Freakinoldguy Freakinoldguy:
It's our shared cultures and languages. Our laws, our collective outlook on the world, our ability to put differences aside to achieve a common goal. Sure if you believe the academics who say finding an Canadian identity is impossible then you aren't going to find one. I've served with people from every race and every part of Canada and there was always one common denominator that identified us. We all considered ourselves Canadians and because this country is a giant tapestry of different regions, customs, cultures, values and beliefs doesn't mean that there is no common identity.
The historians claim that at Vimy Ridge Canada truly became a country and that battle was the one that defined as Canadians. So you can say becoming a country gave us an identity and since the definition of National Identity is:
$1:
National identity is one's identity or sense of belonging to one state or to one nation.[1][2] It is the sense of a nation as a cohesive whole, as represented by distinctive traditions, culture, language and politics.[3] National identity may refer to the subjective feeling one shares with a group of people about a nation, regardless of one's legal citizenship status.[4] National identity is viewed in psychological terms as "an awareness of difference", a "feeling and recognition of 'we' and 'they'".[5]
We've had a Canadian identity since 1865. Only recently have their been questions raised about our national identity and that problem can be laid directly at the feet of PET who through multiculturalism attempted to change the dynamic of our identity. So having this Trudeau claim we have no identity when we clearly do, is just another attempt to shore up his fathers vision of Canada as the first post national state.
Identity is a tricky thing, especially in Canada. Many parts of it have remained the same, but others have changed or been suppressed over the years.
Even at Confederation, most of the Anglophone Fathers of Confederation wanted a uniform plain union, but the Francophone Fathers wouldn't have it. Cartier and his supporters sold Confederation in Canada East (modern Quebec) by talking about how it would maximize their autonomy from the Anglophones in Canada West and allow them to maintain their distinct French identity. That whole sense of Quebecers seeing themselves as having a distinct nationhood of their own, even as they also have one with Canada as a whole, can be seen in the writings of guys like Henri Bourassa, Andre Laurendeau and Claude Ryan. Even Philippe Couillard talked about it when he said that, if we were going to reopen the Constitution to more clearly define Indigenous rights, something would have to be done about Quebec's status as well. Unfortunately, Francophone rights and the French language were repeatedly suppressed outside of Quebec, which most people have forgotten about.
Same thing with a lot of Indigenous peoples-while many of them felt some kind of connection with the British Crown, and didn't object to having settlers as neighbours, that didn't mean they agreed to completely give up their own governance systems or ways of life. They too have been repeatedly trying to make the same point about their own identities and nationhoods being recognized-Pam Palmater and Art Manuel are repeating a lot of the same things guys like Big Bear and Frederick Loft did a century and more ago.
Many people, both Quebecers and Indigenous people, do have a sense of Canadian nationhood. However, that's not the only one they feel connected to, which is something many Anglophones don't realize.
Pierre Trudeau's attempts to get the Franco-Quebecois to abandon Quebec nationalism and solely embrace a pan-Canadian one not only failed, but they've made it so most of his ideas and beliefs were embraced a lot more by Anglophones in other parts of Canada than they were by Francophones in Quebec. Trudeau Senior ended up getting associated with the "One Canada" idea advocated by John Diefenbaker.
That said, what connects us to them is the fact that, while we have some identities that separate us, we have others that unite us. Being Canadian is what connects us-all of us-whatever our other identities might be.
Justin Trudeau is talking out his ass when he says that we have no national identity. We do have one, it's just more complicated than it might seem at first glance.
CKA Uber 
