Tag Archives: Pierre Trudeau

For Canada’s 150th Anniversary : “The Demolition Of A Nation, One Step At A Time”

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For Canada’s 150th Anniversary : “The Demolition Of A Nation, One Step At A Time”
 
 
By Tim Murray
  A Giant Toy Rubber Duck: Canada’s Symbol for its 150th Anniversary.

The Demolition of a Nation, One Step At A Time (revised)

On July 1, 2017, Canada will observe 150 years of Confederation. But as this bulletin points out, is there a nation still to celebrate?

“…the people of Canada do not wish, as a result of mass immigration, to make a fundamental alteration in the character of our population.” Prime Minister Mackenzie King, May 1st, 1947

“It is rare for a nation… to turn in a completely new direction. It is unusual for a democracy take such a turn. People are therefore entitled to inquire whether the distinctive character of their nation—and some of its greatest achievements—will remain if people from very different cultures are encouraged to come and, as far as possible, to maintain their own cultures. “ Geoffrey Blainey (“All for Australia” p. 154)

Demolitions, if viewed in slow motion, are revealed to be a sequential process. They begin with the destruction of the ground floor, and work their way up, until the entire building “suddenly” collapses. Viewed in hindsight, it may appear that the collapse of Canada’s identity was almost instantaneous. But in fact, it did not happen overnight. Our cultural, ethnic and environmental edifice was brought down incrementally, by a series of policies and laws that spanned some forty years. Let’s start at the beginning, in 1962, at the “ground floor” of implosion, and then follow the chain of disintegration up to 2006 and our present predicament, with Canada teetering on the edge of complete colonization and assimilation.

1962 Prime Minister John Diefenbaker’s Progressive Conservative government declared that independent immigrants and their immediate families would be admitted to Canada from everywhere in the world. However, while the Tories said that all comers were welcome, it was successive Liberal governments which set up the machinery to get them.

1965 In response to a global mood to support the movement for colonial independence and repudiate the history that made the Holocaust possible, Canada signed the “United Nations International Convention on All Forms of Racial Discrimination”. This post-war shift in attitude served to discredit principles that were used to legitimize exclusions in existing immigration policy. The signing of this UN Convention, a seemingly innocuous action, came to have a profound impact on subsequent immigration policy-making.

1966 The Pearson government’s White Paper on Immigration Policy advocated a universal admissions policy. The country was to be cut from its cultural moorings, as European immigrants would no longer be given preference. This change in immigration selection criteria constituted a crucial change in direction for the country. It was a confluence of two beliefs. One, that Canada should cast its immigration net widely to capture “the best and the brightest”, and two, that Canada was morally obligated to embrace immigrants from across the world without reference to their ethnic, racial, religious or cultural origins. No longer would the nation’s cultural cohesion be a consideration in deciding who gets in and how many.

1967 The “point system” was introduced. As T. Triadafilopolous of the University of Toronto put it, “Through the points system, Canada would select immigrants according to a set of universal criteria, including educational credentials, language competency in English and/or French, and labour market potential. Applicants’ ethnic and racial backgrounds were no longer to be considered in determining their eligibility for admission to Canada. The result of this change …was precisely what (Prime Minister Mackenzie) King tried to avoid: the diversification of immigration and consequent transformation of Canada’s demographic structure. Whereas immigrants from ‘non-traditional’ source regions …comprised only a small fraction of Canada’s total immigration intake from 1946 to 1966, by 1977 they made up over 50% of annual flows. Changes in immigration policy shattered the foundations of ‘white Canada’ and created the conditions for Canada’s development into one of the most culturally diverse countries in the world. (from “Dismantling White Canada: Race, Rights and the Origins of the Point System”)

1967 The Immigration Department was ordered to no longer list immigrants by ethnic origin but rather by “country of last residence”. This allowed the government to conceal the fact that many third world immigrants had traveled to Canada via traditional source countries like the UK.

1971 Multiculturalism is declared official state policy. Henceforth, Canada was no longer to be perceived as consisting of our two founding cultures, English and French, but as mosaic of equivalent ethnic fragments. Canada was to become the helpless victim of a social engineering project whose sweeping scope was yet to be comprehended.

