Canada is either getting more peaceful or other countries are becoming less so.
The former would be ideal. Canada jumped three spots to rank as the fourth most peaceful country on the planet, according to the 2012 Global Peace Index. That's pretty good, but we can definitely do better.
Iceland is No. 1, and when have we ever been OK with losing to Iceland? They were the evil people in the second Mighty Ducks movie. I guess the peace list didn't take into consideration Hollywood portrayals. Canada, in every movie, is way more peaceful than that Icelandic teenage hockey team.
In order to be peaceful, however, we probably shouldn't be pointing fingers at Iceland. That would be counterproductive. It would be better to embrace them and just say it's water under the bridge. We forgive them for besting us this one time. That alone should bump us up into the top three.
The United States is ranked 88th, and still, the top 100 is OK if you're one of those kids who was fine with just scraping by in school. Actually one of the things helping the U.S. rank so highly is us. Having good relations with neighbouring countries is a category on the Global Peace Index and ours is pretty good. Our southern brothers, without us, would have only Mexico as a neighbouring country and maybe Cuba. That certainly wouldn't help their score. Canada can take credit for keeping the States out of the 90s.
Just don't tell that to any American you encounter. Would you want to risk it with the people ranked 88th on the peace list?
Some people appear to feel that peace is overrated. There seems to be a lot of concern over the Northwest Passage, and our fourth-peaceful-country rating is somehow detrimental to defending our own turf, if those waters are in fact Canada-owned. We think so, but not many other people do.
Either way, getting a bunch of warships and stationing them on patrol in the ice should be considered an incredibly unattractive alternative. The diplomatic option, with a little expert negotiation, is the more mature thing to do here. Planting some guns in the north and telling everybody to keep off our water because it belongs to us is a little childish.
Canada doesn't need to overcompensate for anything. It's difficult to see fellow Canadians disappointed by the fact we're a peaceful nation. Isn't a peaceful country what everybody should be striving for?
I'm not so naïve to say we don't need a military, but its primary focus should be on helping the country's citizens in case of natural disaster like flooding. Any business the military must do externally is just a necessary evil. To be clear, the troops are not evil, just the military institution.
It's unfortunate any country has to arm itself to protect against another, but that is the reality of our imperfect world. Still, it's nice to be considered the fourth most perfect in the world.
If Vancouver and Montreal can get their people to just chill out, we might one day make that top spot. They're ruining it for the rest of us.
