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May 10, 2006
Canadians don't care? No, Canadians are bored by America
I asked my friend Barry Wellman, a famous sociologist who studies Internet communities, why we haven't had many contributions from Canada on LoveUsHateUS.com. Please couldn't he, I asked, knowing that he is a networker without equal, get some friends and colleagues to write. Here's what he said:
"Canadians are bored with the theme, "Love Us, Hate Us", because by nature of living next to the gorilla, they deal with it all the time.
For example, try the term "software lumber dispute" on Canadians and Americans. Every Canadian knows it: American perfidy in ignoring NAFTA rulings about softwood lumber tariffs. I doubt that 0.01% of Americans do. [I didn't.}
"There are many books on the theme of living with King Kong, whom you may recall had his attractions as well as his rambunctiousness destructiveness. Some major ones came from the 1970s. George Grant, Lament for a Nation; Ian Lumsden (ed.) Close the 49th Parallel; Margaret Atwood, Survival (non-fiction). And on a different, more pro-American note, Edgar Z Friedenberg, Deference to Authority."
Posted by Karen Christensen at May 10, 2006 5:05 PM