00:00:00.000hi everybody welcome back to the show I hope everyone had a great Canada Day weekend and
00:00:23.240thank you once again for tuning in now speaking of Canada Day traditionally Canada Day has been an
00:00:31.100occasion to celebrate this country's many accomplishments and the pride that Canadians
00:00:36.740take in their country in recent years however our liberal and progressive elites want to make
00:00:44.480Canada Day more an occasion for self-loathing they want us to focus on everything that's bad
00:00:52.460in Canada's history and ignore all the good that we should be celebrating if you think I'm
00:00:58.640exaggerating consider what NDP leader Jagmeet Singh tweeted on Canada Day today on Canada Day we have
00:01:06.860much to reflect on we must continue to acknowledge the history of colonialism and its lasting impacts
00:01:13.760on indigenous peoples while moving to right the wrongs of the past and work towards justice
00:01:19.340together notice that Singh nowhere says we should celebrate Canada Day but rather we're supposed
00:01:27.860to spend the day reflecting on everything that he considers bad in Canadian history going back to
00:01:34.940the arrival of European settlers and the plight of indigenous Canadians while there's no doubt that
00:01:41.240indigenous Canadians have suffered and in many cases continue to suffer today we have to ask ourselves
00:01:47.540whether Canadians today have to carry this perpetual cross for the sins of their ancestors in the event
00:01:56.060that they're of European descent and how does this apply to new Canadians many of whom are indigenous to the
00:02:04.940places they came from and have themselves been victims of colonization in other words when are we allowed to stop
00:02:14.060considering ourselves visitors and consider this to be our native land if you and your family have
00:02:22.580been here for 400 plus years obviously this is your native land or if you came as a new immigrant for your kids this
00:02:32.540will be their native land asserting that simple fact in no way takes away from the reality that the ancestors of
00:02:41.420indigenous Canadians came to this continent before anyone else so far as we know let's not forget that when
00:02:48.380indigenous people arrived here a millennia ago they too were settlers in a new land when they crossed the ice
00:02:54.500from Eurasia to the Americas in other words if you take a strict definition of who is indigenous really the only
00:03:03.380people on the planet that would qualify are people from Africa where human life is set to have begun
00:03:10.040the rest of the planet was populated in waves of migration that took place over thousands of years
00:03:16.320now as part of those waves of migration European settlers mainly the British and the French arrived in what is today
00:03:23.500known as Canada that's a fact of history along with every other migration that has taken place
00:03:29.840throughout human history it's absurd and really unfair and ridiculous that the descendants of those European
00:03:38.000settlers so many generations later should be made to feel ashamed like they're second-class citizens for
00:03:45.080something they themselves have no responsibility for likewise newcomers to Canada and that included me a
00:03:53.840a quarter century ago came to this country looking for new opportunities and a new life which includes believe
00:04:02.000it or not tapping into a positive sense of Canadian identity just imagine how perplexing it must be when you Canadians
00:04:10.880when they arrive here face a barrage of self-loathing from our political and cultural elites rather than a positive set of values that they can latch on to
00:04:22.880they're being fed this narrative that Canada is fundamentally racist it's bigoted it's evil
00:04:29.260while ironically many new Canadians came here to flee bigotry and oppression in their home countries
00:04:35.740there's something to be learned from our neighbors to the south I happen to be recording this on the 4th of July
00:04:41.820which is Independence Day for the US and what's noteworthy is that on this particular day
00:04:49.360Americans across the political spectrum come together to celebrate what is great about America
00:04:57.200and at least for that day as far as I can tell by and large they seem to be able to put aside their political
00:05:04.460and ideological bickerings and they certainly don't seem to turn this into a day of self-flagellation
00:05:11.180by contrast here in Canada under Trudeau's Canada the significance of Canada Day and the symbols that have made this country so great
00:05:22.920have successfully been whittled down let's not forget that time two years ago when Trudeau lowered the national flag
00:05:31.060for months on end ostensibly to atone for a highly contested claim that the bodies of indigenous children
00:05:38.260were found at the site of a former residential school in western Canada
00:05:42.460two years later no actual bodies have been found
00:05:46.040yet to even assert that simple fact is seen as taboo by our political elites
00:05:51.200it's not just that our political and cultural elites are misguided
00:05:55.260when they keep sounding the drumbeat of past injustices to indigenous people
00:05:59.760I suspect there's something sneakier going on here
00:06:03.820they would like to shift our gaze backward to historical injustices
00:06:09.440which cannot be undone today since we haven't invented time travel
00:06:14.480it clearly is intended to shift the focus away from the situation of indigenous people today
00:06:22.060the data show that they consistently lag behind other Canadians
00:06:27.700both old stock and new immigrants on every possible social indicator
00:06:32.540whether it's income, employment, health or education
00:06:37.160the real challenge is for governments to work toward better integrating indigenous people