Do Americans REALLY consider Canada another country?

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whytemyke

Honorary Canadian.
Ok, now keep in mind this is coming from someone from the north, a state bordering Canada, where we regularly cross the border and chill in Canada like it's nothing. But does anyone else really not consider Canada another country? I mean this not in political terms, but in cultural terms. I mean, yeah, they have a totally different political system, but at the end of the day, Canadians and Americans generally have the same ideals, same values... even the same stories, legends, etc. And this all makes sense, naturally, since we're all basically just transplanted English. But when it comes right down to it, does anyone really consider this to be wrong?

I've always told my friends that I'd defend Canada just as much as I'd defend my own country from foreign invasion, just because I feel THAT MUCH of an identity with the people that I don't consider them so much a different country but a different 'territory'. This isn't to put down Canadians, not at all. I know a lot of Canadians generally loathe the idea that the US and Canada are similar at all... but we are.

I don't know. Am I the only one here that would have Canada's back if shit really hit the fan? Do other Americans identify with Canada as more than just a neighboring nation?
 
I dunno, canadians sure dont wanna be this country when our govt doesnt do something they agree with. And a good portion of america doesnt want to be this country when our govt does something we dont agree with. So i guess sorta ya, we've got a lot in common.
 
I'm Canadian, and while our culture is essentially the same, the average person's political mindset isn't. Canada is a very liberal country, with a lot more people against the war in Iraq and more people smoking pot :p.

I grew up near Montreal, and Quebec is the only place where I feel like I'm in a distinct society. English Canada and the U.S. do feel like one big country with a huge West-to-East border, but if it keeps Bush and other American rednecks out, I'm all for it!
 
Well, the thing with Quebec is that it's a totally different culture than all of Canada, anyways. I wasn't really expecting anyone to identify with the Quebecois too much...
 
"Canadians and Americans generally have the same ideals, same values... even the same stories, legends, etc."

No we don't.
 
From my experience, the mindset of people in Canada living close to the US border is quite different compared to those living in Toronto and upwards. In the bordering cities/towns there seems to be a lot more approval for the USA in general.
 
Well, there's one columnist in the Toronto Star that goes on about how Canada and the U.S are really identical but he always puts in the disclaimer "Of course not including the MidWest, the Bible Belt, and Quebec". Which excludes waaaay too much of either country to be a good argument to my mind. (I've visited Indianapolis a few times and I gotta tell you guys, the place freaks me out, especially the book stores)

But then even if you restrict yourself to English Canada vs Blue state U.S I think there's some pretty significant differences between 'em.

I mean jeez, the greatest Canadian was voted Tommy Douglas (Very much an English Canadian) while the Greatest American was voted Ronald Regan. And that's pretty stark.

Edit: I think perhaps the biggest difference is the attitude from each country towards the rest of the world. Canada has always very concened about what's happening everywhere in the world (prolly because Canada was tied so closely to Britain for so long and Quebec provides a strong link to continental Europe) and that's pretty distinct from the U.S

Edit 2: Also you'll get very different answers from Canadians and Americans on the issue in general :lol Why am I responding to a thread about what Americans think?
 
Azih said:
Edit 2: Also you'll get very different answers from Canadians and Americans on the issue in general :lol Why am I responding to a thread about what Americans think?
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Probably because Americans don't understand that the one way overlap of our media coverage (we hear everything they hear, but they hear nothing we hear) means that whenever a Canadian and American get together and talk, it will always focus on American subjects. They think this means we have nothing of our own, and that leads to topics like this.

But really, we're all the same. Except how we express ourselves politically, religiously, and interpersonally. And that's nothing at all.
 
mean jeez, the greatest Canadian was voted Tommy Douglas (
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In a poll conducted by the CBC. As much as I enjoy some of its programming, the CBC is pretty biased in favor of the left and when they used to have 'counterspin' aka anti-America talk show, you could just see the guests and the audience were living in a universe similar to the Fox news commentators and a redneck in the south, only its for yuppies living in the city in their liberal bubble. I wrote in several times contesting the way they did things including how they got an audience for their show.

They finally switched it up a bit in 2003 when their audience members were no longer made up of luddite anti-American college undergrads that clapped everytime sone lefty made a point. The audience was for the first time divided and offered competiting opinions and often argued against each other. They did for a while anyways before they cancelled Counterspin altogether. This Summer's The Hour was pretty good as well. Other than that, the BBC has more balance than the CBC.
 
Canada is great! I love Toronto, and I have friends from there and Vancouver.

I feel like they are our neighbors - as opposed to a "foreign country."
 
