I understand Canadians pretty well and I’m really not sure what this supposed to be referencing. Few years ago, a poll found that 60% of Canadians viewed China as a “threat” or an “enemy” (40% and 22% respectively; https://angusreid.org/canada-the-u-s-and-china-how-canadians-rate-friends-foes-and-global-trust/). In 2016, 65% viewed China as a threat due to the coverage of its military buildup, just under half expecting a military conflict with it within the next ten years. (https://www.asiapacific.ca/sites/default/files/filefield/apf_canada_2016_nop_final.pdf)

Would you like to hear how Canadians viewed Palestinians not three years ago? Israel? 75% viewed Hamas as a terrorist organization and over half stated their sympathies rested with “both sides” (despite most agreeing that Israel was too "heavy handed’). (https://angusreid.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/2023.11.07_Israel_Gaza.pdf) What’s interesting about this is that this same survey showed that, despite most Canadians recognizing it as a genocide by 2025, 2023 was markedly more mild on Israel than similar surveys from 2020 and 2017 following Israeli escalations that garnered discourses on sanctions as responses to the Israeli genocide campaign. So, there is evidence to suggest that many Canadians became more sympathetic toward Israel once they escalated to a full-scale, total war campaign in Gaza and it wasn’t until that last two years very publicly that most even considered it a genocide (https://www.cjpme.org/pp_47; https://www.ijvcanada.org/2017-israel-palestine-bds-survey/; https://www.ijvcanada.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Survey-2020-Israel-Palestine-2020-06-16-Final.pdf).

I’m not sure where many Canadians get this impression that Canadians are some badass, principled people, but their perceptions are about as flexible and contingent on current conditions as any other group of people. It isn’t like Canadians view any nations in Latin America as “enemies,” and yet they allow their state to support and facilitate violence conducted by Canadian mining corporations on them with impunity (https://justice-project.org/the-canada-brand-violence-and-canadian-mining-companies-in-latin-america/). So, I’m not really sure what it even means for Canadians to view any other state as an “enemy,” when their condemnation, sympathy, or apathy seems to have little to no conviction and often very little bearing on how they allow their government to respond to those states; let alone with their longtime economic partner and imperialist co-conspirator, the US.

However, I do know that these narratives have become far more common in the two years since Trump was reelected, and Canadians finally found themselves marginally effected by US imperialism.