Vancouver 2010: a reflection on Canadian national consciousness
This is the post I've been wanting to write all week, but haven't found the time to, because of papers, readings, company, and the myriad of other things besides watching the Olympics. So I will offer you all, should you care to read them, a couple of snippets about what fascinated me about the Olympics. As usual, I do my best not to offend people--do know that I am aware I generalize to some extent. I don't speak for all Canadians, just like I don't mean to rig on anyone from any other country.
A few things straight up. I like sport a lot, and appreciate it as a fitness and character-building endeavour, but I don't follow professional sports to any regular degree. I chalk it up to not having a sports-obsessed family--my dad will watch a game here or there, but his sport is tai chi. Athletes are entertainers and performers, and that's not the type of entertainment I typically go for. But that is a much bigger soapbox and for another time.
The Olympics, however, is only partially about sports--it's an international and (some may argue) political event, and this time around I've been watching it more as a cultural event. I've always, always loved the Olympics, and so does my dad. I watched more sports (and more television!) in 17 days than I have in the past several years. I watch everything, especially the sports that don't get television coverage, like luge and curling. And as an anthropology geek, I've been preoccupied the past two weeks reading up how other countries and cultures are receiving the Olympics, particularly the United States and Great Britain. Part of this came from frustration at NBC's appalling television coverage, but the more I read, the more I was fascinated: how countries project their self onto an other, which reveals far more about the self than the other.
I am also Canadian, and these Olympics have been lonely for me, since I had to be at school. But I will say this: I have never, ever been more proud to be Canadian in my life. It's true, it's cheesy, and Canadians have always struggled with national consciousness (if you are interested, read part one of The Unfinished Canadian). With vestiges of French, British and American culture, Canadians have been known to define themselves as what they are not. Sure, you will get extremists and loonies in every country, but my general view is that Canadians, despite borrowing elements from other, more clearly delineated cultures, are just so... nice. You bump into them, and we'll apologize first. Our cars will stop for pedestrians. Most people are modest, arguably a reaction to the bit more exuberant United States. We get offended when people aren't as nice as we are, but we don't really bite back because that would be rude. If we make a mistake, we try to make amends (which is why the First Nations still have a vocal role in government); if others are nice to us, we go out of our way to thank them (THIS story is one example). We're not the most competitive of people, we like games where everyone wins, and in athletics we're more about sportsmanship than victory. Canada has an international reputation for peacekeeping, multi-culturalism, and politeness--and (also arguably) has a mixture of the 'best' of those cultures: free speech from the United States, universal health care from France, and the queen from... well, she's the queen.
Again, you are bound to get many shades of Canadian than what I've described above--I'm probably in the more 'exuberant' category of Canadian, and most of the time I think nationalism is tacky. But when someone says, "this is so Canadian" or "that's not very Canadian," this is what they mean.
Which brings me to two things: one, Own the Podium. Own the Podium was a government initiative for Canadian athletes, costing taxpayers some amount I don't remember. It was significant. Own the Podium was one of the criticisms fired at the Vancouver Olympics in the first week, when the organizing committee got a lot of national and international heat--the abysmal Canadian medal count was only one issue among the death of the Georgian luger, the snow melting at Cypress Mountain, and the mechanical flame failure at the opening ceremony. Some Canadians--even some former Canadian Olympians!--called it "not very Canadian" to be so ambitious in the medal count (OTP aimed to be first overall in the standings). Personally, I don't have a problem with Own the Podium, but I can easily see why some believe it goes against Canadian culture. It's very ambitious. It means we'd be playing to win, not just to participate. Some of this comes from Britain, where it used to be considered unsportsmanlike to actually train for an athletic competition, and to show your pride was an act of arrogance. And god forbid, focusing on medal count isn't Canadian at all!
1) There is absolutely nothing, nothing wrong with ambition and showing one's pride, and doing so doesn't make you any less Canadian. The best example I can think of is Scott Moir, half of the Canadian ice dance team that won gold. He is a huge supporter of Own the Podium, and has been outspoken about going for the gold for months. The key thing to remember is to be gracious whatever the outcome, win or lose. Also, though Virtue and Moir won, there is no shame in second place, so long as the athlete put in her best effort. I'm looking at you, critics of Jen Heil. Or even fourth or fifth place, Melissa Hollingsworth.
2) While I don't think it was feasible for Canada to be first in medal count, we've come a long way in recent decades. As recent as Albertville ('92) we were still getting single digits. You can make the per-capita argument that Canada does pretty well for 35 million people, but the truth is that it's much more about national sporting culture than population--which is why Norway always kicks a lot of butt at the Winter Olympics.
