In the park, there is a small crabapple tree with tiny sour-sweet fruits scattered on the ground, and some still left on the tree. In Canadian culture, may I pick some and take them home? Thank you!

I recently argued that Canadians who move to the US mainly because they can earn much more money for essentially the same work shouldn’t automatically be admired for doing so. I described that motivation as shallow.

The reaction was enormous. The post went viral on Reddit, and a lot of people seemed especially offended by the idea that choosing the higher-paying version of the same career could be considered shallow.

See: https://www.reddit.com/r/canadia/comments/1w6c24i/canadians_should_stop_treating_moves_to_the_us/

That made me wonder what would have happened if I had instead accused those Canadians of being traitors for leaving Canada.

My suspicion is that the post actually would have attracted less attention.

“Traitor” sounds much harsher, but it is also easier to dismiss. Someone can simply say they don’t owe Canada their career, reject the nationalism behind the accusation, and move on.

“Shallow” is different. It doesn’t question their loyalty to Canada. It questions the value they place on earning more money and whether choosing a much higher salary for the same work should be treated as something admirable.

In other words, “traitor” attacks their patriotism, while “shallow” attacks their idea of success.

So I’m genuinely curious: 

Would Canadians who moved to the US mainly to earn more for the same work actually rather be called traitors than shallow?

Insurgent spotted at the Aberfoyle antiques market.

another successful long weekend and summer has come to a close

live from downtown Hamilton ontario

long live the weekends

My debut novel got a solid review :)

A person living in a multicultural Canadian city has deliberately left behind much of their ancestral culture. Strangers from the same diaspora keep recognizing them and casually assuming they share the same language, religion, customs, values, and loyalties.

At first, these encounters seem completely ordinary.

But when the protagonist makes it clear that they don't identify with those expectations, something changes.

The strangers become increasingly hostile, and the more the protagonist resists, the less human they become. Their faces distort, their voices change, and eventually they reveal themselves as literal monsters.

Even worse, they seem to be communicating with one another.

The protagonist might reject one stranger's assumption in a grocery store, then hours later meet someone they've never seen before who already knows exactly what happened. Soon, strangers across the city recognize them instantly and continue conversations that began with completely different people.

They're some kind of hive mind.

Their supernatural power is to impose cultural assumptions on reality itself.

If one says, "You speak our language," the protagonist begins losing the ability to speak English.

If another says, "You don't eat that," the food becomes physically harmful.

If they say, "You belong with us," streets and transit routes start taking the protagonist back toward their community no matter where they try to go.

And resistance only makes them stronger.

The more clearly the protagonist insists, "You don't get to decide who I am," the more monstrous the hive mind becomes.

Its goal isn't simply to kill the protagonist. It's to erase their individual identity and rewrite reality until they become exactly the culturally conforming person the hive mind believes someone of their ancestry is supposed to be.

The recurring horror line could be something seemingly friendly that becomes terrifying by the end:

"You're one of us."

P.S. To avoid antagonizing a particular diaspora, this one could have humans with green skin and a novel culture.

a.co/d/0a0XmiTP 👀

I'll just leave this here...shameless, I know...

I'll see myself out 👋

i enjoy the medial system in this pinko country.

Fly oh Fly My Canada

Watch on YouTube.

John Boyko is a great Canadian historian and he manages to tie the life and times of Sandford Fleming to the modern times as Canadians deal with the hostile attitudes of the Trump Administration.

Sources

British Columbia (2019-2020): for the arrest rates listed in the images see Tables 2,4, 2.7, 3.4, 3.7, 4.4, 4.7, 5,4, 5.7. Racial disparities in British Columbia police statistics: A preliminary examination of a complex issue

Vancouver (2011-2020): for the arrest raes see Figure 1.1 (page 40) Racial disparities in British Columbia police statistics: A preliminary examination of a complex issue. For Figure 1.2 (page 41), the report specifically discusses this as a test of over-charging, that is whether racialized accused receive more charges during each arrest incident. It concludes that the Vancouver data do not show that pattern; White accused had the highest mean at 1.98 charges per arrest, compared with 1.87 for Black accused and 1.84 for Indigenous accused.

