“Wokeness” Is Not the Threat

Defending Canada: Why resisting American political cultism, not "wokeness," is key for Canadian conservatives.

What Makes Us Immune And What Doesn’t

Canadian Conservative by AI

Canada is not immune. We may think we are because our politics look different, our leaders sound less extreme, and our national culture, at least outwardly, still favours civility and consensus. We consume the same media, grapple with the same economic stressors, and struggle with the same deep-rooted inequalities as our southern neighbours. But we tell ourselves, reassuringly, that Canada is fundamentally different. That somehow, the conditions that birthed the Trump cult and the radicalization of American conservatives couldn’t take hold here.

And yet, we see warning signs everywhere. Convoy protests that paralyse cities. Conservative leaders engaging with far-right provocateurs. An escalating war on public institutions and journalism. The groundwork for political cultism is already being laid. The difference is not that Canadians are innately more rational or moderate but that we still retain certain structural and cultural guardrails the United States has lost.

This is not about assigning partisan blame or preaching to a choir. It is about what makes a democracy collapse, or resist collapse, and how Canadians can learn from the catastrophic failures of our neighbours. It is about understanding how cult thinking spreads, how media and political figures can hijack reality, and why defending our information infrastructure is the key to defending our democracy.

When Truth Becomes Treason: The Power of Cult Thinking

Donald Trump is not merely a controversial politician. He is a convicted felon, a serial abuser, and an insurrectionist who attempted to overturn a democratic election and install himself as a dictator. These are not partisan statements. They are documented facts upheld by courts of law and institutions of record. And yet, tens of millions of Americans reject these facts entirely. They believe, not despite the evidence but because they reject it, that Trump is a hero, a saviour, even an instrument of divine will.

This isn’t political disagreement. It’s a mass psychological phenomenon rooted in cult behaviour. Right-wing media in the U.S. has created an alternate reality, one in which objective facts are constantly reframed as liberal lies and loyalty to the leader trumps loyalty to the truth. The result is a post-truth society where politicians can commit atrocities and suffer no consequences from their base. The cult defends its leader no matter what. When facts threaten that leader, it is the facts that must be destroyed.

What prevents Canadian conservatives from falling prey to the same authoritarian trap? We are told that Canada is different, that our culture is less violent, our government more accountable, our people less gullible. But are we? Or are we simply not there yet?

Structural Immunity: Parliamentary Guardrails and Party Control

Canada's parliamentary system creates important barriers against outsider demagogues. Unlike the U.S. primary system, Canadian political leaders cannot hijack a party without internal support. The Conservative Party of Canada is not at risk of being conquered by a Trump-like outsider in the same way. A leadership race depends on the confidence of the caucus, not just a populist groundswell. This makes it harder for cult figures to ascend unchecked.

Moreover, elected MPs in Canada are more likely to face consequences if their leader behaves recklessly. A sitting prime minister must maintain the confidence of the House. In the U.S., however, an American president can defy Congress, discredit courts, fire watchdogs, and obstruct justice with little recourse. The system was never designed to withstand a leader who refused to play by the rules. Canada’s system, while not perfect, was.

Cultural Barriers: Education, Secularism, and a Shared Social Contract

Our education system, while under pressure, remains more equitable. We lack the same level of religious indoctrination that defines much of the U.S. evangelical right. Homeschooling is regulated. Science curriculums are generally respected. Our society is more secular. Our civic values, though often strained, still emphasize collective responsibility and pluralism.

Gun culture has not poisoned our politics to the same extent. Nor has white supremacy, though racism remains a real and urgent problem, especially concerning Indigenous peoples. The legacy of slavery has left a particularly brutal psychic wound in the American body politic, a wound that authoritarians exploit with ease. Canada’s racial injustice is real and must be addressed, but our history has not created the same widespread trauma-based political psychosis.

Perhaps most importantly, our social safety net, health care, unemployment insurance, and housing supports still provide some degree of stability for those in need. Where people are destitute and abandoned, they are more vulnerable to conspiracy and cult narratives. America let its poor rot. Canada has not gone as far.

Looking Beneath the Surface: Cracks in the Canadian Shield

Despite these differences, the threat is real and rising. We see it in the growing attacks on the CBC and independent journalism. The Conservative campaign to defund and dismantle the CBC is not merely about cost-cutting. It is a deliberate assault on one of the last remaining sources of shared factual information in Canada. If successful, Canadians would be left with a media landscape dominated by American content, social media disinformation, and hyper-partisan propaganda.

It would be as if, during the Second World War, Britain decided to abolish the BBC so its citizens could get their news from Nazi radio. The comparison is not hyperbole. Media control is one of the first and most essential tools in the authoritarian playbook. The war against truth always begins with a war against journalists.

The Conservative flirtation with far-right U.S. influencers, Tucker Carlson, Patrick Bet-David, and PragerU, signals a growing ideological alignment. These figures are not just conservative commentators. They are architects of a global authoritarian narrative, one that trains followers to reject liberal democracy as inherently corrupt and to embrace a politics of grievance, domination, and denial.

When Pierre Poilievre attacks journalists as biased and promotes disinformation figures in their place, he is not just making a political point. He is eroding the foundations of a fact-based reality. And when no conservative followers speak up in protest, when dissent is silenced or waved away with cries of “fake news” or “both sides do it,” we see just how fragile our political culture has become.

The Cult Next Door: Political Infection in the Age of Memes and Media

American culture dominates our media, our newsfeeds, and our online discourse. Most Canadians can name more U.S. senators than Canadian MPs. Many voters go to the polls with American worldviews in their heads, shaped by viral clips, partisan rants, and YouTube personalities. Social media has blasted through our regulatory barriers, flooding our minds with American narratives that are increasingly weaponized by hostile state and non-state actors.

The rise of evangelical churches, American-style political organizations, and U.S.-owned media conglomerates has only accelerated the transformation. Conservative talk radio networks have become breeding grounds for culture war grievances, pushing the political right toward U.S.-style extremism. The “freedom convoy” protests were a taste of what happens when these narratives take root: the invocation of the U.S. First Amendment in Canadian courtrooms is not just ignorance; it is evidence of a shifting national identity.

The Conservative Choice: Return to Reality or Embrace the Cult

This is not just a critique of one party. It is a warning. If conservatives in Canada allow their movement to become defined by U.S.-style authoritarianism, they will destroy the very country they claim to defend. The Canadian Conservative legacy, economic pragmatism, civil liberties, and national unity are being sacrificed on the altar of Trumpism.

If Pierre Poilievre were to one day attempt something truly authoritarian, a coup, the abolition of civil rights, the elimination of democratic checks, would Canadian conservatives push back? Or would they mirror their American counterparts, deny it happened, blame liberal propaganda, or defend him as a necessary strongman in a war against the “woke”?

This is the question every Canadian conservative must answer, and soon.

The Cost of Denial and the Urgency of Action

Canada has not yet fallen. But we are closer to the edge than we like to admit. The difference between us and the United States is not moral superiority or political immunity. It is that we have not yet fully dismantled the guardrails that protect democracy from tyranny. But the tools of destruction are in hand. The CBC is under siege. Our political discourse is becoming unmoored from facts. And many who once stood for integrity and truth now prefer power and propaganda.

To those who still believe in facts, decency, and democracy, across all political affiliations, now is the time to speak up. Defend our public broadcasters. Support local and independent journalism. Call out cult thinking wherever you see it, even if it comes from your political tribe. Demand that leaders tell the truth, not just what their base wants to hear. This is not a fight against conservatism. It is a fight for Canada.

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