Many people have recently learned that their passports contain “significant” symbols of our culture and history. The Terry Fox Statue, the National Vimy Memorial in France, the Gray Cup and the Stanley Cup will no longer be featured in our new passport design.

And there are many people who seem attached to these illustrations. Rarely have we seen so much passion for the images that adorn a travel document. We are outraged by what we believe to be the victory of wokism, which would burden our state apparatus. According to some, we want to wipe out, sanitize, and abolish our culture in favor of beavers and squirrels, which are considered symbols of the Canadian Consensus. It’s ridiculous I know.

Can we calm down

No, not everything is a scandal, not everything is a conspiracy, not everything is an insult and certainly not everything is political.

To be honest, it’s far more disturbing to see Pierre Poilièvre waving our passports and ripping his shirt than to see our government adopt harmless and bordering on the ridiculous illustrations. That he should expect Canadians to be mobilized against Trudeau for knowingly removing “symbols” of our nation is frankly an insult to our intelligence community.

Remember that it was Stephen Harper’s Conservative, his spiritual father, who removed an Alfred Pellan painting in the foyer of the State Department in Ottawa to replace it with a portrait of the Queen (before the Trudeau government once handed over the plaque) . Perfomance).

To be clear, the proposed new design isn’t particularly pretty, deep, or symbolic. But it works. When we put the famous sun on our health chart, nobody called conspiracy. For good reason!

Because we must get back to basics: a passport is not a history book. It is not intended to educate us about our symbols or to teach customs officials in other countries before stamping. It is a travel document whose security and durability must be assessed. We might find it beautiful, we might find it ugly, but as long as it allows us to travel and makes counterfeiting difficult, that’s ultimately all that matters.

It’s a bit disheartening to see how hypersensitive and milky we are and that nothing is coming that turns us on. It seems to me that we have other priorities that could not be more pressing.