3) When things go wrong, don't write it off as a waste of time, or a waste of money. This is mainly for the domestic reception, I have lots to say about international coverage later. What I couldn't understand was the collective despair that swept over Canada when our darlings didn't win as many medals as we'd hope. "Canada is a fourth to be reckoned with"? Our athletes who came in top-five, compelled to apologize for letting the country down? What are we, South Korea and Japan? I'd soon as hope not our country's international prestige isn't just defined by the performance of one or two people. And I thought it wasn't Canadian to be so preoccupied with medal count?
Whatever. You see my point. Canadians got defensive, because we get defensive when people are rude. Investing taxpayer dollars in athletes, and athletic programs is no more crazy than investing taxpayer dollars in an arts festival. Canada, other nations are much quicker to give you crap, don't give them a head start by giving your own people crap! You might turn cynical like the British.
Speaking of the British, The Guardian gets negative points for being overtly (and rudely) critical of the early phases of the Olympics. Then even repented later, but still retain OTP was out of character for Canadians--and most of their criticisms were levelled at weather-related and venue-related delays. Honestly, do you really think that during the London games, it's not going to rain at all? The BBC, though, you get props for your coverage, for mentioning how Canadian these games were, and how the London committee will be seeking to emulate the Vancouver atmosphere in London. There was also a piece about how Vancouver reacted to early negative British press--they were hurt, obviously, since it's evident from everything that I've read that everyone in Vancouver, spectator, volunteer or athlete, is having a ball. It's true, though that this sect of British media will be much harsher on their own than on any foreign nation.
The NBC gets negative points, and so does ESPN (the website, anyway. The number of trash-talking sports trolls are appalling. Not saying Canadians don't do this too, but the amount of people I saw maligning Canadian athletics, particularly figure skating and hockey, was through the roof). Case in point, Virtue and Moir won in ice dance, and a ton of comments I read were about how Davis and White got robbed, and the only reasons the Canadians won were because they were on home ice, and the judges favoured them. You're always going to get that in subjective sports, but the way some nations like the U.S. seem to justify their athlete's losses will remain beyond my mental capacity. I read a lot of trash-talking about how the U.S. hockey team was going to cream Canada's, then those exact same people retorted with, after Canada won, "nobody in the U.S. cares about hockey anyway."
(Speaking of figure skating, I am quite confident that almost every podium finisher was overscored, but I chalked it up to it being the Olympics. I agree with most of the medal standings, especially re: ice dance. Virtue and Moir rightfully deserved the gold medal over Davis and White, but probably not by the number of points that they did.)
I am positive, positive that this is a select representative of American viewers. Most Americans, especially the ones I know, are thoughtful, considerate, tolerant and open-minded. What frustrates me is how American network television has the audacity to presume that all Americans only care about other Americans. I know this is a self-perpetuating cycle, but it's the same opinion that book publishers believe white readers will only read books with a white protagonist on the cover. Maybe I've been spoiled by college and anthropology and interest in cultures outside of my own. Everything NBC aired was in relation to American athletes, every feature was about an American, maximized for dramatic effect. NBC's coverage was tape-delayed and jampacked with commercials and annoying commentators and Mary Carillo's feature on polar bears. They seem to have milked the criticism of the Vancouver Games to maximum effect, everything from Canada's OTP and to Jen Heil's silver run to the delays at Richmond Olympic Oval. No love from me, NBC. Sorry if it fucked up your airing schedule, but if you learned to air things live maybe you wouldn't be so frustrated?
(Another aside, I can't help but laugh at one of the Canadian hockey players tweet before the gold medal men's game. "If the Americans win, they'll make another movie about it. We don't want that to happen." It's true, Americans seem to glorify success (not a bad thing in moderation), while Canadians expect success and become critical when they don't get it.)
It's possible that I'm so pissed about NBC's coverage, and the Guardian's unnecessarily rude criticism because I don't like it when people are mean. Could that be attributed to my Canadianness? Probably. I am not one to stifle freedom of speech, and people cay say what they want, though I prefer them to level criticism constructively. The funny thing is, the Guardian had the audacity to call Canadians "thin skinned" when we reacted to their negative criticism. Guess what, we have free speech too, and can react however we damn well please.
