A recent NY Times article, Canada's View on Social Issues Is Opening Rifts With the U.S. highlights and quantifies all the stereotypes of Americans that Canadians hold dear. But this article in today's Globe articulates what I learned living in San Francisco on co-op for the better part of a year. Differences in social views are strongly regional, and in the Northeast and on the west coast (where I'll be moving in the new year) the people I'll live and work with will probably seem, well, pretty normal. Indistinguishable from Canadians, even. Yes, some Americans are the gun-toting, bible thumping, flag waving, gay-bashing, yee-haw, bomb-em-back-to-the-stone-age stereotype, (and where would the Canadian identity be without them?) BUT, contrary to conventional Canadian wisdom, you can easily move to the states and choose not to live anywhere near them.

Consider a place like, say, Seattle for example. The editor of the Seattle Times read that NY Times piece and thought in response:

Accepting of gay marriage, reluctant to make pot-smoking criminal, distrustful of Republicans, unchurched ... Hey, wait a minute! These aren't Canadians, they're Seattleites!

So there you have it. Up with the open-minded, cosmopolitan, urban centers where I wouldn't mind living, and down with Canadian ignorance of America's "normal" side.