What Canada Day means to me

I'm sorry to hear that that the Rossland Museum has decided to cancel its Canada Day Celebration, and instead focus upon yet another instance of Canada's injustice to its people. They've chosen to follow a social media movement which is leveraging that incident to rouse support to fix a critical problem at the core of our nation.

True, Canada is not perfect--it has behaved very badly at times. Canada's treatment of its indiginous peoples, Chinese workers, Japanese Canadians, Doukhobor families, and non-white citizens, to name some of many, has been deplorable in the past, and still remains so. There is no excuse for these colonial and unjust behaviours. The shame is deserved.

However, Canada has also done a great many good things in its long history, and it's the Good of Canada that we honour on Canada Day. It's the Good of Canada that we wish to hold up as an ideal, and to strive for. To dismiss celebrating that Good because we haven't yet resolved some serious faults is a shame of its own.

As a Canadian citizen, a privileged white settler, I am thus accountable for my country's past and current treatment of, and behaviour towards all people in this country and all over the world. I will also be accountable for Canada's future actions, so I advocate celebrating Canada Day fully (no fireworks pls) and positively, showing ourselves and others what kind of country I believe we can be. And get down to work on making it a reality!