And it's possible I'm so harsh on NBC's coverage because what I remember of Canadian coverage was so excellent. rosa_g can tell you more about it, but CTV offered Olympic channels without commentary and that was the clincher for me. Even with-commentary channels, I remember, had features on athletes of different nations, and atmosphere in Vancouver was no different: the consensus is that, while we were proudly Canadian, we extended a warm welcome to other countries and other cultures too. They showed events in full, and they showed them live. rosa_g was nice enough to v-chat with me on some important Canadian medal moments, she spun the laptop around to face her television so I could catch three awesome gold medal runs live: Maelle Ricker's snowboard cross, Jasey-Jay Anderson's parallel GS, and Canadian men's speedskating team pursuit. The crackly screen quality was worth it.
I wished so much I was in Canada for these games. As the second week went on, the critics were silenced, and many were touting Vancouver 2010 to be the best Olympics ever. We had a record gold medal haul, breaking the record for most gold medals won by a nation at the Winter Olympics, most won for a host nation, most Canadian medals at any Olympics, winter or summer. (And I still maintain that this would never had happened without OTP.) Those in Vancouver knew all along it would be a success, when the rest of Canada caught on, it was unstoppable--and it was then capped off by the most perfect finish ever. The Olympics seemed to unite Canadians in a way previously unseen--as aforementioned, we're a bit self-conscious about our national pride, slightly apologetic, modest, polite and afraid of appearing arrogant. Some 95% of Canadians tuned in to watch the Olympics on television, and Vancouver's atmosphere was absolutely electric. Maybe after the Olympics we'll go back to being self-conscious, but this was an opportunity to proudly proclaim we were Canadian, because we are a proud country, just not always willing to show it. And we are proud, but not afraid of cheering on other nations too. What made me tear up a little, is that when the U.S. women's hockey team lost in the final to Canada, Canadian fans started a chant of "U.S.A.! U.S.A.!" For these Olympics, we were secure enough in our identity to not feel threatened by challengers. (Of course, men's hockey is different, and emotions were running a lot higher there. 'Nother story.)
So in the end, these Olympics, at least for me, were far from being about sport. There was competition, yes, but the whole thing was an exercise in Canadian national consciousness. Especially in the closing ceremony, when Catriona Le May Doan lighted the flame with the last beam up, in an ironic, slightly apologetic, humorous way that was so Canadian. I can't tell you how many times I sang the national anthem, how many times I wore my smelly Roots Canada sweatshirt, how many times I waved those Olympic mittens. I can't even tell you how many times I welled up, crying, because even though I don't show it that often, I am really proud to be a Canadian. Hell, I'm crying now. I really hope there's another Winter Olympics in Canada before I am shrivelled and old.
Take a lesson, London, it might feel good to collectively give a damn!
A few things straight up. I like sport a lot, and appreciate it as a fitness and character-building endeavour, but I don't follow professional sports to any regular degree. I chalk it up to not having a sports-obsessed family--my dad will watch a game here or there, but his sport is tai chi. Athletes are entertainers and performers, and that's not the type of entertainment I typically go for. But that is a much bigger soapbox and for another time.
The Olympics, however, is only partially about sports--it's an international and (some may argue) political event, and this time around I've been watching it more as a cultural event. I've always, always loved the Olympics, and so does my dad. I watched more sports (and more television!) in 17 days than I have in the past several years. I watch everything, especially the sports that don't get television coverage, like luge and curling. And as an anthropology geek, I've been preoccupied the past two weeks reading up how other countries and cultures are receiving the Olympics, particularly the United States and Great Britain. Part of this came from frustration at NBC's appalling television coverage, but the more I read, the more I was fascinated: how countries project their self onto an other, which reveals far more about the self than the other.
I am also Canadian, and these Olympics have been lonely for me, since I had to be at school. But I will say this: I have never, ever been more proud to be Canadian in my life. It's true, it's cheesy, and Canadians have always struggled with national consciousness (if you are interested, read part one of The Unfinished Canadian). With vestiges of French, British and American culture, Canadians have been known to define themselves as what they are not. Sure, you will get extremists and loonies in every country, but my general view is that Canadians, despite borrowing elements from other, more clearly delineated cultures, are just so... nice. You bump into them, and we'll apologize first. Our cars will stop for pedestrians. Most people are modest, arguably a reaction to the bit more exuberant United States. We get offended when people aren't as nice as we are, but we don't really bite back because that would be rude. If we make a mistake, we try to make amends (which is why the First Nations still have a vocal role in government); if others are nice to us, we go out of our way to thank them (THIS story is one example). We're not the most competitive of people, we like games where everyone wins, and in athletics we're more about sportsmanship than victory. Canada has an international reputation for peacekeeping, multi-culturalism, and politeness--and (also arguably) has a mixture of the 'best' of those cultures: free speech from the United States, universal health care from France, and the queen from... well, she's the queen.
