ishmael n. daro

The Harper government opened Parliament today with a Speech from the Throne that was mostly about the economy, as expected, but there was one rather unexpected development.

In a section about honouring Canadian history and identity, there was this bombshell: “Our Government will also ask Parliament to examine the original gender-neutral English wording of the national anthem.”

The meaning of this is not ambiguous. O Canada, as beautiful of an anthem as it is, has only one reference to gender. In the third line, the anthem recognized the “true patriot love in all thy sons command.” Changing this to something less exclusive is a no-brainer and it has been sought for many years.

O Canada!
Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free!
From far and wide,
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
God keep our land glorious and free!
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

Now, it bears mentioning that “sons” does not specifically mean men, but uses the word in a universal sense, much like man and mankind were once used to refer to a person or to humanity in total (the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, for example).

“In all thy sons command” also doesn’t mean that men are somehow in command, at the expense of women. It simply means that Canada commands the true patriot love of all the citizens.

And yet, you can’t deny that to say sons and refer to the whole populace is intrinsically sexist. Even though I’m not personally offended by it, I recognize that it is outdated language. The original wording of “O Canada” was “True patriot love thou dost in us command.” Changing it from “all thy sons command” to the original or even something more modern like “all of us command” is a minor change and it makes the anthem more inclusive — which we are always told is one of the values Canadians cherish.

While we are at it, there’s also that pesky reference to God keeping our land glorious and free. This one is even more easily rectified by changing “God” to “We.” It’s just one word, and the revision is even more admirable. After all, it is we Canadians who keep this land glorious and free, not some unseen deity that 15 per cent of Canadians don’t even believe exists.

Already, people are up in arms about the mere suggestion that the anthem would possibly be considered for revision. The Calgary Herald apparently got their most childish columnist, Naomi Lakritz, to tackle the subject. First, she stupidly assumes that only women could possibly object to sexist language, and then she calls the concern mere foolishness.

“Women look as foolish complaining about the anthem as men would look if it ever occurred to them to feel threatened by the fact that like other countries, Canada is referred to as ‘she.’ Nor do you hear of sailors griping about hurt feelings and being excluded, because the ship they’re serving on isn’t referred to as ‘he.’ ”

Well, that’s just stupid. Referring to countries as females is already rare as people frequently use the word “it” instead of “she” anyway. And sailors being hurt about their ships… How low are the standards at the Calgary Herald that this makes a worthy argument? Believe it or not, what we call the country or its navy’s ships is not the same thing as a national anthem.

Over at the Globe and Mail’s Silver-Powers blog, Liberal party hack Robert Silver is similarly in stitches over the mere suggestion that we, as sensible human beings, might think about what our anthem means. Something tells me he would not object if his own party had suggested the same thing, but then again, the fact that the Globe and Mail has a blog set up for two party hacks is already a mystery.

Silver mockingly suggests that if we rectify the gender balance in the anthem, why surely we should change the rest of it because it is offensive to immigrants, pacifists, atheists, and the blind. Har-har.

Meanwhile, a Facebook group has already sprung up (doesn’t it always?) to fight back against this latest assault on our values.

The page’s tagline is “In all thy son’s command!” managing to add an apostrophe where none exists. In the description of the page, the author’s passion over the issue is clear: “Political correctness has ruined a lot of things in this country, but DON’T LET IT RUIN OUR NATIONAL ANTHEM!”

People who whine about political correctness, itself a nebulous term, almost never give examples of what in their life has been taken away as a result of greater sensitivity. Presumably, we can no longer call people niggers and faggots and get away with it, but is that such a loss?

We should remember that no one has actually proposed any legislation to change the anthem yet. It was a single line in a 6,000 word throne speech. Still, it’s clear that people are not going to be adults about this and have an open dialogue about national symbols like the anthem, which has only been official since 1980, by the way. There are legitimate points to be made about keeping the anthem as it is, but it’s likely that hysteria will overtake this debate.

I personally object to the reference to God but if people want to keep things as they are, so be it. But if there are significant objections to other parts of the anthem, like the gendered language, then people should be open to the possibility of change. The fact that we are able to look at our national institutions critically is a strength, and something we love to hold over our American neighbours, rightly or wrongly. So let’s have an honest dialogue about “O Canada” and if people decide to keep it as it has been, then at least we do so knowing that we take our roles as citizens seriously.

Oh, and the argument that “Government has bigger fish to fry” is just silly. The federal government is a massive enterprise; a few people within the government and civil service can safely look at the anthem without bridges crumbling and people dying in the streets.

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photo: Flickr