1974 Biologist Jack R. Vallentyne of the Fisheries and Marine Service called for a national population policy. His call was ignored. Vallentyne, a former professor at Cornell University, was made leader of the Eutrophication (pollution) Section of the Freshwater Institute in Winnipeg. It was in that capacity that Vallentyne became alarmed at the extent to which overpopulation and over-development was promoting eutrophication of our water resources.

1976 The Science Council of Canada released its report number 25, “Population, Technology and Resources” which concluded that perpetual population growth would stress Canada’s limited non-renewable resources. It advocated restricting immigration and stabilizing Canada’s population. Another forgotten report.

1976 Voluminous anecdotal evidence had come to challenge the claim that European interest in emigrating to Canada had diminished, as prospective skilled and educated immigrants from Britain and the Continent with immediate family were being turned away in droves. Immigration officials in 1976 conceded that as many as 60% of British applicants were being rejected while unskilled third world immigrants with poor language skills were welcomed with open arms. The vision of the 1966 White Paper was being fulfilled. The number of immigrants with skills steadily declined while the number who were sponsored as relatives increased from 34% in 1966 to 47% by 1973.

1976 Canada’s first separatist party, the Parti Quebecois, was elected. By this action, Quebec Francophone voters indicated that they were not prepared, as English Canadians were apparently were, to see their unique culture dismembered by a multicultural globalist agenda. Quebecers were not willing to go down with the English Canadian ship.

1980 English Canada got its second wake-up call when Quebec held its first referendum on separation. After it was defeated, English Canada went back to sleep, and the global “out-reach” to non-traditional sources of immigration continued with Official Multiculturalism still in place.

1980-1983 In response to a recession, the government of Pierre Elliot Trudeau cut immigration levels from 143,000 to 89,000. It was the only time in recent decades that a federal administration reduced immigration quotas in deference to tougher economic times and the need to defend jobless Canadians. Thereafter, immigration policy would be the prisoner of political imperatives, most specifically ethnic vote-seeking.

1982 The “Charter of Rights and Freedoms”—forming part of the Constitution Act—was signed into law. It relegated Parliament to a secondary role—and through it diminished the ability of a majority of the population to influence the direction of the country. It allowed the courts to strike down provincial and federal statutes to satisfy individual rights. Consequently, as writer Frank Hilliard observed, it achieved Pierre Trudeau’s goal of altering our British Parliamentary system and replacing it with a model that divided society into ethnic communities, each with its own cultural norms. It is noteworthy that the Charter’s Section 27 requires the Charter to be interpreted in a ‘multicultural context’.

1986 Employment Equity Act—allowed a staggering number of recently-arrived immigrants to leap-frog over resident Canadians to secure jobs in the federal public sector. The Act became a template for similar legislation in other provinces which also affected the private sector.

1986-89 The Health and Welfare department of the federal government completed a report “Charting Canada’s Future” which concluded that Immigration has only a short-term effect on Canada’s age structure. Moreover, increases in immigration to as high as 600,000 per year would have, in the long-term, no impact on the age structure. Even changing the age structure of immigrants from 23% below age 15 in 1988 to 30% below 18 and then 50% below 15 would have little long-term impact on Canada’s overall age structure. That message continues to be ignored to this day.

1988 The Multiculturalism Act—institutionalized the policy of multiculturalism begun by Pierre Trudeau.

1988 Breaking with Trudeau’s belief that Canadians should not apologize to ethnic lobbies for alleged past injustices, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney apologized and compensated the Japanese-Canadian community for the federal government’s internment of Japanese-Canadians during the Second World War. The apology began an era of grovelling which can be seen for what it was, not a sincere desire for redress, but a naked grasp for the ethnic vote.

1991 The Intelligence Advisory Committee, with input from Environment Canada, the Defence Department and External Affairs produced a confidential document for the Privy Council entitled “The Environment: Marriage Between Earth and Mankind”. The report stated that “Although Canada’s population is not large in world terms, its concentration in various areas has already put stress upon regional environments in many ways.” It added that “Canada can expect to have increasing numbers of environmental refugees requesting immigration to Canada, while regional movements of the population at home, as from idle fishing areas, will add further to population stresses within the country.” The document was apparently buried.

1991 The Economic Council of Canada, in a research report (“The Economic and Social Impacts of Immigration”), concluded that immigration has been of no significant benefit to the economy. Once again, it was a message that is still forgotten.