Again, you are bound to get many shades of Canadian than what I've described above--I'm probably in the more 'exuberant' category of Canadian, and most of the time I think nationalism is tacky. But when someone says, "this is so Canadian" or "that's not very Canadian," this is what they mean.
Which brings me to two things: one, Own the Podium. Own the Podium was a government initiative for Canadian athletes, costing taxpayers some amount I don't remember. It was significant. Own the Podium was one of the criticisms fired at the Vancouver Olympics in the first week, when the organizing committee got a lot of national and international heat--the abysmal Canadian medal count was only one issue among the death of the Georgian luger, the snow melting at Cypress Mountain, and the mechanical flame failure at the opening ceremony. Some Canadians--even some former Canadian Olympians!--called it "not very Canadian" to be so ambitious in the medal count (OTP aimed to be first overall in the standings). Personally, I don't have a problem with Own the Podium, but I can easily see why some believe it goes against Canadian culture. It's very ambitious. It means we'd be playing to win, not just to participate. Some of this comes from Britain, where it used to be considered unsportsmanlike to actually train for an athletic competition, and to show your pride was an act of arrogance. And god forbid, focusing on medal count isn't Canadian at all!
1) There is absolutely nothing, nothing wrong with ambition and showing one's pride, and doing so doesn't make you any less Canadian. The best example I can think of is Scott Moir, half of the Canadian ice dance team that won gold. He is a huge supporter of Own the Podium, and has been outspoken about going for the gold for months. The key thing to remember is to be gracious whatever the outcome, win or lose. Also, though Virtue and Moir won, there is no shame in second place, so long as the athlete put in her best effort. I'm looking at you, critics of Jen Heil. Or even fourth or fifth place, Melissa Hollingsworth.
2) While I don't think it was feasible for Canada to be first in medal count, we've come a long way in recent decades. As recent as Albertville ('92) we were still getting single digits. You can make the per-capita argument that Canada does pretty well for 35 million people, but the truth is that it's much more about national sporting culture than population--which is why Norway always kicks a lot of butt at the Winter Olympics.
3) When things go wrong, don't write it off as a waste of time, or a waste of money. This is mainly for the domestic reception, I have lots to say about international coverage later. What I couldn't understand was the collective despair that swept over Canada when our darlings didn't win as many medals as we'd hope. "Canada is a fourth to be reckoned with"? Our athletes who came in top-five, compelled to apologize for letting the country down? What are we, South Korea and Japan? I'd soon as hope not our country's international prestige isn't just defined by the performance of one or two people. And I thought it wasn't Canadian to be so preoccupied with medal count?
Whatever. You see my point. Canadians got defensive, because we get defensive when people are rude. Investing taxpayer dollars in athletes, and athletic programs is no more crazy than investing taxpayer dollars in an arts festival. Canada, other nations are much quicker to give you crap, don't give them a head start by giving your own people crap! You might turn cynical like the British.
Speaking of the British, The Guardian gets negative points for being overtly (and rudely) critical of the early phases of the Olympics. Then even repented later, but still retain OTP was out of character for Canadians--and most of their criticisms were levelled at weather-related and venue-related delays. Honestly, do you really think that during the London games, it's not going to rain at all? The BBC, though, you get props for your coverage, for mentioning how Canadian these games were, and how the London committee will be seeking to emulate the Vancouver atmosphere in London. There was also a piece about how Vancouver reacted to early negative British press--they were hurt, obviously, since it's evident from everything that I've read that everyone in Vancouver, spectator, volunteer or athlete, is having a ball. It's true, though that this sect of British media will be much harsher on their own than on any foreign nation.
The NBC gets negative points, and so does ESPN (the website, anyway. The number of trash-talking sports trolls are appalling. Not saying Canadians don't do this too, but the amount of people I saw maligning Canadian athletics, particularly figure skating and hockey, was through the roof). Case in point, Virtue and Moir won in ice dance, and a ton of comments I read were about how Davis and White got robbed, and the only reasons the Canadians won were because they were on home ice, and the judges favoured them. You're always going to get that in subjective sports, but the way some nations like the U.S. seem to justify their athlete's losses will remain beyond my mental capacity. I read a lot of trash-talking about how the U.S. hockey team was going to cream Canada's, then those exact same people retorted with, after Canada won, "nobody in the U.S. cares about hockey anyway."
(Speaking of figure skating, I am quite confident that almost every podium finisher was overscored, but I chalked it up to it being the Olympics. I agree with most of the medal standings, especially re: ice dance. Virtue and Moir rightfully deserved the gold medal over Davis and White, but probably not by the number of points that they did.)
