Honestly, Americans can't win for trying with Canadians. If I had said that I think all cultures around the world SHOULD replicate American culture, you would call me arrogant, imperialistic and brash. I say I wish American culture was NOT copied, and I'm accused of being an insecure American threatened by other countries' success. How should I feel, exactly, that will be "acceptable" to you?
You choose to make huge assumptions about me, and I can guess what those assumptions are (because you make the same assumptions about all Americans, 360 million of whom are the EXACT same, after all ). Let me make this easy for you: I am a liberal. I am a well educated professional. I'm fairly well-travelled, and I'm a pretty voracious reader. I'm a busy mother of 3. I have been fortunate to have had the experience of living in different parts of Canada and the US. I say "fortunate" because, I firmly believe that living in different places opens one's mind, and can teach a person that his or her worldview has been terribly limited and even misguided (travel, education and reading all can do this, too, but they don't compare). One learns to be more adaptable, curious, accepting, humble, accommodating, open-minded, patient and kind. I don't WANT to surround myself with people who think just like I do. Doing so is boring and it teaches NOTHING.
Now, the "Dixiefied" comment: Really? Do you feel better now? What does this comment even mean, exactly? There you are, complaining about the other guys making "demoralizing" comments, yet you (and others on this thread) have proven yourself to be very willing to stoop to a petty, childish, ignorant, denigrating, "demoralizing" level yourself. Congratulations. You're a worthy contender, after all.
You can look throughout my entire posting history on CD, and you will find NO comments that deliberately demean, ridicule, antagonize or demoralize ANYONE. That's because I make a conscious and very deliberate effort NOT to. I'm a strong believer in the Golden Rule, and I conduct myself accordingly (IRL AND online). I am able and happy to listen to other points of view, even those directly opposed to mine, without allowing myself (yes, it's a choice) to become belligerent. Even on this thread, when or where have I posted the kind of comment that you posted here?
I have news for you: You are no different from the far right, loud-mouthed, obstinate, closed-minded individuals in the US (that you complain about). The difference is that YOU probably consider yourself, in comparison to those ridiculous yahoos south of the border, to be a rational, tolerant, compassionate, open-minded liberal.
Last edited by newdixiegirl; 07-09-2014 at 10:49 AM..
For people living in such a high-immigration country where millions of people have moved from other countires, have taken on the "Canadian" identity and in most cases think that life is better here, some Canadians sure have a hard time accepting that Canadians can also move somewhere else, become something other than Canadians, like it there better, and then come back to Canada or at least on Canadian forums, and honestly discuss why they feel the way they do.
What? Canada can't have a conversation on a National level because it has the population of California?
I'm not following your'e logic.
Canadian can, and likely will, do whatever they choose.
The remarks were to American perception. Canadians get no vote on that. And in the overall scenario of North America it vastly outweighs the Canadian view.
So yes of course you can have what ever views you like in your small pond. But they will hardly ripple the larger ocean.
..... Now, the "Dixiefied" comment: Really? Do you feel better now? What does this comment even mean, exactly? There you are, complaining about the other guys making "demoralizing" comments, yet you (and others on this thread) have proven yourself to be very willing to stoop to a petty, childish, ignorant, denigrating, "demoralizing" level yourself. Congratulations. You're a worthy contender, after all.
You can look throughout my entire posting history on CD, and you will find NO comments that deliberately demean, ridicule, antagonize or demoralize ANYONE........ Even on this thread, when or where have I posted the kind of comment that you posted here?.......
Did 'dixiefied' hit a nerve with you? Is that considered some kind of cultural slur down there? Maybe like calling somebody white trash or whatever? If so then that's news to me. What does dixiefied mean to you? If you don't like being referred to as 'dixiefied' then why did you choose a name like newdixiegirl? Dixiefied has a meaning for me and I recognize you as having become dixiefied due to your cocky cockerel-o'-the-walk manner of expressing yourself and the way you say "bless your heart" in your posts intended as a condescending insult. Did you really think that other Canadians are so naive that they don't really know what "bless your heart" means in the south?
I had reserved judgement about you in all of your previous posts here on the Canada forum until you proudly, arrogantly claimed that your American-raised children regularly point out white trash when they're visiting in Canada. I won't deny that there are trash people in Canada and in all other countries and I accept that it's a fact of life. I don't make an effort to go looking for trash though and I wouldn't teach my children to go looking for trash people and then have my children point it out and say "oh look mommy, there's another white trash person". That has got to be one of the rudest and most ignorant things I've ever seen anyone take pride in and boast about it online. All that says about you is that it takes class-conscious trash to teach their children to look for trash and to point it out when they see it, thereby raising the children to also be class-conscious trash themselves.
Well bless your cotton pick'n' little heart and bless your American-raised childrens' cotton pick'n' little hearts too.
I don't like you and your condescending, cocky, class-conscious attitude and I think you're an embarrassment to Canada. I think you should stay in Dixie permanently. And bless your heart again for good measure.
.
Last edited by Zoisite; 07-09-2014 at 02:15 PM..
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