Militaristic tone of citizenship guide decried in Geist magazine essay
It refreshing to read the essay by author Stephen Henighan in Geist magazine, detailing the propogandistic nature of the government citizenship study guide that is now given to new immigrants (and, if the current government has its way, may soon be put in the hands of every high school student.) Henighan points out that the guide evokes a Canada unrecognizable to older Canadians and takes on a deliberately militaristic tone:
If I did not recognize the land described in Discover Canada, that was the volume’s intention: to drive a wedge between old Canadians and new Canadians; between me, who did much of my schooling in Canada, and my partner, who arrived here as an adult; between the liberal, statist, internationalist culture of the past and what the authors hope will be the conservative, decentralized, militaristic culture of the future.He says that the Canadian tradition of opposition to militarism is censored in a document which mentions war 35 times but makes one, grudging reference to peacekeeping and where a spread about the rights and responsibilities of citizens is "emblazoned with photos of happy soldiers".
"Discover Canada is not so much Canada for Dummies as Canada for Spartans." [he says]
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