Sonnet 87

I read many, many blogs, and some of those are blogs written by expats. When expressing their determination to vote in this upcoming election (more often than not, for Kerry), they usually get trolls proclaiming that, because they moved away to another country, they are no longer American and cannot vote. Their rights and their passports say otherwise. The bloggers defend themselves as best they can against this ignorance, reminding people that the United States is not the only good place to live in the world. Yes, it’s true, you can move away from the States and still be happy! You can move away from the States and be concerned about the political happenings back home! Nothing and no one can take that away from expats, no matter how much the trolls wish they could.

These expats speak of frustration at the United States, speak of the well of sympathy they’ve encountered in their adopted lands. I read those blogs, particularly those from Canada, with a sense of jealousy. When I lived in Canada, the atmosphere was anything but friendly and full of sympathy. Anger, resentment was more like it. I could probably count on my hand that number of times that the United States wasn’t insulted in my classes. It just wasn’t Bush-bashing, either. It was an all-out assault on the Americans in class, on every single person living in the States. No matter how many times I tried to defend myself by expressing my moderate to liberal views, I was still an evil American. Evil to the core.

Part of it might have been my surrounding community. English geeks are notorious for their overinflated sense of selves, using their excellent command of the language to try to wrap up less verbose people into contradictions and denials. Everyone always had something to say; generalizations were encouraged when it came to the current political climate. It was strange; we’re supposed to find supporting and contradictory evidence, then use both to try to formulate the best supporting argument we can. Except when it came to politics. My Canadian professors were in on it, too - how many times were jokes made at my expense?

I found the Canadian climate hostile; no one wanted to acknowledge that I wasn’t a Bush groupie. My unwillingness to march in anti-war events and attend anti-war concerts was another of my major malfunctions. For me, it was sheer workload that kept me from marching or attending. Others, who probably had as much workload but neglected it for social action, looked on me in disdain. After a while, it became easy to not care. After all, I was only there for a year. They’d have to suffer Toronto winters for maybe the rest of their lives. Mwahahaha.

Seriously, though, living in Canada was no easy feat. Acclimating to such a hostile environment was difficult; sometimes going to class made me sick to my stomach, wondering what they’d say to the horrible American this time around. I had long ago learned that protesting my innocence was futile; if I didn’t actively participate in their activities, I was endorsing a man whose sad command of the English language made me dislike him from the first. What they didn’t understand was that my protest was quiet. I was waiting hungrily for 2004. I was sending money to my social causes. I sent letters, signed petitions. I wasn’t being a lump; I just wasn’t conforming to their ideal of a progressive American.

I really wish I had experienced the level-headed discussion some bloggers recount. I wish that I had found someone in my cohort who didn’t hold my American citizenship against me. However, my cohort was the polar opposite of the trolls on the expats’ blogs. There was only black and white. There is a “with us or against us” mentality on the liberal side, but it seemed to only exist in Toronto. I didn’t agree wholeheartedly with them, I didn’t participate in their activities, so I must have been a horrible person. A Bush supporter.

Someone once actually asked me if I had voted for Bush in the last election, expecting a yes answer. “No, I helped Gore win Michigan,” I answered snootily. They were genuinely surprised.

Then again, at that point, I wasn’t willing to share my political views with anyone from my cohort. They didn’t know them because they assumed. You know what happens when you assume.

I really don’t miss Canada.