1991 Immigration Minister Barbara McDougall of the Progressive Conservative government of Brian Mulroney launched the policy of mass immigration, which greatly increased immigration levels to 250,000 per year. Like the Liberals’ White Paper policy of 1966, which was engineered by Tom Kent to defeat “Tory Toronto” by recruiting immigrants from ‘non-traditional’ sources, the McDougall policy was designed as a political stratagem to woo ethnic voters away from the Liberals by earning their gratitude. Mass immigration then must be seen as primarily a political weapon to defeat rival political parties rather than a policy that confers a legitimate economic or demographic benefit to Canada.

1994 July 6 Canada’s state broadcaster, CBC/Radio-Canada, with Policy 1.1.4, declares that its mandate requires that its programming should “reflect the multicultural and multiracial nature of Canada”. “In fact”, the CBC continued, “by the reasons of the ethnic diversity of the audience, the Corporation has long practiced a policy of cultural pluralism in its programming, and intends to continue to reflect the multicultural richness and multiracial characteristics of Canadian society in keeping with the Corporation’s obligation to ‘contribute to shared national consciousness and identity’. Schedule planners and programs staff are expected to demonstrate continuing awareness of and sensitivity to this aspect of CBC/Radio-Canada role.” In so doing, the CBC in effect became the voice of immigrant ethno-cultural lobbies and power blocs, while the views of the full cross-section of mainstream Canadian society were largely excluded.

1995 A second referendum on separation was held in Quebec. It was defeated by the narrowest of margins, 0.8%. Many would argue that the 1995 referendum was hijacked by the federal government, which poured in a ton of money in publicity largely exceeding the amount authorized by the referendum laws. The Gomery commission subsequently found many key Liberal figures guilty of fraud. In addition, for good measure, the federal government fast-tracked the citizenship process for all new immigrants in Quebec in the months leading up to the referendum . This action was timely, as it allowed these immigrants to vote and tip the scales to victory for the “No” side.

Premier Jacques Parizeau accurately blamed the loss on the ethnic vote, which had grown with mass immigration. Failing to see that their own society was being undermined by the very same forces that were undermining Quebec, English Canadians rejoiced. However, the result clearly illustrated that since 1980, an increasing proportion of the Francophone population were opposed to the multicultural makeover of their society.

1997 The $2.4 million federally commissioned Fraser Basin Ecosystem Study, led by Dr. Michael Healey of UBC, was released. It stated that BC’s Fraser Basin was overpopulated by a factor of three. Healey later urged all levels of government to develop a Population Plan for the country. The study was ignored by the government that funded it.

2001 The Population Institute of Canada made a presentation to the House of Commons Committee on Immigration which recommended that the government develop a Population Plan for Canada, as called for by Dr. Michael Healey. The presentation fell on deaf ears.

2005 Ontario’s Environment Commissioner, Gordon Miller, released a report that challenged the provincial government’s plans to accommodate an additional 4.4 to 6 million people for Ontario over the next 25 years. In introducing this annual report, Miller issued strong cautions. “One of the troubling aspects of the improved planning system is that it is still based on the assumption of continuous, rapid population growth. Government forecasts project that over the next 25 years, Ontario’s population will increase from just over 12 million to 16.4 million or perhaps as high as 18 million. Three quarters of these people are expected to settle in the urban area around Toronto and in the Greenbelt lands. Even with higher development densities, this is a vast number of people settling in an already stressed landscape. ” He added that the area did not have the water resources to support the population increase, nor the ability to handle sewage created by the increase. Miller was vilified for his comments.

2006 Following Mulroney’s precedent of apologizing and compensating Japanese-Canadians for the wartime actions of Mackenzie King’s government, Prime Minister Harper compensated Chinese-Canadians for federal laws that were enacted before the First World War to protect Canadian jobs from the importation of cheap Chinese labour. The compensation came with a profuse apology.

2006 The C.D. Howe Institute reported that immigration levels would have to be raised to impossibly stratospheric levels to have any effect in slowing the rate of Canada’s aging population.

2013 Canada’s most famous environmentalist, Dr. David Suzuki, said that Canada was overpopulated and that immigration levels should be reduced. Like Gordon Miller, Suzuki was vilified by everyone except the general public, who evidenced their approval in the comments section of newspapers across the country which carried the story.

