Job Discussion Forums

[leeroy]

I'm going to get in trouble for this, but still...

Canadians (in my experience, and notwithstanding exceptions) suffer from "little brother" syndrome.

A similar thing affects Kiwis in regard to Australia, The Irish/Scottish/Welsh regarding the English, and pretty much any country that has a smaller population to its neighbour but a similar culture.

Canadians feel the need to state (constantly) that they are from Canada as a way of saying "look! I'm not American!"

In a similar fashion, Kiwis will fervently explain how New Zealand is infinitely better than Australia for thousands of reasons, almost in spite of the fact that most of their (intended) audience knows nor cares little about the whole situation. A strange neurosis hits people from "little brother" syndrome, causing them to be needlessly patriotic - which, as we all know, is the last refuge of a scoundrel...

[FGT]

Following on from, and agreeing with, Leeroy's comments; you might get more response if you invited a separate response from Scots and Welsh: they may not like to claim "UK" as their origin (?).
I'm European. (mongrel blood, in Turkey by choice, UK passport, shared history).

[dln]

As a NON-Canadian who has unexpectedly had to move to the Canadian West (relatively temporarily), I can say that it seems Canadians are just very happy to talk with strangers. It's common to be riding on public transport here and have someone strike up a conversation. People in shops love to know where you're from, and I even had a teaching colleague who took his low-intermediate level class out to the streets for one of the coolest and most unpretentious lessons I ever heard of. They stood in a group and waited for Canadians to come along, then he would (rather loudly) give them WRONG directions to some landmark. 100% of the time, the friendly Canuks stopped to politely correct him.
Anyway, the point is that maybe Canadians contribute disproportionately to the forum because for them, it's normal to interact with strangers?

[nomadder]

Interesting theory. While in Toronto recently I found many strangers talking to me-and not just the ones wanting money or speaking mumbo jumbo. Not the norm for a big city. Very friendly.

[shenyanggerry]

And nomadder, Toronto is considered the MOST unfriendly city in Canada by Canadians!

[Wolf]

[Shonai Ben]

I too am Canadian but I am very happy living in Japan and I have no intentions of moving back.

[joe-joe]

FGT wote:

[Following on from, and agreeing with, Leeroy's comments; you might get more response if you invited a separate response from Scots and Welsh: they may not like to claim "UK" as their origin (?).
/quote]

I would agree many people from Wales, Scotland AND indeed Northern Ireland as well, may not like to be associated with their dreaded English neighbours, but I used 'UK' as a catch all for them. If they don't like to be considered as from the UK they could always use the 'Elsewhere' option I suppose And I think we're all of 'mongrel' blood anyway; it's only a few misguided racists who would ever think anyone has 'pure' blood. Besides it's things like culture and religion which divide us, not biology, ('cut us do we not bleed', etc).

As to Leeroy's comments, well I think he has a point there, but the British often get regarded as the little brother of the US as our leaders seemed determined to follow them wherever as an obedient lap dog. At least the Canadian government had the strength to refuse to back the war in Iraq.

Wolf; delighted to know you are a Bahai (Baha'i); I don't get to meet many outside of my Mother's immediate circle. The only other time I saw any great number of your faith was in Israel in Haifa at the Shrine of the Bab, and Gardens there. If haven't been there yet, and you get the chance you should go as the Gardens are quite beautiful

And without wishing to be accused of stereotyping at all, I have in general found Canadians very friendly and nice to be around, and not as weird and/or obnoxious as some nationalities I could mention!

[ls650]

[dyak]

[CountryClub]

I met an English guy who guessed my nationality (Canadian). When I asked him how he knew he eventually confessed that it was a guess. He told me that if he was unsure of a NA accent, he would just ask if the person was Canadian. An American doesn�t care but a Canadian is always impressed and complimented that he got it right. Same thing holds true for Australian and NZ folk, he said. Ask them if they are from NZ.

[Celeste]

I am a Canadian, and I can attest to the fact that we have "little brother" syndrome. A guy from New Zealand spent 20 minutes trying to convince me that it shouldn't bother me to be called an American due to the fact that I was from a continent that he referred to as "the Americas". I told him that by that logic I should probably be called an Australian, and he got very defensive and angry and said that he was an Astral-Asian (a term I had never heard before). I then told him that I likewise considered myself a North American, but not an American. He insisted that it wasn't the same thing.

I did have one obnoxious co-worker from a place in Canada sometimes referred to as the rock (Newfoundland) who took great pleasure in cutting into lines at the supermarket or train station in Korea and shouting "Out of my way, I'm an American!" I could have died when he did this in my presence.

[lagger]

I'm Australian (or Australasian) and some Kiwi friends and I were travelling around Chile (Chileans, by the way, hate the term American because they feel they are also American and prefer the term estadounidense).

Anyway, we got drunk one night and had a party and made a huge ruckus and everyone complained. The owner came to our room and asked us to shut up and asked where we were from. My Kiwi friend said, "Somos estadounidense," without blinking. Maybe the bad reputation American tourist have isn't their fault at all.

[yaramaz]

I'm a lumberjack and I'm okay... add another Canuck to the list, hailing from the wilds (and not so wilds) of Vancouver Island. However, it's been a really long time since I've lived there...

My South african ex used to tell people he was from the independent republic of Bophuthatswana, or Bop for short. He was sick of all the assumptions people in London made about Afrikaner men-- it got prettyconfrontational at times (he was 20 years old, nerdy and sweet and as unracist as they come, yet he was being constantly blamed for all of apartheid).

[nomadder]

Heard all Latin Americans consider themselves Americans. I'm Canadian but got tired of making the distinction and don't care if people call me American. I could say North American. Maybe we should reclaim the word though it would feel strange if a Brazilian and I met and I said"Oh you're American? Me too." Maybe we could use North, Central and South to distinguish? Nonetheless what can we call those from the US? Statesians?