The Mosaic They Keep Mentioning

What else did I first think, touching down on Calgary’s early-morning darkness, the city’s lower jaw seeming to swallow me hole? None of it happened immediately. Canadian nationalism encroaches slowly like a bank of skylight and terrace flowers. I like to attribute Canadian nationalism to that sense of conscience, of loamy softness and particular sincerity. Yes, each and all of these ideas I had lightly poured into me, layer by layer, a lamellae of politnesses and tolerance all throughout my childhood. We’re better, more accepting, a mosaic of culture and people, I’d come to learn to know. A retinue slew of moral goods and good optics. Is that what this country is?

There’s a profusion to discuss when it comes to Canadian nationalism, like the internal, ideological conflict between Anglophone Canada and Quebécois nationalism, or remaining sovereignty within a growing sentiment of globalized effort and interaction, which in part relates to a Canadian civic nationalism... Only two of which I’ll discuss here, for its intersection with immigration and my experience at the conjunction, my Asphodelic promenade right across the border, listless, without memory or intent. Nationalism is hard to define but Canadian nationalism holds particular difficulty in its investments beyond itself.

And is conducted in how Canadian culture is placed in contrast to American nationalism, which is more powerful but to our distaste. How come Canada has no great, remarkable artists? I read that somewhere. A low-toned concern, not likably-admitted, of the tepidity of Canada’s cultural effect. And is conducted when Canadian nationalism involves itself with multiculturalism and progressive policy, not just as part of globalization’s concourse like Canadian peacekeeping, but the Multiculturalism Act and how Canada wants to form itself. A nation in which all people can come together, in which their disparate cultures can thrive. And is conducted under the pallor of “that sense of conscience”, which underpins the earlier two defining factors. Nicety and moral standard. Propensity for neoliberalism. This country accepts me. I know that to be true. So why do I feel like this?

Three things to consider:

1. According to a 2022 study from UK-based Institute for Strategic Dialogue, Canada was found to be among the very worst of white supremacist countries, with over 6 600 channels of hate-forums and online right-wing extremism, additional to the the rising statistics of hate crimes and hate groups, the latter projected to be 123 in number across Canada. In articles on this relation about Canada, it’s been described as “a wake-up call” and “unexpected.”
2. A synopsis of “The End of Diversity”, by Professor of Black studies at the University of Toronto Rinaldo Walcott: “In this essay, the author suggests that diversity as an idea has reached its logical end. The essay proposes that something more radical and sustaining than diversity is now required if whiteness is to be understood as the foundation and barrier that preempts nonwhite others from the structural arrangements that currently govern human life. In arguing that diversity is over, the essay seeks to grapple with the structural limits of our desires for an inclusive society in which foundational antiblackness continues to shape Canadian and more broadly North American regimes of power and belonging.”
3. Placating. Regular heartbeat. There are compositions of air, rituals for speaking. I struggle with politeness. Fearing the inability to offend which fears the palpation of regular conversation. I’m not arguing for a freer speech, common euphemism that is for right-wing loathing. Instead, I take frustration with my art class’s inability to assume the race of the artist and so sacrifice a vital dimension of the works discussed, unable to acknowledge stereotypes as necessary or ascribe meaning in the subject matter. Is that it? The forget-me-not centre (left or right) of neoliberalism? Pervading my feeling of disfigurement, watching what’s told to be real be not true. Being told yes, we think you’re human too, but I think they’re lying.