Happy 4th of July

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Have a cup of tea! :wink:

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If it weren’t for the American Revolution, the United Empire Loyalists wouldn’t have come north to Canada and surged the population of what became Ontario:

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Happy 150th birthday to you too!

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Man!, that is some serious grudge holding!!!

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More like a humorous version of the actual Canadian history curriculum.

This is such a good time of year for examining different takes on history. The time in between Canadian and American Thanksgiving is good too.

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(Kidding) Happy 4/7/2017, USian friends! :heart_eyes:

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I had my tea.

Patriotism makes me mildly nauseous.

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Any tea left in the pot? My tummy is tetchy too.

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Nice one!

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Some fireworks for the Fourth. Director Oskar Fischinger fled the Nazis to come to the US where he made this short film. Rather reminiscent of Fantasia, which he also worked (uncredited) on

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Howard Zinn was required reading for me, so I already know this.

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One of the fun things Ontarioans like to talk about is the massively different takes on the war of 1812 on either side of the border.

Case in point: the TV show “Turn” - which is about “Washington’s spies” during that era. Its very popular in the US. Its unwatchable in Canada. LOL (Not every “redcoat” was a rapist or evil dammit! And not every “American” wanted to revolt!)

We even have heritage minutes about the war!

(She’s in my family tree somewhere!)

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Never heard of it. It sounds laughable.

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It sounds like Braveheart goes to America

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That would be The Patriot.

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:frowning2:Don’t mention the war!:sweat:

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We were literally not told about this war in elementary school. Then, if we asked, we were told nothing except that it was a draw. It was a draw, that’s the ticket. Possibly the only draw ever in the history of armed conflict :confused:

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Well we were told the vengeful British burned the White House.
But why this was done, who knows?

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We were told we burned the White House down because (along with other reasons):

  • it was retaliation for, and an attempt to finally stop, raids by Irish-Americans aka Fenians on those territories still loyal to the British (ie: what is now Canada)
  • to stop the new American Republic from taking the remaining British territories by force, thus removing our sovereignty. We were also told the War of 1812 was largely guerrilla warfare, which is why things like burning down significant buildings and Laura Secord’s heroics figure more largely in the telling than, say, any battles.

Finally, we were told, as one of my teachers put it, that we “won the war but lost the treaty”. At the end of the war of 1812, Britain was concerned with Napoleon and how he’d changed the political landscape. They didn’t want France allying with the US and having another go at taking us over. If they had insisted on keeping all the territory they had gained during the War of 1812 (quite a ways south into the modern US), there would have been another war.

So when it was time to negotiate peace, they said, “Look, we’ll give you back all the land we captured and you stop attacking us, yeah?” and the US agreed.

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To be fair, in the alternative history that didn’t get taught in schools, the English were as resentful of their German king as were the American colonists, and people in England generally supported the Americans. The only reason we got the Hanoverians was the anti-Catholic legislation on Royal succession, and the reason we had that was the quite genuine support of the Pope for Spanish attempts to take over England.

Can we all in the English speaking world agree to stop our arguments and address the root of the problem, the family that screwed up an awful lot of the civilised world?
Down with the Hapsburgs!

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