Canada is a multi-ethnic land and many citizens are proud of their ethnic heritage. It is difficult to say when legitimate ethnic pride goes rancid, but the point is reached when it involves deriding or deprecating another group. In an early ’90s attendance at Edmonton’s Heritage Days Festival, I listened to a comedian on the stage of one ethnic group’s pavilion cracking a callous joke about members of another ethnic group in a bus running over a cliff – the punchline being that regrettably the bus was not full. Around the same time I (a multi-ethnic personal mix) ceased membership in one ethnic association after becoming uncomfortable with the amount of ill humour being routinely directed toward another ethnic group – one from which I also happen to have descent. In both these examples there are longstanding historical grievances. But is it desirable to perpetuate the rancour in Canada?
It can go beyond jokes. The last few decades has featured a marked increase in Canadian activism relating to countries of ethnic origin. Nearly 30 years ago, explosives stolen at Fort McMurray were reportedly found in a European ethnic based conflict. Around the time that I was getting upset at the ethnic joking, a Heritage Days punch-up took place between young men descended from different sides of the frenzied violence then brewing in the Balkans. Involvement went a bit further than fisticuffs for one young man from Edmonton. He headed over to the Balkans and enlisted for the side he supported. Later, he used a captured Canadian army officer as a human shield against NATO bombing. It took more than a decade before this disgraceful episode ended in him getting a richly deserved Canadian prison sentence. At that he may have been lucky – mistreating Canadian war prisoners helped get one Canadian hanged for treason in 1947.
Typically, people with ethnic dislikes turn a blind eye on their own groups’ defects. Also in the early ’90s I was at a social gathering where I got into a discussion about a country’s recent dissolution. A proponent identified with one ethnic-based new nation thereby established. I suggested the old time multi-ethnic empires at least preserved peace between unruly peoples. He gave me a passionate denunciation of his country’s rulers back then, including their suppressing his language. I suggested the new country would soon do the same to an ethnic minority there. Couldn’t happen, he said earnestly. But within a year it did.
Of late, we have been seeing people get into trouble after returning to their ethnic homeland and involving themselves in activities, which displease the authorities there. A lot of the other countries involved have vile human rights records. Should you go there knowing your intentions may get you into trouble, while expecting Canada to rush to the rescue? It brings to mind the closing words of the old song Texas Rangers – “you’re best to stay at home.” Your new home, that is – Canada.
Writer David Haas is a long term St. Albert resident.