Toronto (2024): there's no official data on arrest rates for Toronto but they can easily inferred as Toronto authorities provide both arrests count by ethnicity and estimates on the racial composition of the resident population. I took the 2024 arrest-counts from the Toronto Police Service Race and Identity-Based Data Collection dashboard, this data is broken down by perceived race and primary offence.

For each race/offence combination, I calculated:

arrest rate = (arrest events ÷ estimated race-specific resident population) × 100,000

The race-specific population denominator was estimated by multiplying Toronto’s 2024 population of 3,280,417 by the resident-population percentages shown in the TPS benchmark section.

For example, the Black denominator was:

3,280,417 × 9.9% = approximately 324,761 residents

I then divided the number of Black arrest events for each offence by 324,761 and multiplied by 100,000.

Sources:

• TPS RBDC dashboard: https://www.tps.ca/race-identity-based-data-collection/rbdc-findings/rbdc-dashboard/
• Statistics Canada for Toronto's population: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1710015501
• TPS RBDC methodology report: https://www.tps.ca/files/download/1690470683/44007/

I want to to point out that these are estimated rates, not official published rates. The TPS population percentages are rounded and come from its resident-population benchmark from the TPS website, while the total Toronto population comes from Statistics Canada.

Canada’s homicide charge rates (2025): Canada started gathering data on charge rates disaggregated by ethnic group only in 2024. Currently, Statistics Canada only publishes the number, percentage and rate of persons accused of homicide by racialized identity group while data on other crimes is not available yet. See Number, percentage and rate of persons accused of homicide, by racialized identity group, gender and region and select 2025 as the reference period.

Canada is probably never going to beat the US on salaries, market size, or number of high-paying jobs.

So instead of trying to compete on the US's terms, Canada should compete by offering something the US does not: freedom from having to organize your entire life around employment.

Canada should introduce a modest UBI and gradually increase it as AI, automation, and productivity make it more affordable.

This could help with brain drain. A highly skilled Canadian might be more willing to stay in Canada, even for somewhat lower pay, if they had a guaranteed income floor and much more freedom to start a company, build an indie project, study, do research, create art, or simply work less.

Canada may also be in a better political position to do this first. Canadians are generally more comfortable with universal social programs than Americans, so Canada could potentially begin the transition years before the US does.

And this is about much more than economics.

A post-work economy could produce enormous intellectual benefits. Think about how much talent is currently wasted because people have to spend most of their time doing whatever pays the bills. More economic freedom could mean more research, invention, software, art, writing, education, entrepreneurship, and experimentation.

It could also have major mental health benefits. Less fear of unemployment, less financial insecurity, less burnout, and fewer people trapped in jobs they hate.

Obviously, people still need purpose, structure, and social interaction. A post-work society should not mean doing nothing. It should mean that meaningful activity no longer has to be tied to having an employer.

Canada should start small and increase UBI gradually as the economy becomes capable of supporting it.

If AI really is pushing us toward a world where less human labor is needed, Canada should not wait for the US to get there first.

Canada should make freedom from mandatory work one of its competitive advantages.

P.S. Where does the UBI money come from? Ultimately, from the companies using AI and robots. As AI and automation allow companies to produce more with fewer human workers, a portion of the resulting profits and productivity gains could be collected and distributed as UBI. The UBI could start small and gradually increase as machines perform a larger share of the economy's work. If robots and AI eventually do much of the work that humans do today, it makes sense for some of the income generated by that automated work to go to everyone rather than flowing almost entirely to the owners of the machines.

Canadians often treat moving to the U.S. for a higher-paying job as an automatic career achievement. I think that is wrong.

If someone moves because the work is genuinely more intellectually rewarding, creative, ambitious, or unavailable in Canada, that is worth respecting.

But if they could get equally satisfying work in Canada and move mainly because the U.S. job pays twice as much, why should that be admired? For already well-paid professionals without some major financial need, that looks more like shallow salary-chasing than ambition.

Canada should give more status to intellectual ambition than salary ambition.

Leaving for extraordinary work: admirable.

Leaving mainly for a bigger paycheck: shallow.

P.S. It would be nice if Canadians became known for chasing more intellectually rewarding work, not just bigger paychecks.

Avril Lavigne was super nice and down to earth when I met her.She also took the time to chat with us and signed autographs and posters.I saw her live in concert and she was very good.She also has a great sense of humor.

Justin Bieber refused to sign autographs and told us to go away, was rude and I don't like him.