I am positive, positive that this is a select representative of American viewers. Most Americans, especially the ones I know, are thoughtful, considerate, tolerant and open-minded. What frustrates me is how American network television has the audacity to presume that all Americans only care about other Americans. I know this is a self-perpetuating cycle, but it's the same opinion that book publishers believe white readers will only read books with a white protagonist on the cover. Maybe I've been spoiled by college and anthropology and interest in cultures outside of my own. Everything NBC aired was in relation to American athletes, every feature was about an American, maximized for dramatic effect. NBC's coverage was tape-delayed and jampacked with commercials and annoying commentators and Mary Carillo's feature on polar bears. They seem to have milked the criticism of the Vancouver Games to maximum effect, everything from Canada's OTP and to Jen Heil's silver run to the delays at Richmond Olympic Oval. No love from me, NBC. Sorry if it fucked up your airing schedule, but if you learned to air things live maybe you wouldn't be so frustrated?
(Another aside, I can't help but laugh at one of the Canadian hockey players tweet before the gold medal men's game. "If the Americans win, they'll make another movie about it. We don't want that to happen." It's true, Americans seem to glorify success (not a bad thing in moderation), while Canadians expect success and become critical when they don't get it.)
It's possible that I'm so pissed about NBC's coverage, and the Guardian's unnecessarily rude criticism because I don't like it when people are mean. Could that be attributed to my Canadianness? Probably. I am not one to stifle freedom of speech, and people cay say what they want, though I prefer them to level criticism constructively. The funny thing is, the Guardian had the audacity to call Canadians "thin skinned" when we reacted to their negative criticism. Guess what, we have free speech too, and can react however we damn well please.
And it's possible I'm so harsh on NBC's coverage because what I remember of Canadian coverage was so excellent. rosa_g can tell you more about it, but CTV offered Olympic channels without commentary and that was the clincher for me. Even with-commentary channels, I remember, had features on athletes of different nations, and atmosphere in Vancouver was no different: the consensus is that, while we were proudly Canadian, we extended a warm welcome to other countries and other cultures too. They showed events in full, and they showed them live. rosa_g was nice enough to v-chat with me on some important Canadian medal moments, she spun the laptop around to face her television so I could catch three awesome gold medal runs live: Maelle Ricker's snowboard cross, Jasey-Jay Anderson's parallel GS, and Canadian men's speedskating team pursuit. The crackly screen quality was worth it.
I wished so much I was in Canada for these games. As the second week went on, the critics were silenced, and many were touting Vancouver 2010 to be the best Olympics ever. We had a record gold medal haul, breaking the record for most gold medals won by a nation at the Winter Olympics, most won for a host nation, most Canadian medals at any Olympics, winter or summer. (And I still maintain that this would never had happened without OTP.) Those in Vancouver knew all along it would be a success, when the rest of Canada caught on, it was unstoppable--and it was then capped off by the most perfect finish ever. The Olympics seemed to unite Canadians in a way previously unseen--as aforementioned, we're a bit self-conscious about our national pride, slightly apologetic, modest, polite and afraid of appearing arrogant. Some 95% of Canadians tuned in to watch the Olympics on television, and Vancouver's atmosphere was absolutely electric. Maybe after the Olympics we'll go back to being self-conscious, but this was an opportunity to proudly proclaim we were Canadian, because we are a proud country, just not always willing to show it. And we are proud, but not afraid of cheering on other nations too. What made me tear up a little, is that when the U.S. women's hockey team lost in the final to Canada, Canadian fans started a chant of "U.S.A.! U.S.A.!" For these Olympics, we were secure enough in our identity to not feel threatened by challengers. (Of course, men's hockey is different, and emotions were running a lot higher there. 'Nother story.)
So in the end, these Olympics, at least for me, were far from being about sport. There was competition, yes, but the whole thing was an exercise in Canadian national consciousness. Especially in the closing ceremony, when Catriona Le May Doan lighted the flame with the last beam up, in an ironic, slightly apologetic, humorous way that was so Canadian. I can't tell you how many times I sang the national anthem, how many times I wore my smelly Roots Canada sweatshirt, how many times I waved those Olympic mittens. I can't even tell you how many times I welled up, crying, because even though I don't show it that often, I am really proud to be a Canadian. Hell, I'm crying now. I really hope there's another Winter Olympics in Canada before I am shrivelled and old.
Take a lesson, London, it might feel good to collectively give a damn!