As a Canadian, it is so conflicting seeing the malevolent and brutish authoritarianism on the move in America. American pluralism was a hard fought Eden of enlightenment governance and produced a galaxy of creative wonders the world loves and admires. In Canada, pluralism is the gravity that holds our sovereign hearts together and feeds our civic souls.
The tyrants aren’t bringing something back, they are trying to take something away that they can never have, our togetherness in the acceptance of others. The endurance of pluralism is best made manifest in the family. The family endures despite its differences. The opposite siblings, the old world grandparents, the silent fathers, the meddling mothers, the brash, influential aunts and uncles and the mischievous cousins.
In these familial differences lives a deep, unspoken loyalty. If ever we should need each other, all grudges are cast aside. No distance is too far traveled. We mend fences, cook, clean and care for each other in the most basic of ways. Our conflicts are what we have in common. These differences are the pluralism of family life, the unique details of our family stories, common in all humanity.
These universal bonds that we take for granted that get lost in the petty grievances of everyday life are fodder for manipulators, profiteers and propagandists. There is no politics that should distract us from the lived and living memory of generations who have traveled far and wide and endured hardship to live within democracy. Our minds become childlike when the persuasive masters of mediums play us against each other for profits. Like a child we learn from these grifters and bullies how to fear each other when we would otherwise playfully get along.
All of the energy that is required to blame and pull away from each other could be used to achieve greatness as it once did and will again. The past that they profess in the name of purity and the walls they build around themselves, are for their own selfish, mortal gains. It is the children and generations to come that have the most to lose in what they throw away.
Hold out your hands and embrace your country. It’s a blessing that you took reason and you try.