2013 Reacting to growing ethnic enclaves and the threat of the emergence of a parallel Islamic society, the Parti Quebecois government introduced a Charter that would re-establish the secular nature of Quebec society, a hard won achievement of the Quiet Revolution of the 1960s. Recognizing that support for the Charter would represent a clear repudiation of the multicultural agenda, the political class and the English media denounced the proposal.

2014 The fact that the Charter enjoyed the support of a majority of Quebecers—and apparently a majority of Canadians in the rest of Canada– the media and the political establishment attempted to discredit the Parti Quebecois government by raising the prospect of another referendum on sovereignty. This was (and is) a ploy to shift the focus away from the Charter.

2015 Two months following his electoral victory, the new Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, essentially confirmed that the mission of cultural and ethnic fragmentation conceived five decades before had been accomplished. In fact, it had gone beyond that. Canada was no longer even a multicultural state—or a nation—but something the world had never seen before. “There is no core identity, no mainstream in Canada”, Trudeau proudly observed, “There are (just) shared values—openness, respect, compassion, willingness to work hard, to be there for each other, to search for equality and justice. Those qualities are what make us the first post-national state.” A state, in other words, that has been cast adrift, cut from its cultural, ethnic and moral moorings.

In reviewing these policies , pronouncements and laws, it is apparent that the promotion of official multiculturalism and quota hiring (“employment equity”) were conceived to work in tandem with mass immigration, so that immigrants would be made to feel fully integrated and at home with their new country. This great “multicultural experiment” then, was essentially an immigration project which changed the ethnic profile of the nation and grew the population by 25%. It was an experiment conducted by a political class on ordinary Canadians without the consent of ordinary Canadians. It had no electoral mandate. The result is that most Canadians feel like lab rats living in an environment they no longer recognize. They bear witness to the demolition of a nation.

Justin Trudeau on Castro’s Death- a PM without Common Sense

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Paul Fromm, Director of the Canadain Association for Freedom of Expression gloats with talk show host Brian Ruhe about How Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stuc…
Published on Dec 2, 2016

Paul Fromm, Director of the Canadain Association for Freedom of Expression gloats with talk show host Brian Ruhe about How Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stuck his foot in his mouth by overpraisingFidel Castro in his eulogy. Brian and Paul discuss the theory that Justin Trudeau is the son of Fidel Castro!

Below is a FAIR USE of an article by PAUL WELLS, National Affairs, Tues., Nov. 29, 2016, at:
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2…

I want to talk about the rest of Canada’s weird, hesitant relationship with Cuba. But first, since I’m just getting to it now, a few words about Justin Trudeau and Fidel Castro.

We haven’t seen Justin Trudeau mourn like this since his dad died. In expressing his “deep sorrow” at the death of Castro, a “larger than life” figure whom Trudeau lauded as “a legendary orator” —

Sorry, let’s just pause right there. Legendary orator? On Sept. 26, 1960, Castro addressed the United Nations General Assembly for four and a half hours, a record unchallenged to this day in the most boring room on earth. In 1998 in Havana, he spoke for seven and a half hours. Calling Castro a great orator is like calling porn legend Ron Jeremy a romantic: it confuses volume with quality.

Onward. Trudeau lauded Castro’s “tremendous dedication and love for the Cuban people,” whose speech and dietary protein Castro rationed, by law, for decades. I guess it was tough love.

To be sure, Trudeau balanced his praise with criticism. “During Castro’s rule, thousands of Cubans were incarcerated in abysmal prisons, thousands more were harassed and intimidated, and entire generations were denied basic political freedoms,” the prime minister wrote. Just kidding! No, that last quote isn’t from Justin Trudeau at all. It’s from Human Rights Watch. As for the PM, in a communiqué overflowing with praise for Castro, he could find room for only one word about the Cuban dictator’s human rights record: “controversial.”

Nor can the PM’s defenders long sustain the notion that his statement must have been penned by some careless lackey in the Prime Minister’s Office. No, the communiqué is too solidly in line with the entire Trudeau family’s record on the man to be anything but an honest reflection of Justin Trudeau’s thought.

Castro was a pallbearer at Pierre Trudeau’s funeral. The PM’s brother Alexandre Trudeau wrote in this newspaper a decade ago that Castro was “something of a superman,” whose “intellect is one of the most broad and complete that can be found.” Alexandre Trudeau wrote that he “grew up knowing that Fidel Castro had a special place among my family’s friends,” even if ordinary Cubans “do occasionally complain, often as an adolescent might complain about a too strict and demanding father.”

