Oh *sigh* Canada

Recently there has been talk in Canada about changing the national anthem to be gender-neutral. A week or so ago, Governor General Michaelle Jean asked the Conservative government to review the national anthem and to consider changing it to be gender neutral. Changing, for example, a phrase saying ““True patriot love in all thy sons command” to “True patriot love thou dost in us command.”

Following this there was a huge outcry from Canadians saying this issue doesn’t really matter, and that sexism doesn’t exist anymore and we shouldn’t be wasting our time with such an inconsequential issue.

Here’s the thing, I do agree with some of these things. Considering the uproar that happened when Stephen Harper prorogued parliament at the end of 2009, the Conservative government seems to just be trying to attempt to touch on women’s issues to seem like they care. In doing this they can claim that they care about women’s rights and try to win over women voters.

So while I do agree that perhaps this is not the women’s issue for the government to focus on seeing as, I believe, there are bigger issues to worry about, I also just don’t get the big deal with changing a couple words. By the way that many people, my friends included, reacted you’d think that they were attempting to steal their identity. While I see their need to be patriotic, which i feel we sometimes are lacking in Canada, I found it really excessive. Large amounts of Facebook groups were popping up, and the comments at times were getting out of control.

For example, after a long series of comments on people saying that those who don’t agree with our national anthem should “get the fuck out of our country” someone actually wrote this about the woman initiated the discussion “What do we know about this woman??? Is she on Face Book?? Can we terrorize her??? I agree 150% with everything said here.....Get The Hell Out of Our Country If You Don't Like Our Anthem!!! What a stupid bitch!”

The discussion got to not only women bashing but religion bashing. Another commenter wrote: “Just wait....in another generation or so the muslims will be complaining about the God reference because it 'offends' them.”

I thought Canada was inclusive no matter what sex, race, religion or disability you so happen to have. But it is apparent that is not so.

The whole attitude around the issue seemed feminist and women bashing. Many stated that sexism is dead in Canada and women and men are equal etc. So…equal in what way?

We hear about women’s rights issues every day in the news, though maybe we do not realize it. Woman gets kidnapped and killed, woman claims sexual harassment at work, woman raped in backyard of school. There is always violence against women, in a developing country or not.

Is this not sexism? People are violent or inconsiderate to a person based on their sex? So how is sexism dead in Canada? Mind you, how is sexism dead in any country?

While I agree that changing the Canadian national anthem seems unimportant just because it’s not a very big women’s issue, the attitude towards feminists and women pushing this issue was extremely disappointing.

While I am proud to be Canadian, I am definitely not proud of this.