National pride is weird. I watched the hockey game, I cheered for the home team. I enjoyed it. After the hockey game, I honked my horn going home like everyone else celebrating. However, the whole time I was thinking "This makes no sense."
I am supposed to be proud to be a Canadian. I don’t think the concept makes any sense. I had absolutely nothing to do with being born here, or even raised here. I was a kid. None of it was my responsibility. How can I be "proud" of something I had nothing to do with? I made no decisions. When I say this, people usually come out with a statement like "You should be grateful to be here." Well duh. I’m glad I was lucky to be born in such a wealthy country, and glad I am middle class, life is alot easier than it could be. But that again is nothing to be proud of, it wasn’t my fault. Otherwise they say "aren’t you proud of your heritage?" Again I had nothing to do with it. How can I be proud of people who lived in canada living their lives and devleoping their own culture. this comes naturally to any group of people. Some of them did praiseworthy things, many did not. I do feel pride for people when they do praiseworthy things. I feel proud of people when they are brave enough to get arrested for a good cause. That’s not proud to be a canadian though. I’m proud of Chinese people who do that.
If people question national pride, they might point to the bad things done by the canadian government, like invading afghanistan. They are not proud of that, thus they are not proud of Canada, they are ashamed. I however, don’t think the concept of Canadian pride makes any sense whatsoever. Moreover, it’s a tool to get us to join the army and kill people overseas.
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