One notes family similarities in prose style.

Justin Trudeau is defending the statement he made following the death of former Cuban president Fidel Castro. The prime minister says he never shies away from addressing human rights issues.(THE CANADIAN PRESS)
So a prime minister who claims to prize evidence-based policy was caught putting family connections ahead of the exhaustively documented abuses of a man whose death marks a crucial step in his own people’s long-delayed march toward freedom.

But the rest of us — we cold and bashful Canadians — will probably continue to watch Cuba as we have for decades, unsure or divided in our response to events in the land Fidel Castro leaves behind.

Exhibit A in the theatre of ambivalence is Justin Trudeau’s predecessor. Stephen Harper met Raul Castro, Fidel’s brother and still the president of Cuba, only 19 months ago, attending what would be Harper’s last Summit of the Americas in Panama City. The two men sat smiling awkwardly at each other in hard-backed chairs next to a little round table.

Probably most Canadians not named Trudeau have long known that Cubans did not have the government Canadians would want for them — and, indeed, not the government Cubans would choose, were they granted the freedom to change their minds about the revolution. But that knowledge doesn’t tell us which mix of engagement and isolation is wisest.

Most Canadian leaders have fallen back on a policy of doing a little less than the Americans. It’s a deeply unsatisfying policy. John Diefenbaker resisted putting Canadian forces on a war footing during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Harper let Obama decide on a change in stance, providing only conference facilities and plausible deniability.

Having blown some political capital by saying what he thinks, Trudeau is now going to skip Fidel Castro’s funeral. It’s a retreat to ambivalence dictated by a public outcry that must have astonished the prime minister, who grew up with a photo of Fidel Castro in his family’s home and thought, perhaps, that everybody does.

Paul Wells is a national affairs writer. His column usually appears Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.

Honouring Both Sides on Remembrance Day

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Honouring Both Sides on Remembrance Day 

11 Nov 2016 4:33

https://youtu.be/kEZNkOnCXGQ

Honouring Both Sides on Remembrance Day

Paul Fromm discusses the meaning of Remembrance Day. He honours ALL brave Europeans who fought for ideals. He notes that these wicked wars, WW I and WWII, were a genetic catastrophe for European man. 

Inline image 1

November 11 is also the 51st anniversary of UDI, Rhodesia’s Unilateral Declaration of Independence. [In 1979, they were betrayed and backstabbed by the U.S. (arch-conspirator Henry Kissinger), Britain, South Africa and Canada.

Inline image 2

Multiculturalism and the Politics of Identity

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Multiculturalism and the Politics of Identity  

by Brad Salzberg, April 2015

 

For nearly three decades I have pondered the origin, meaning and impact of Canada’s official multicultural policy. During this period, certain conclusions have crystallized in my mind, and yet at the same time, many unanswered questions remain.

 

It is well known that the founder of multiculturalism is former prime minister Pierre Trudeau. What is not so well known are the circumstances under which this maverick prime minister formulated multicultural ideology, and it’s eventual legislation.

Trudeau was the first western leader to meet with Mao Tse Tung, founder of the People’s Republic of China, in the year 1970.  Subsequent visits to China would follow, including a walk along the Great Wall, during which the Prime Minister did a ballet pirouette, subsequently explained as a way to break the formality of the occasion.

 

Less than one year after Trudeau’s first visit to China, he introduced multicultural ideology to Canada. His intention, as he publicly stated, was for multiculturalism to “function within a bi-lingual framework”. It would take seventeen more years for multiculturalism to achieve “official” status. In 1988, the policy was entrenched in our constitution as the Multicultural Act of Canada. By 2008, largely due to the influx of foreign money, the “function within a bi-lingual framework” component had all but disappeared.

'Multiculturalism and the Politics of Identity    
by Brad Salzberg, April 2015

For nearly three decades I have pondered the origin, meaning and impact of Canada’s official multicultural policy. During this period, certain conclusions have crystallized in my mind, and yet at the same time, many unanswered questions remain.