Deku said:
In a poll conducted by the CBC. As much as I enjoy some of its programming, the CBC is pretty biased in favor of the left and when they used to have 'counterspin' aka anti-America talk show, you could just see the guests and the audience were living in a universe similar to the Fox news commentators and a redneck in the south, only its for yuppies living in the city in their liberal bubble. I wrote in several times contesting the way they did things including how they got an audience for their show.

They finally switched it up a bit in 2003 when their audience members were no longer made up of luddite anti-American college undergrads that clapped everytime sone lefty made a point. The audience was for the first time divided and offered competiting opinions and often argued against each other. They did for a while anyways before they cancelled Counterspin altogether. This Summer's The Hour was pretty good as well. Other than that, the BBC has more balance than the CBC.
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Well I enjoyed Counterspin and like any talk/debate show its tone was determined by its hosts (Carol Off the last one was the most neutral of the three). It was always a slick left version of Michael Coren Live in that way. (The Counterspin audience isn't much different from the way Jon Stewart always has an unfair advantage on the Daily Show).

CBCs bias if obvious though. It's really too bad but I think it is kinda impossible for the CBC to adequantly represent the segment of Canadian society that wants to dismantle/neuter them (and that's a priority). I think if the CBC was to become as established as the BBC (annual TV license fee for public broadcasting best idea evar!) than it wouldn't be always fighting for its existence and wouldn't be as top heavy on the kind of people that are champions of public broadcasting.
 
Azih said:
the greatest Canadian was voted Tommy Douglas
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This is the greatest Canadian of all-time:

03.jpg
 
It's just America Jr. We will get around and annexing you guys and putting a stop to that legalized gay marriage thing just as soon as we are finished with Iraq. Don't you wory. ;)
 
The anti-American and anti-Canadian stuff is kinda ridiculous. Obviously the two countries aren't exactly the same, but seriously, we're both primarily English speaking Western countries, there isn't THAT much of a difference. Now I'm from the US, and I spend a significant amount of time in Canada, and I've heard more than my fair share of "Americans love killing brown babies, and they're all so stupid" stuff knowingly and unknowingly said around me. But on the contrary, I've heard tons of ignorant statements made about Canada (it's this big 'running joke' at work that I frequent Canada). Seriously, if you put the nationalism aside, and just look at the big picture, we're two neighboring countries that have pretty similar societies that have some pretty similar cultural things, but there are some differences. It's not like one is truly better than the other across the board.
 
Being a Canadian who travels a lot between the US and Canada I can say that there is a differenece a big difference especially when you start going to the lower states. New York, Washington, etc I sorta feel like I'm home because they're cold... REALLY cold during the winter :P
 
Deku said:
In a poll conducted by the CBC. As much as I enjoy some of its programming, the CBC is pretty biased in favor of the left and when they used to have 'counterspin' aka anti-America talk show, you could just see the guests and the audience were living in a universe similar to the Fox news commentators and a redneck in the south, only its for yuppies living in the city in their liberal bubble. I wrote in several times contesting the way they did things including how they got an audience for their show.

They finally switched it up a bit in 2003 when their audience members were no longer made up of luddite anti-American college undergrads that clapped everytime sone lefty made a point. The audience was for the first time divided and offered competiting opinions and often argued against each other. They did for a while anyways before they cancelled Counterspin altogether. This Summer's The Hour was pretty good as well. Other than that, the BBC has more balance than the CBC.
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I love The Hour...it's one of the few things that makes CBC worth more then a bucket of piss.







Moose said:
Is it just me or do Canadians really not like us too much? :(
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No one likes you. And with the bullshit that we've seen this past week, it's easy to see why.






Lambtron said:
The anti-American and anti-Canadian stuff is kinda ridiculous. Obviously the two countries aren't exactly the same, but seriously, we're both primarily English speaking Western countries, there isn't THAT much of a difference. Now I'm from the US, and I spend a significant amount of time in Canada, and I've heard more than my fair share of "Americans love killing brown babies, and they're all so stupid" stuff knowingly and unknowingly said around me. But on the contrary, I've heard tons of ignorant statements made about Canada (it's this big 'running joke' at work that I frequent Canada). Seriously, if you put the nationalism aside, and just look at the big picture, we're two neighboring countries that have pretty similar societies that have some pretty similar cultural things, but there are some differences. It's not like one is truly better than the other across the board.
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Agreed...Canada's got enough fuck ups of our own that we shouldn't feel smug pointing out the fucks up of the US.
 
Actually, most Americans I know think of Canada as America Jr. Honestly we don't get much coverage of anything going on up there at all. So there is nothing to base a factual opinion on. We just know Canada is up there and they are an ally.
 
Being from New York, I certainly feel more at home in Canada than I do in the south. Cept for the moose fucking, I can never get used to that.
 
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