How relevant is Canada?

I’m not upset. That’s just a typical American comment.
Ignorant and proud of it. That’s how your coming off.

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I’m sorry to break it to you, it really is. Europeans don’t think about Canada either. Europeans don’t even think about the EU all that much :sweat_smile: What is the EU was the most googled thing for the UK :joy:

He seems like he’s just being honest to me. Why would you expect anyone to be that interested in Canada? It’s a small country with a heck of a lot going for it, but simply not greatly important when it comes to weighty issues like finance, global politics, etc.

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Now if we were talking about beautiful places to visit in the summer, Canada might come up.

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Canada is a fine nation with fine people. Loved visiting the loved the people. Beautiful country. They get a lot of things right for sure. But it’s just not that important in practice even though on paper it is. Which is why I’m saying it’s interesting. Part of the G7 and top 10 economy in the world yet not really talked about in the rest of the world. I meant no disrespect to Canada as a country, just pointing this out.

I thought he sounds like an angry Canadian Kermit.

Question for Canadians: Do Albertans or Canadians generally use the word “bloody” a lot? Peterson does. I’ve never met a Canadian who does, but Peterson doesn’t seem like the type for affectation.

One word: Vermont

No. What’s the best book about Canadian history and culture? That’s a serious question.

I love Vermont! :sunrise_over_mountains:

The best book(s) I ever read about Canada was Harry Turtledove’s Southern Victory series.

My point is that I wouldn’t call any country irrelevant. Different courses and schools focus on different things. I didn’t take too many courses on African politics, for example, but instead of calling them irrelevant, I try to read up on them.

Someone calling a region of a country irrelevant simply suggests they haven’t focused on it. I repeat. It is a bit ignorant.

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He said it’s interesting that it’s irrelevant on the world stage, which is such a mild opinion as to make me wonder why you seem so offended. You can feel free to convince him why it is relevant, but let’s not go further down the path of insulting people for their opinions.

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I’m saying it’s interesting how it’s irrelevant when on paper it is relevant. It’s hard to argue against that when I pointed out that the 3 major English financial and economic news sites don’t mention Canada once in today’s front page. We do read about major news, like NAFTA. But day to day stuff, Canada almost never makes the news worth reading about. Hardly anyone outside of Canada specializes in the Canadian market, they might specialize in North Ameirca, but that’s just a nice way to say the US mostly. Even Mexico is more talked about as an emerging market connected to the US.

What? I liked the Worldwar series despite the not-so-subtle quasi-pedophiliac-fetishism. I kept forgetting the books weren’t written in the 70s.
That put me off reading the Southern Victory series, which looked like the most interesting of his non-alien alternative history novels. But if that’s the best resource for Canadian history it’s not promising. Corner Gas would be a better introduction.

I can’t say I got any vibe like that from SV. I’m being somewhat facetious, but I really haven’t read much about Canada specifically. I’d like to though. I’m particularly interested in the Lower Ontario Rebellion, sounds hardcore. That being said, there were several Canada-based subplots in the series that were very interesting and gave some perspectives I hadn’t understood before. I made sure to pick up a bottle of applejack when I did go to Quebec, very nice.

To throw Canada a bone. They’re solid at traditional commercial banking. But this isn’t all that important for people in finance unless that’s what you do. It’s not sexy.

Can it be relevant on paper if it isn’t on the front page?

Boring Canada, no sexy financial crisis to make them relevant.

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Canada is extremely conservative in banking. So that’s probably why no interesting news comes from there. They aren’t raking in cash but also not going into another disaster every month.

Not saying Canada doesn’t play a role at all. They obviously do matter. But just not on the top of the list for developed countries. I could say italy is just as if not more irrelevant when on paper they’re a major economy to some extent. We just learn about Italy because its like what not to do :laughing:

Not necessarily a good thing to be relevant on the news.

Like many things it probably depends on your metrics (world class snipers, or financial crises, for example). There probably isn’t a master list for developed countries.

Going back to your original statement that:

I’m still of the opinion that if you never think about Canada, that goes a long way to explaining why you don’t see how Canada is relevant globally…

But I’m biased

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I’ve mentioned the metrics I was considering. I know what you mean but it’s just not at the top of the food chain for the financial world.

I asked my Canadian classmates this and he had the best explanation. He said Canada is an amazing place to live, work life balance to to envy for compared to Americans. But who would you trust to handle your money. People who work work work or have a work life balance?

Similarly he also added by London banking jobs are going just bleed out to EU countries just like that. Would anyone want Parisans that care about work life balance compared to Londoners. And no one wants to be treated like a 2nd class citizen for not speaking French. :sweat_smile:

Fair enough, but that is a far cry from

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I’m Canadian, and I pretty well agree with Andrew 0409. People ask why I post on American politics so much- partly it’s the entertainment value, but mostly it’s because what happens in the U.S. matters in a way that Canadian affairs don’t.

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