It is well known that the founder of multiculturalism is former prime minister Pierre Trudeau. What is not so well known are the circumstances under which this maverick prime minister formulated multicultural ideology, and it’s eventual legislation.
Trudeau was the first western leader to meet with Mao Tse Tung, founder of the People’s Republic of China, in the year 1970.  Subsequent visits to China would follow, including a walk along the Great Wall, during which the Prime Minister did a ballet pirouette, subsequently explained as a way to break the formality of the occasion. 

Less than one year after Trudeau’s first visit to China, he introduced multicultural ideology to Canada. His intention, as he publicly stated, was for multiculturalism to “function within a bi-lingual framework”. It would take seventeen more years for multiculturalism to achieve “official” status. In 1988, the policy was entrenched in our constitution as the Multicultural Act of Canada. By 2008, largely due to the influx of foreign money, the “function within a bi-lingual framework” component had all but disappeared.

With the benefit of hindsight, it is obvious this unprecedented policy was a major game-changer. To this day, it is arguable the majority of Canadians are unaware of the policy’s full impact, and its implications for the future of our country. 
One significant but largely overlooked factor is to be found in the area of funding. The Act explicitly states that ethnic cultural organizations are to receive government funding for the promotion of cultural events, language and holidays. 

In practical terms, this scenario played out whereby the largest and best organized ethnic communities received the lion’s share of the funding. Basically, it was a “snooze and you loose” situation. Indeed, many non-profit groups hit the snooze button. The outcome was an inequitable distribution of funding, with a few select communities receiving tens of millions, and smaller communities receiving little, or nothing.

Times change. Demographics change, and no where in the world has this change been more profound than in Canada, a nation with the highest per-capita immigration rate in the world. Interestingly, until Australia adopted constitutional multiculturalism, Canada was also the only nation in the world with official multiculturalism. Pretty special, yet in all the excitement and fanfare, few seemed to notice or care that the general public had no input in the implementation of the policy. The public did not ask for or endorse this policy in any manner. It was a purely unilateral government decision, entirely devoid of the democratic process. 
Only with the dawning of the 21st century did the true impact of this policy begin to reveal itself. With mass immigration transforming the ethnic make-up of our nation, the demographic change became increasingly profound. In 2012, a Statistics Canada study pronounced that caucasians will become a minority in Toronto and Vancouver by 2031. 

As a result, Canadians of European origin today find themselves in a curious situation. Our government says white Canadians are headed for minority status, yet as an identifiable group, this diminishing segment of Canadian society lack a defined communal identity. This is all quite understandable, as in the past there was no need to even consider the issue of identity. Historically, Euro-Canadians were a well entrenched majority, and there was no reason to believe this would change, at least not to the degree that a re-thinking of identity would be necessary.

Multiculturalism mandates that minority groups have the right to promote their ethnicity, and to receive money to do so. We see this manifested, for example, in Vancouver’s two week celebration of Chinese New Year, complete with taxpayer-funded social events, dragon parades, and colourful community centre displays. The Viksaiki parade, largely government funded, is the largest festival of the year in Surrey, B.C., a city with a population on par with the municipality of Vancouver.

Let’s be frank- present-day multiculturalism has resulted in a number of oddities, inequities, and downright curiosities. Our society has arrived at a situation whereby the white Canadian are a “pending” minority, yet they lack in a communal voice or identity. When attempts have been made to create an identity on par with our larger “minority” communities, these actions are met with cries of xenophobia, racism, and other nastiness.

Why the double standard? How did we arrive at a situation where the only identifiable group prevented from organizing, receiving funding, and promoting their traditions are those whose ancestors founded our country? Take the holiday of Christmas for example. Within contemporary society, the religious components of our biggest holiday are disappearing- basically, politically correct forces want the “Christ” taken out of Christmas. At the same time, Muslim and Sikh holidays have been elevated to the highest level of multicultural sensibility.
Is it therefore reasonable to say that multicultural policy is largely responsible for a cultural “inversion” unprecedented in the history of our country?   Questions therefore arise- has multicultural policy become a tool to promote all ethnicities except that of Canadians of European heritage? What will happen come 2031…will caucasians be the only minority without the ability to promote their ethnicity? Will their behaviour as a minority community still be labelled as oppressive when they attempt to establish an identity for themselves within our multi-ethnic society? Are there special interest organizations and individuals who would prefer this be the case? After three decades of personal involvement and education on these matters, my answer to the latter question is yes.

