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Người Canada Gốc Việt: A History of the Vietnamese in Canada

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    Who are Canadians of Vietnamese origin?

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    The boat people started arriving in Canada on July 27, 1979

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    Canada exploits the boat people for partisan political purposes

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    Research and write about the Canadian boat people


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Canada gets a new national identity

and Canada's Vietnamese community get a mythical origin story to match.

Myth and propaganda

Canada's Vietnamese community gets a new origin story, and today draws its identity from an alternate reality created by that story.

The origins of Canada's Vietnamese community
  • Who were the boat people? The bizzare work of rewriting history

  • How many refugees? 50,000? 60,000? 201,000?


Harper's national identity project

Government rewrites history to shape a new national identity for Canada.

  • Why Harper hates the Vietnamese and their history

  • Re-framing the Vietnam war and re-casting the boat people.


Canada's pro-Saigon policy

brought the Vietnam war to Canada. Canada declares that the Saigon military regime has a legitimate claim to power in Vietnam and is an ally of Canada

Stephen Harper disseminating a revised historical narrative
  • Harper deceived Canadians It was a pattern for him.


Bringing the Vietnam war to Canada

The detailed story of how Harper created a new origin story for Canada's Vietnamese community and got his pro-Saigon policy through parliament.

  • 2008-2015 Rewriting Canadian history A chronology and a lesson in propaganda technique.

  • Fact checking bill S-219 making revised history the law

  • Debating Bill S-219 how parliament chose hostility over respect. With media reports.


The hostile environment

Canadian politicians have developed many ways to express hostility toward Vietnamese Canadians.

Canada's pro-Saigon policy is an offensive betrayal

Government speaks to Vietnamese Canadians using partisan political references to the Vietnam war. This is to remind the community of their new role as a model for Canada's new national identity as a warrior nation.

  • Journey to Freedom Day aka flag raising ceremony

  • The yellow flag with three red stripes and the scarf


Are Canadian politicians doing what they appear to be doing?

Canadian politicians are demanding that the Vietnamese community reshape itself to conform to an invented origin story based on the Vietnam war.

Saigon national flags in parliament - Liberal section
  • Find politicians by name

  • Chronology: Federal government

  • Chronology: Provincial governments

  • Chronology: Municipal governments


Senator Ngo

Senator Ngo's role is to sustain the myth, in part by visiting provincial and municipal governments to promote Journey to Freedom Day. He regularly reports his progress to the Senate.


Undoing the hostility

How do we stop politicians from speaking to Vietnamese Canadians in hostile terms?

What would a national commemoration to the Boat People look like?

  • What If ... you had come to Canada from a conflict zone?


Page updated: 2022-02-02, 673 words

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