Our Future Lies in Taking Pride in Our Present, Not Ruminating on the Past

We can't let either traditional or progressive dogma hold us back

Maybe it's just that algorithms still tend to offer me way too much edgelord content due to my less-than-popular stance on Covid restrictions and the outlets that shared them, but it really feels like there is way too much talk about moving backward lately.

Generally, I am pretty content to either just ignore or engage with the sillier stuff I am recommended in bemused interest, but some ideas do get to me more than others. One such idea I've been hit with a bit more than I'd like is “cultural Christianity”.

A prominent recent example is Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali-born critic of Islam, previously strongly associated with the new atheist movement. Recently, she has expressed more positive views on Christianity, seeing it as a potential tool in defending Western values and freedoms.

What irks me is the traction this idea seems to be gaining amid recent concerns over pro-Palestine rallies across the Western world, sometimes rightly seen as pro-Hamas and anti-Semitic. 

Even Richard Dawkins, despite being one of the most prominent atheists (and still disagreeing with Ali on religion) has described himself as a cultural Christian to highlight Christianity's relative benefits over other religions - though, given his opinion of other religions, it's probably more like comparing a societal cold to a serious flu than promoting a cure (but I digress).

This is driven by the idea that these demonstrations are ostensibly anti-Western and pro-Islam, rather than merely advocating for Palestinian rights - and that Islam is not a “fundamentally decent” religion like Christianity.

As per Ali, we face a moral vacuum (often filled by such movements, along with, in her view, the “woke” who enable them) because we've stopped emphasizing traditional moral frameworks and have struggled to provide effective secular alternatives. 

Those who buy into this tend to think that our collective struggle to find meaning is due to a lack of religion or a “god-shaped hole”, as they find it challenging to cope or find purpose within the freedoms of liberalism.

But I believe the real issue is our recent failure to celebrate what actually makes us unique and successful in the West - especially our freedom to express diverse opinions, including these kinds of views. I, for one, appreciate that people who think this way can voice their thoughts, and that I am just as free to see such views as stemming more from personal needs than making a convincing case for a wider need for religion.

I feel they themselves aren't appreciating or even understanding the true significance and meaning of our Western values and freedoms if they argue that we need to push one religious view to fight another. By suggesting that only a return to a more Christian society can fill a moral vacuum and defend Western values, they undermine the very liberal principles that allow for their own diversity of beliefs and expressions.

Maybe too much exposure to the edge-o-sphere really has gotten to me, but I feel (uncharacteristically) compelled to paraphrase George W. Bush here: that would be letting the terrorists win.

In this way, the people who support a renewed push for Christian social dominance have too much in common with both the creeping Islamist views they fear and the “woke” people they believe are enabling this to happen.

I don’t really care to get into the weeds of what are often deeply jargonistic theological arguments over the truth of religion, as either Ali or Dawkins might. My most important argument about religion has always been that it does not make people’s lives better. People often argue about whether religion is true, but I fundamentally don’t think it’s good for people, writ large. I prefer to observe and pontificate on what people actually do and what that means for our responses - and my real problem with religion as a social framework is that it isn’t responsive enough.

It’s not that I have a problem with anyone believing what they want - it’s that I think the people converging around the idea that we need to push any particular belief, or fixate on the origin of our ideology, are missing what has historically been great about Western civilization - which is that we move on and don't get stuck.

In a way, this adaptability once reached its apex in Canada. For people from other places or those conditioned to expect more restrictive social norms, it can be hard to understand. The way we have typically done things is, actually, by not having a specific way of doing things. We adapted, grew, and changed. We took the best from everywhere and were very open to criticizing the worst of everything. Our problem now is that we've stopped doing this.

We are now so focused on condemning every misstep in our past that we lose sight of context, nuance, and the bigger picture. People in the past, however imperfect, did some good things that got us to where we are today.

An example that comes to mind is the decision still being heatedly debated by the Toronto city council to rename Yonge-Dundas Square to Sankofa Square.

The push to besmirch the name of Henry Dundas is in itself quite silly. While some criticize him for delaying the abolition of the British slave trade by advocating for a gradual approach, this strategy was a political compromise that ultimately garnered enough support to pass key legislation - and thus, Dundas's pragmatic approach was instrumental in achieving significant progress against slavery.

But replacing his name with the term Sankofa is an almost perfect parody of how we now fail to see any good in our past while being willfully blind to any flaws in other cultures.

The term is Ghanaian and means “learning from the past”, which is actually pretty ironic when what we are doing is rewriting the past - idealizing any "other" place without recognizing its own complexity - attempting to make everything the West did seem bad and everything from anywhere else seem good.