Let’s face the facts: the multicultural ideal originally put forth by Pierre Trudeau no longer exists. Toward the end of his life, when asked his feelings on multiculturalism during a parliamentary visit, Trudeau indicated his sadness, stating that “this was not what he wanted”. In 2015, it is apparent that what was once a policy is today an INDUSTRY, comprised of multicultural organizations, civil libertarians, legal professionals, Charter of Rights advocates and immigration consultants- not to mention our top post-secondary institutions. 

Those of us who have been around a while may recall a time in our history when things were very different. During the “cold war” of the 1950’s, Russian-style communism was presented by government and media as a danger to society, capable of undermining the freedom and democratic rule so cherished by our nation. In the 1960’s, a wave of anti-Americanism swept through Canadian society. Events such as the Vietnam War stimulated a desire for a separate identity from our neighbours to the south. Our federal government, sensing public discontent, launched a program entitled the Royal Commission on Arts, Letters and Sciences to analyze “the degree of English-Canadian dependence on the United States”. 

Fast forward to 2015. Today, we find our government bending over backwards to ingratiate the desires of communist governments, and their economic interests. Trade deals, foreign currency hubs, foreign student programs, foreign worker programs, funding for pro-communist university departments. Foreign language advertising and signage has permeated some communities to the degree that they no longer appear Canadian. Our banks market in foreign languages, often without an English or French equivalent. Indeed, the situation is so extreme it often appears our government has greater concern for the well being of non-Canadians and foreign governments than for their own citizens.

Meanwhile, among the top source countries of our immigrants who provide the majority of our immigrants, all is culturally “status quo”. No government-enforced multiculturalism. No priority for foreign workers or students. In fact, all of Canada’s top immigrant source countries continue to retain their core identities, as they have for centuries, or even millennia. Only Canada, as well as Australia, are constitutionally mandated for the very fabric of their nations to undergo comprehensive cultural transformation. Just two nations out of slightly under two hundred countries in the world. In other words, only 1% of the world’s nations are truly multicultural. 

 From these facts we see that on an international level, multiculturalism is far from the norm. In reality, it is barely on the map. Furthermore, the Canadian public has never endorsed or given consent to this transformative policy. Clearly, it’s implementation is non-democratic. 
On this basis, and considering current societal prohibition of European-Canadian identity, how long will it be before the founding English and French Canadian populations of our nation are relegated to the periphery of society?  One generation. At present immigration rates, that’s all it is going to take. Yes indeed, the times they are a ‘changin. 

by b. salzberg, (c)  2015'

 

With the benefit of hindsight, it is obvious this unprecedented policy was a major game-changer. To this day, it is arguable the majority of Canadians are unaware of the policy’s full impact, and its implications for the future of our country.

One significant but largely overlooked factor is to be found in the area of funding. The Act explicitly states that ethnic cultural organizations are to receive government funding for the promotion of cultural events, language and holidays.

 

In practical terms, this scenario played out whereby the largest and best organized ethnic communities received the lion’s share of the funding. Basically, it was a “snooze and you loose” situation. Indeed, many non-profit groups hit the snooze button. The outcome was an inequitable distribution of funding, with a few select communities receiving tens of millions, and smaller communities receiving little, or nothing.

 

Times change. Demographics change, and no where in the world has this change been more profound than in Canada, a nation with the highest per-capita immigration rate in the world. Interestingly, until Australia adopted constitutional multiculturalism, Canada was also the only nation in the world with official multiculturalism. Pretty special, yet in all the excitement and fanfare, few seemed to notice or care that the general public had no input in the implementation of the policy. The public did not ask for or endorse this policy in any manner. It was a purely unilateral government decision, entirely devoid of the democratic process.

Only with the dawning of the 21st century did the true impact of this policy begin to reveal itself. With mass immigration transforming the ethnic make-up of our nation, the demographic change became increasingly profound. In 2012, a Statistics Canada study pronounced that caucasians will become a minority in Toronto and Vancouver by 2031.

 

As a result, Canadians of European origin today find themselves in a curious situation. Our government says white Canadians are headed for minority status, yet as an identifiable group, this diminishing segment of Canadian society lack a defined communal identity. This is all quite understandable, as in the past there was no need to even consider the issue of identity. Historically, Euro-Canadians were a well entrenched majority, and there was no reason to believe this would change, at least not to the degree that a re-thinking of identity would be necessary.

