Like Justin Trudeau before him, Prime Minister Mark Carney is embracing \u201cpostnationalism.\u201d<\/p>\n
During his speech at the Liberal party\u2019s convention in Montreal on Saturday, Carney praised multiculturalism and \u201cinclusivity.\u201d He declared<\/a>\u00a0that Canada was a nation \u201cforged through accommodation, not assimilation\u201d.<\/p>\n The prime minister proceeded to misrepresent Sir Wilfrid Laurier. Carney praised Laurier because he \u201cgoverned a country that had once conquered his people.\u201d He certainly got the first half of that sentence right, as he did govern a country. As for the second party, Canada never conquered Laurier\u2019s people, for his own people helped to build Canada itself.<\/p>\n Regarding\u00a0Canada\u2019s tradition of accommodation, Carney was not entirely wrong. Confederation in 1867 was the maturation of the old colonial pact struck by the British and French-speaking\u00a0Canadiens\u00a0after the Seven Years War. Once the British conquered New France in 1760, they realized that governing the King\u2019s new French-speaking subjects would require concessions.<\/p>\n In exchange for the loyalty of\u00a0les Canadiens, the Crown guaranteed their French civil code, their French language, and the place of their Roman Catholic faith. Confederation merely confirmed this bargain as the basis for a new country in North America.<\/p>\n If history truly mattered in Ottawa, Carney would not enlist Laurier\u2019s memory in such a sloppy fashion, for Canada\u2019s seventh prime minister was no proponent of squishy multiculturalism or \u201cinclusivity.\u201d At a speech in Edmonton in 1905, Laurier spoke of welcoming newcomers, but not without clear obligations<\/a>\u00a0to the Canadian nation which they sought to join.<\/p>\n In order to\u00a0share in\u00a0\u201cour lands, our laws, our civilization\u201d,\u00a0they were to become unambiguous British subjects, to take part in public life, and \u201cbecome Canadians.\u201d It was nothing short of a call to assimilate, not to become part of a \u201cmosaic\u201d or a \u201chotel\u201d state.<\/p>\n Citing Laurier to argue against assimilation is like citing Ren\u00e9 L\u00e9vesque to argue against Quebec independence. What happened to Carney\u2019s praise for the monarchy, bilingualism, and Canada\u2019s \u201cproud British heritage<\/a>\u201d as part the \u201cbedrock<\/a>\u201d of Canada\u2019s founding peoples?<\/p>\n Bedrock is not decorative gravel, but praise of it can\u00a0apparently be\u00a0a hollow public relations exercise. If not given primacy, Canada\u2019s \u201cbedrock\u201d peoples will not be bedrock for long.<\/p>\n Why is that progressive \u201cinclusion\u201d so often\u00a0grows\u00a0by subtraction? The symbols of British and French heritage are the first to be\u00a0pulled down<\/a>\u00a0and replaced with\u00a0something bland<\/a>,\u00a0inoffensive<\/a>, or unfamiliar.<\/p>\n Is there\u00a0really so\u00a0little value to the cultures that built Canadian democracy, industry,\u00a0literature\u00a0and the norms we take for granted?<\/p>\n Those who insist that \u201cculture war\u201d issues are not worth wasting time on are often the ones who are most eager to rename and replace\u00a0streetnames, monuments, and buildings. Who and what we choose to remember or uphold as inspiration\u00a0greatly matters. Choosing abstract ideals as the best representation of Canada, rather than our history and national cultures is a deliberate choice.<\/p>\n Globe & Mail\u00a0columnist Konrad Yakabuski may have been premature when he wrote\u00a0last year\u00a0<\/a>that Carney was abandoning Trudeau\u2019s post-national mission of turning Canada into a country with \u201cno core identity\u201d.\u00a0If Carney will praise the \u201cbedrock\u201d of three\u00a0peoples\u00a0one month and then invoke Laurier the next, while stripping Laurier of his pro-assimilation positions, he is certainly not fully turning the page. Canada may as well also be a giant food court full of foreign cuisines with the Charter plastered on the walls.<\/p>\n Canada is suffering from a record-low fertility rate, with\u00a01.25 children born<\/a>\u00a0per woman in 2024. The government has\u00a0sought\u00a0to\u00a0address this<\/a>; not by taking measures to revitalize family life, but by replenishing our population through large-scale immigration. If Canadians will not reproduce themselves, nor have the state\u2019s backing to absorb newcomers, we will be pushed even further along the road to becoming a pure economic zone with no nation to speak of.<\/p>\n Obsessing over cohesion looks quaint and\u00a0possibly even\u00a0suspect until cohesion itself\u00a0disappears\u00a0and the consequences\u00a0emerge.<\/p>\n Recently Canadian police have been compelled to\u00a0guard<\/a>\u00a0places of worship with assault rifles, while transnational gangs\u00a0wreak havoc<\/a>\u00a0in Vancouver\u2019s suburbs, and sectarian tensions from India manifest in the\u00a0harassment\u00a0<\/a>of Hindus outside their temples in Brampton.\u00a0According<\/a>\u00a0to many, Montreal is\u00a0slowly losing<\/a>\u00a0its\u00a0francophone culture<\/a>, and becoming a\u00a0mental enclave<\/a>\u00a0that stands apart from the province\u2019s French-speaking majority. This is a small preview of life in a pure economic zone.<\/p>\n The accommodation reached in 1867 should not be erased by an ideology of dilution. It was meant to be a permanent foundation, that newcomers could join if they agreed to \u201cbecome Canadian,\u201d in Laurier\u2019s words.<\/p>\n Even Laurier\u2019s other famous quote, \u201cCanada is free, and freedom is her nationality<\/a>\u201d can only be understood in the context of Laurier\u2019s classical<\/a>\u00a0liberal<\/a>\u00a0beliefs,\u00a0and his upbringing in\u00a0a\u00a0solidly<\/a> Anglo-French country. Liberal societies that prioritize the individual only work when questions of culture and society are settled.<\/p>\n