This idealization paints a romanticized picture of simplicity and moral purity but ignores the human messiness (and agency) of any society but our own - and that moral failures aren't a privilege exclusive to Western societies.

While the term may sound nice, and we can all get behind “learning from the past”, I question if that's truly our intention when we consider erasing the name of a person who helped end slavery in Britain and thus here in Canada before we even became a country, with a term from a tribe with no connection to Canada, in a country that only began its own gradual abolition process 81 years later than we did.

I also just find it frustrating to get held back by distractions like this. As our mayor has pointed out, the city of Toronto is broke. If there is an argument to spend any money or effort on the square, it should be focused on enhancing the experience for residents and visitors today. What has always made us great, and a better place to live for so many people with roots from all over the world, is that we look forward, not backward.

We need to celebrate how far our more open values, where we can question everything and hold nothing sacred, have brought us from insular thinking. You can’t fight fire with fire, and you can’t fight regressive ideologies with regressive ideologies. In the end, we're all lucky to live in a better place because the people who came here before us moved away from more restrictive and sectarian cultures to build a more open one.

Closing it off now - whether you are on the side obsessed with using the past as an excuse for bad behaviour today, or the side enthralled with a particular piece of our past because they don’t like how things are working today - will not make this a better place for any of us. Sanctifying other cultures while dehumanizing our own ignores our achievements and progress, distorting our understanding of history and humanity.

Don't get me wrong; I have my issues with how things are working too. I just think a big part of why we have those issues is that no one wants to say anything positive about our collective efforts anymore, especially about those who don't share their views. 

We need to feel good, to emphasize how we are all capable of good, in order to have the motivation to build better things together. While it's important to acknowledge and address our problems, it's equally crucial to recognize our shared achievements and potential.

I see a similar mindset at play when some less inspiration-oriented Canadians respond to young people's concerns about the housing crisis by suggesting they should lower their expectations and accept less for themselves - that perhaps they just have to get used to living with several generations of family members, in smaller spaces, or sharing accommodations.

They argue that young people should just adjust to these conditions, rather than expecting the kind of single-family home luxury their parents enjoyed, on the basis that more austere arrangements are common in other parts of the world. So who are we to expect better?

It's the same dismissive, defeatist attitude on display recently in Calgary, where people have been urged to drastically cut their water usage for nearly a month now following the rupture of the city's largest water main, given a real threat that they could run out of water. Many of their fellow citizens dismiss complaints about the fact that this was allowed to happen and how long it is taking to fix, on the grounds that there is no comparison to third-world drinking water conditions.

But there's nothing entitled or elitist about expecting better governance in our relatively wealthy country. 

The West, led by America and including Canada (though to a lesser extent), has historically been a beacon for those seeking opportunities to dream and achieve more. We were meant to be a place where anyone from around the world could come and, if we all worked hard enough, expect a better future. This is what seems to be slipping away - not so much a sense of tribal belonging, but a more fundamental belief that effort can lead to shared advancement, regardless of one's background.

It's crucial to acknowledge that this was, and should remain, our path towards a better society, providing the motivation to continue working together towards improvement. 

Canada is not simply “so-called”, as it has become fashionable to dismissively and disrespectfully delegitimize our status as a recognized, sovereign country. It’s a place we built together, and even if how we came to be a country isn’t perfect - that is the story of every place, in every time, and every group of people.

It’s debilitating to fixate on all the things that are wrong, to obsess over all the people you think are wrong, without always keeping an eye on how we can make things better. This, I believe, is a significant reason why so many feel we are broken, and why we are allowing things to break down - including our infrastructure, economy, and social fabric. What we need to unite over is our capacity to move forward collectively.

The story of the Canadian flag has always resonated with me, especially as a designer, because it represents a pivotal moment in Canadian history where we chose to celebrate who we are as a country, rather than where we came from. The iconic red and white Maple Leaf flag marked a significant departure from the previous Red Ensign, which was too much about our ties to Britain and not enough uniquely ours. This new flag symbolized a united and independent nation, embracing its own identity and more diverse heritage. It is a powerful reminder that we are a country built on the principle of progress, always looking forward to a better future.

So, in that spirit, and because it’s Canada Day, I am going to spend some time today thinking a bit less about everything we are doing wrong, and put a bit more effort into appreciating all the things we still get right - and considering how we can amplify them. 

Because it isn’t productively motivating to focus solely on what’s wrong - and, lord knows, we have enough of a productivity problem as it is.