Your understanding is skewed.

http://www.elections.ca/content.aspx...t=index&lang=e

http://www.ukpolitical.info/Turnout45.htm

60+% in both countries for general elections.

My bad So there aint a whole lot of difference between the two countries so the Canadians arent politically stunted as implied by some of the posters on here after all then?

I found your figures for voter turn out disturbing, so I googled. Where did you get your 20%?

UK figures
http://www.ukpolitical.info/Turnout45.htm

Canada

http://www.elections.ca/content.aspx...t=index&lang=e
They look pretty similar to me.

What a shame you don't care enough about your future "as a family" to be interested in how politics will affect it.

We hang out with a group of 10 families, 8 of which are Canadian so I hear them talking at times to each other about politics and they seem fairly passionate about it. Just not as passionate as they are about life

What a shame you care about it enough to think all of your interest in it will make any difference to your life

If recent political debate in Canada is anything to go by it would appear that, in the centre of the universe, one can allege all one wishes to about some politicians without producing the evidence at the centre of the "debate", or without naming sources, while laughing when those, against whom the allegations are made, state that the media has a vendetta against them.

That was worthy of Sir Humphrey.

I chuckled at the Globe today, it described an aide to the Mayor as having been a partner in a hashish dealing business. An enterprise that included the Mayor and was headed by his brother. The suggestion was that the aide's career at city hall had advanced unfairly quickly due to this business connection. No mention that drug dealing is technically illegal in Canada and so participation in such a business necessarily implies tax evasion. They're being kind to the Fords, perhaps balancing the Star's crack allegations.

One of the big reasons we are thinking of moving...

I've met quite a few Canadians interested in politics here, though many are quite disenfranchised with the system and as such "don't care", which I've seen in the UK also.

As for inward looking, for people that really varies, I think as immigrants we do have a natural advantage in that respect, being able to see things from different perspectives. However, I do think the News here is often very good at comparing things in Canada to other countries in Europe as well as the US - I've seen quite a few reports where they talk about how things are done elsewhere in the world.

Patio season!

I find Canadians very opinionated. Just takes a little bit of skill to work an angle that draws it out.

Generally if you talk about the french language, immigration or trades unions you'll get no end of experts on the matter.

Talk about the "lack" of Canadian culture (whether you believe it or not) and you'll not be waiting long for a nationalist diatribe, often focused around what isn't American about Canada.

Something as simple as "Why do you spell civilised like an American?" can set people off.

I sort of agree, but there is an inbuilt bias amongst immigrants that what we know and care about is important, and what we don't know or care about isn't.

I couldn't be bothered researching you, have you ever lived in Canada or spent any time in North America?

This point is endlessly debated on BE. I'm married to a home-grown Canadian teacher who has two degrees and she's not even allowed to teach her kids about anything on WW2 (read Holocaust etc) unless she gets prior approval from her Principal. The school's focus here are all on North America, with passing reference to European history. Usually related with the same level of intellect as the designers of red telephone boxes found in the average north american theme pub.

There's no BBC and no Radio 4. No Broadsheets. If you grew up with CNN/Fox and to a lesser extent CBC, then your knowledge of the world is restricted to soundbites. The news here makes me vomit with it's lack of information.

So i go elsewhere to read my news. I make sure my world is informed.

But if you didn't know other things were going on in the world, you wouldn't know any better, would you? Hopefully you had educated parents and teachers to help relieve the lack of cultural input. I believe though that Playstations have filled much of this responsibility.

I do meet many educated Canadians every day, but if you're asking them to comment on anything remotely political or historical, then they simply don't have the prior exposure to hold up a conversation. Unless they've traveled extensively outside North America, which most haven't. Their viewpoint will be from a local standpoint nly, as the OP said.

In the workplace the lack of "getting to the point" infuriates me. But people will stick the knife in the back just as easily, make no mistake humans are humans wherever they go.

I lived in the Middle East, it's exactly the same there. You grow up knowing what you know, which is a direct result of what you're exposed to.

I don't think we can really disparage the Canadians for being culturally lacking, the fact that it comes across as ignorance is unfortunate. And after a while it's annoying which is why we all usually take a break back home every so often to check back in to the reality of where we grew up. Or spend time on BE answering posts like this .

But really if you had traveled in North America to any degree you would understand this is just how it is here. They'll spend 5 house at a time talking about fishing and BBQs here, if you'll only give them the chance. When i think of the size of land i just got with my new house and for the price i bought it compared to back home - i'm happy to tune into Radio 4 and iPlayer to get my political debate thanks.

I don't agree with this view, I think it is the other way around, Canadians always seem more laid back and at ease than Americans do generally speaking. Americans just seem to talk and talk because they're afraid of quietness. And when I talk to Americans there always seems to be more fear of whatever, crime, government, traffic even. I think they talk and talk to ease their nerves. There always has to be some big bad evil that has to be overcome, govt mismanagement, the Soviet Union, terrorism etc.

Americans are more sociable generally speaking, I will say that though.

Examples I can think of are going for a walk - Americans always say hello when they walk past you, Canadians generally don't. Go to the supermarket, you can strike up a conversation with an American, much harder with a Canadian. Being on an airplane - on an American flight I can barely think because everyone is yapping to each other, I've been on Canadian flights where you could hear a pin drop. I can always spot the Americans on Canadian flights because they're yapping on and on, when I get to customs I always look to see what passport they're holding to see if I was right and I always have been so far.

Canada does have a lower birthrate than the US. My theory is that being trapped in the basement all winter watching hockey kills social skills among Canadians.

As for the world view of Canadians, okay it can be quite poor but I've met plenty of people in plenty of countries who are like that, at least in Canada the CRTC mandates a lot of news coverage so Canadians seem to be better informed by and large than Americans.

I remember years ago an American saying to me that the security threads they'd started putting in the money were a way of the government monitoring his movements, I can't imagine ever hearing a Canadian say that. Although better access to healthcare is probably the reason.