Canadian Olympics… proud of being modest?
Sunday, February 21st, 2010I’ve been watching the Olympics these past days. I’m in Canada right now, which really gets me into the spirit of it, as I’m sure British TV focuses on British athletes, and Canadian TV on Canadians. Which it should. I was always excited for the winter Olympics, just because, well, as a nation, Canadians have 5 months of winter, so it’s not like we’re going to start sweeping the summer Olympics. We love hockey, we have snow. There’s nothing else to do here.
Here’s my view from my window today: try training for a marathon here.
It's snowing today!
The media in other nations are critical though. Things aren’t going smoothly. There’s hilarious, embarrassing, annoying happenings. Every event has them. Just because you try hard, doesn’t mean that people can’t criticise you. People will always complain. People will always be critical. People will always joke. Get over it.
I am quietly proud of being a Canadian. I love our snowy, boring nation.
What I hate is this arrogance. And the arrogance at being polite and modest. How can you be declaring yourself modest? How does that make ANY sense?
Skeleton champion belts out Oh Canada. He's got the right idea... he's just absolutely 100% ecstatic about winning.
I’m all for the cheering, singing oh canada, flag waving (who said Canadians don’t wave flags? I happen to think we have a beautiful flag!), and glorifying the athletes. We’re going to cheer louder for our countrymen, there’s going to be more of us than other fans, and tell me of a country where this isn’t true.
Canadians aren’t that interesting (with a few notable exceptions). We are nice, and we’re doing our best, but we should learn how the world works. We’re not very often in the world media, we don’t get criticism very often because we’re often not a big player. Now that we’re in the spotlight, we’re boasting with arrogance about our modesty.
These Canadians that are hurt by the criticism, that say we should just focus on the sport, have lost their grip on reality. Grow some thick skin, Canada. The Olympics are going fine. They suck at times, they’re great at times. That’s life.
Speech writers/media content creators: Your arrogance makes us look bad.
I’m sure most Canadians flinch when someone goes on about how AMAZING we are. We have a beautiful country, and we’re nice. Let’s not forget that we usually let people discover this themselves. We’re not perfect, but I think some of the public data is misrepresenting us. If we were acting like proper Canadians, we’d be proud, but acknowledge that we’ve made mistakes and things haven’t gone perfectly. We’d be able to laugh at ourselves.
I also look forward to 2012 in London, where I know cynical Brits will have no problem criticising their own nation’s attempt at Olympic glory.
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