To the Editor:
Re “O Canada, Come Join Us,” by Ross Douthat (column, Jan. 12):
Dear Mr. Douthat,
We read your invitation to join the American family, and while we’re flattered, we must politely decline.
Think of us Canadians as your favorite cousin who loves poutine over burgers and health care over havoc. We cherish our friendly rivalry, like beating you at hockey, but living together? Perhaps not.
You suggest we abandon our quaint customs like universal health care, generous parental leave and that cute little thing we call gun control. And as much as we love visiting your beautiful bustling cities, we adore our community-focused, syrup-sweet lifestyle even more.
We’re a modest bunch, albeit a bit smug about our politeness and how we manage to embrace everyone, from every corner of the globe. Our mosaic is colorful, our winters are white and our hearts — forever red with maple leaf pride.
So, while we appreciate the familial invite, think of us as the relatives who love family reunions but prefer their own home afterward. After all, someone has to keep the rink lights on.
Feel free to visit Canada anytime, Mr. Douthat — no need to bring a casserole, just an open mind and maybe a hockey stick.
Richard Wright
Hong Kong
The writer is a Canadian author living in Hong Kong.
To the Editor:
Oh, yes, Canada, do join us! We could surely use your civility down this way. Be aware, though, that the price of admittance to our republic has become rather steep.
You must pledge fealty — publicly, abjectly — to our incoming dear leader. You must abandon all pretense of honesty, which is best done by repeating the same lie at every public forum. You must be wantonly cruel to immigrants and treat them like barbarian pet eaters. You must make nearness to power your all-consuming quest.
More than anything else, you must look the other way! Whatever your education, however densely layered your syntax, you must never acknowledge the world you’ll be ushering in by your silence.
Mark Jacoby
Cherryfield, Maine
To the Editor:
As a Canadian, I am gobsmacked that an American — Ross Douthat — would confuse widespread dissatisfaction with a federal government with a wish to fold up the entire country in order to merge with another. By that measure, shouldn’t you have been knocking on our door to become our 11th province years ago?
Short-term frustrations aside, we’re fine, thanks.
Anthony Wilson-Smith
Toronto
To the Editor:
In spite of the lengths that Ross Douthat goes to provide his bona fides as a scion of Canada, his essay is a stark example of one of the United States’ most prominent social and cultural exports: main character syndrome. Why wouldn’t Canadians want to “participate in the great drama” and help “shape the imperium”? The better question is, Why would we?
So we can pay more for less accessible health care? So we can be saddled with more education debt? So we can be beholden to more monopolies, with fewer protections? So we can have even fewer political options?
Maybe instead of preening in the mirror, have a look around you. The “shining city on a hill” is collapsing, and we can hear you arguing about who is worth saving from up here. Viewed from the outside, the “great drama” of America is more “Real Housewives” than “West Wing,” and shaping the imperium clearly has a billion-dollar minimum buy-in.
Dave MacLachlan
Halifax, Nova Scotia
James Carville Is Still Wrong
To the Editor:
Re “Why I Was Wrong About the 2024 Election,” by James Carville (Opinion guest essay, Jan. 6):
Mr. Carville is still wrong. He sees everything through the prism of the 1990s Clinton years. This election was not some complex mystery that Mr. Carville had to ponder, seeking hidden truths. It was purely about the candidates, and about underlying racism and sexism.
The jobs reports were great, gas prices are down, the stock market was booming and inflation was decreasing. None of that really mattered to voters no matter what they may have said in exit polls. I believe that the vast majority of Trump voters would not vote for Kamala Harris or anyone like her under any circumstances. No amount of political messaging can change basic human nature.
Donald Trump appealed to the worst in us, and almost half of voters fell for it. Sadly, we must face the reality that a large portion of American voters harbor a great deal of racism, sexism and xenophobia.
Nathan P. Carter
Winter Park, Fla.
To the Editor:
James Carville writes, “Denouncing other Americans or their leader as miscreants is not going to win elections.” Sadly, it seemed to work quite well for Donald Trump.
Jeremy Pressman
West Hartford, Conn.
Helping the Hurting
To the Editor:
Re “When Grief Comes to Your Mailbox” (Opinion guest essay, Jan. 5):
Sloane Crosley writes about the onslaught of letters she received after she wrote about the suicide of a friend. She did her best to respond, although, as she put it, “On top of not being a grief counselor or someone partial to tasks, I have an allergy to earnestness.”
I may be too earnest. When my first book, “Girltalk: All the Stuff Your Sister Never Told You,” came out, I was 28 and utterly unprepared for all the reader mail about depression, disorders and stepfathers who entered bedrooms. But I wrote everyone back, thousands of handwritten letters. I didn’t see how I could do otherwise.
Email made correspondence easier, and the internet has given girls more places to share feelings and seek information. But I still receive letters and still write back. I know that kind words are a powerful balm.
Ms. Crosley explains that many of us “refuse” hard conversations because we fear “less-than-perfect articulation” of turmoil or condolences.
True. But when you know someone is hurting, saying something beats staying quiet. Even just texting “Thinking of you” lets the other person feel your affection and put a heart on it. If you can say more (you, not A.I.), better still. When you show you care, less-than-perfect words add light to darkness.
Carol Weston
Armonk, N.Y.
The writer is an advice columnist at Girls’ Life.
Why I Don’t Fly
To the Editor:
I applaud “Green Air Travel Is Still a Fantasy,” by Mark Miodownik (Opinion guest essay, Jan. 2).
When I tell people whom I know to be otherwise concerned about climate change that I have, for years, not indulged my love of travel through jet transportation because of its extremely disproportionate and damaging impact on the environment, they stare at me as if I have two heads or sheepishly look away.
Unfortunately, for most, the travel bug trumps the looming threat of environmental collapse, underscoring the limits of most people’s willingness to sacrifice their self-enjoyment regardless of the environmental costs or to act as consumers through flight boycotts to force changes in the dangerously polluting aviation industry.
Mark Bierman
Brooklyn