 

Multiculturalism mandates that minority groups have the right to promote their ethnicity, and to receive money to do so. We see this manifested, for example, in Vancouver’s two week celebration of Chinese New Year, complete with taxpayer-funded social events, dragon parades, and colourful community centre displays. The Viksaiki parade, largely government funded, is the largest festival of the year in Surrey, B.C., a city with a population on par with the municipality of Vancouver.

Let’s be frank- present-day multiculturalism has resulted in a number of oddities, inequities, and downright curiosities. Our society has arrived at a situation whereby the white Canadian are a “pending” minority, yet they lack in a communal voice or identity. When attempts have been made to create an identity on par with our larger “minority” communities, these actions are met with cries of xenophobia, racism, and other nastiness.

 

Why the double standard? How did we arrive at a situation where the only identifiable group prevented from organizing, receiving funding, and promoting their traditions are those whose ancestors founded our country? Take the holiday of Christmas for example. Within contemporary society, the religious components of our biggest holiday are disappearing- basically, politically correct forces want the “Christ” taken out of Christmas. At the same time, Muslim and Sikh holidays have been elevated to the highest level of multicultural sensibility.

Is it therefore reasonable to say that multicultural policy is largely responsible for a cultural “inversion” unprecedented in the history of our country?   Questions therefore arise- has multicultural policy become a tool to promote all ethnicities except that of Canadians of European heritage? What will happen come 2031…will caucasians be the only minority without the ability to promote their ethnicity? Will their behaviour as a minority community still be labelled as oppressive when they attempt to establish an identity for themselves within our multi-ethnic society? Are there special interest organizations and individuals who would prefer this be the case? After three decades of personal involvement and education on these matters, my answer to the latter question is yes.

 

Let’s face the facts: the multicultural ideal originally put forth by Pierre Trudeau no longer exists. Toward the end of his life, when asked his feelings on multiculturalism during a parliamentary visit, Trudeau indicated his sadness, stating that “this was not what he wanted”. In 2015, it is apparent that what was once a policy is today an INDUSTRY, comprised of multicultural organizations, civil libertarians, legal professionals, Charter of Rights advocates and immigration consultants- not to mention our top post-secondary institutions.

 

Those of us who have been around a while may recall a time in our history when things were very different. During the “cold war” of the 1950’s, Russian-style communism was presented by government and media as a danger to society, capable of undermining the freedom and democratic rule so cherished by our nation. In the 1960’s, a wave of anti-Americanism swept through Canadian society. Events such as the Vietnam War stimulated a desire for a separate identity from our neighbours to the south. Our federal government, sensing public discontent, launched a program entitled the Royal Commission on Arts, Letters and Sciences to analyze “the degree of English-Canadian dependence on the United States”.

 

Fast forward to 2015. Today, we find our government bending over backwards to ingratiate the desires of communist governments, and their economic interests. Trade deals, foreign currency hubs, foreign student programs, foreign worker programs, funding for pro-communist university departments. Foreign language advertising and signage has permeated some communities to the degree that they no longer appear Canadian. Our banks market in foreign languages, often without an English or French equivalent. Indeed, the situation is so extreme it often appears our government has greater concern for the well being of non-Canadians and foreign governments than for their own citizens.

 

Meanwhile, among the top source countries of our immigrants who provide the majority of our immigrants, all is culturally “status quo”. No government-enforced multiculturalism. No priority for foreign workers or students. In fact, all of Canada’s top immigrant source countries continue to retain their core identities, as they have for centuries, or even millennia. Only Canada, as well as Australia, are constitutionally mandated for the very fabric of their nations to undergo comprehensive cultural transformation. Just two nations out of slightly under two hundred countries in the world. In other words, only 1% of the world’s nations are truly multicultural.

 

From these facts we see that on an international level, multiculturalism is far from the norm. In reality, it is barely on the map. Furthermore, the Canadian public has never endorsed or given consent to this transformative policy. Clearly, it’s implementation is non-democratic.

On this basis, and considering current societal prohibition of European-Canadian identity, how long will it be before the founding English and French Canadian populations of our nation are relegated to the periphery of society?  One generation. At present immigration rates, that’s all it is going to take. Yes indeed, the times they are a ‘changin.

 

  

by b. salzberg, (c)  2015