Tearing down Macdonald inaccurate, dangerous
The recent and growing hysteria about John A. Macdonald is inaccurate, misplaced and dangerous. The demonizing of our first prime minister, a man whose dream of a nation from coast to coast brought about the great country we are all now living in, is a selfish exercise in special interest coercion and bullying.
We may indeed be well aware, and many of us are, of Sir John’s faults and deficiencies, but he was also the architect of this nation and the 72 resolutions that brought about the British North America Act and our subsequent nationhood. He was, in short, a great man, who overcame personal tragedies and failings to serve his country repeatedly.
What is really at work here is an attempt to recast our history based on historical inaccuracy and the myopia of transferring one age’s values onto another’s. I would ask those who agree with demonizing Sir John A. since they object to his 150-year-old values, to tell me what the values of 2167 will be so that I can prepare in advance and be on “the right side of history”. Absurd. Right? Yet that is what people are doing in the case of Sir John A.
Tearing down statues of Sir John A. Macdonald is just another example of ideologically driven historical and social tyranny. Yes, I can see it in the case of truly villainous historical figures like Stalin or Pol Pot, but let’s face it, that is not who Sir John A. Macdonald was. As a Canadian citizen I owe my nation to our first prime minister and I am proud of him.
What is happening now is both unjustifiable and extreme, not to mention mere copycatting of what is happening in America. It’s time we looked at reality in order to cast a fairer picture of what Canada’s history and its great men and women were like rather than yielding to partisan politics and extremism.
Perry Foster
Duncan