The Greatest

[mindspell]

In the past few months, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation did a show that tried to figure out who was the Greatest Canadian. So they figured out a bunch of finalists, did bios of each for weeks and then let the people of Canada decide by voting, American Idol style. Every week you had a canadian personality, called an advocate, that would try to rally the troops to its finalist. Unsurprisingly, the show was much talked about on TV, Radio and households across Canada.

The winner was Tommy Douglas (fortunatly it wasn't a hockey person, because a couple were in the finalists), a politician responsible for the first Canadian Medicare program. Who should've won? And who do you think is the Greatest American/British/Greek/wherever you are from?

1. Tommy Douglas (politician, "father of medicare")
2. Terry Fox (athlete, activist)
3. Pierre Trudeau (prime minister)
4. Sir Frederick Banting (medical scientist, co-discoverer of insulin)
5. David Suzuki (geneticist, environmentalist, broadcaster, activist)
6. Lester Bowles Pearson (prime minister)
7. Don Cherry (ice hockey coach, commentator)
8. Sir John A. Macdonald (prime minister)
9. Alexander Graham Bell (scientist, inventor, founder of the Bell telephone company)
10. Wayne Gretzky (professional ice hockey player)

 

[lizard]

Greatest Canadian is clearly Neil Young.

Greatest American would be Martin Luther King or Morris Dees.

 

[RjBeals]

Greatest Canadians: Bob & Doug McKenzie

 

[lizard]

hmmm...you've got a point there...

 

[0sm0se]

The co-discoverer of insulin didn't win? ah, constant devalution of scientific discovery

 

[xfer]

that list is kind of pathetic. not that a "greatest american" list voted on by the american people wouldn't be pathetic. but still.

off the top of my head, ben franklin was pretty awesome, just in terms of genius, greatness, significance, et cetera. also he invented x-ray spex.

 

[mindspell]

Who exactly, apart from Wayne Gretzky and Don Cherry, do you think is pathetic?

 

[xfer]

it's just not a very world-class, history-making list.

 

[mindspell]

Well, Lester Pearson is the only Canadian with a Nobel peace prize, he basically founded the Blue-Helmets Corps for the UN.

David Suzuki has done some pretty important genetic research before becoming a broadcaster. He is now the most important envirronmentalist voice in Canada.

Frederic Banting I don't think you can argue.

Alexander Graham Bell either.

Pierre Elliot Trudeau was a charismatic leader, probably our most respected Prime Minister abroad in history. He also made history when Canada became the first country to have the human rights declaration attached to its constitution.

John A. McDonald was the first prime minister of the country, only reason he is there. he wasn't a visionary, was a known bigot (he once said publicly that Chinese, that were employed to build railways, were a half breed of subhumans that were only useful to die in mines).

Terry Fox and the foundation he started raised more money for cancer than any organisation in Canada ever. The kid got cancer, got his leg amputated, then decided to run accross Canada (with crappy artificial leg I might add) at a rate of 26 miles per day, without breaks, to raise money for cancer. He died three quarters of the way through because his cancer picked up along the way. This is the kind of selfless actions that deserves to be there.

 

[xfer]

No argument with Bell. Trudeau is a stretch and a half--America's had a lot of darn charismatic leaders, too, and I'm not putting them on our list just for that sake--but maybe.

Terry Fox? GREATEST CANADIAN being a one-legged kid who died of cancer running? I mean, he's noble, sure, good guy, great, but if he's one of the Greatest Canadians I'm going to have to apply my "pathetic" designation to more than just the list.

I am really taking "greatest" to heart here. Ralph Nader is a terrific boon to American and a good American, but internationally and historically I don't think he's GREAT (which connotes epic stuff). It's nice you're a prize-winning geneticist and environmentalist, but that's not exactly "great" in any except a provincial sense.

 

[mindspell]

Btw I am not saying that I agree with Trudeau being there, he fucked us over about 12 times so I won't advocate him beign on the list but I can understand it. Terry Fox probably deserves to be on the list more because that's what canadians aspire to be, noble, good guys and selfless, more than his accomplishment. Just like Tommy Douglas won because he was the father of medicare and that's what Canadians believe is their calling card throughout the world. Same goes for Suzuki. It is more about what they represent than what their accomplishments were/are.

 

[xfer]

I think we are clashing mostly over the meaning of "great", because all of the reasons you gave don't support "greatness" (although they do support other positive adjectives). I would find a dictionary definition but I'm sure there are a dozen slightly different definitions because the word's been so debased recently.

 

[mindspell]

I guess greatness is a very relative term.

 

[xfer]

Not at all!

 

[mindspell]

It is subject to your interpretation. How can there be this absolute greatness? If your passion swimming, there will most probably will be swimmers in your top ten. Who exactly is the foremost authority in greatness? Aristotle is the father of logical thought, because of his history changing and everything that followed him (all science, every thinker alive) he must be the greatest human who ever lived then? I don't think I have to go to the religion route....

 

[xfer]

Yes, Aristotle is pretty great.

If you have awesome swimmers in your top ten, you are not really judging greatness properly.

The unfortunate thing about greatness is that its moral component is not the primary factor. Franklin Delano Roosevelt is most certainly great, although he participated in one of the greatest acts of mass slaughter in all history. But swimmers simply do not impact history in a significant way.

 

[mindspell]

History of swimming they do. Mark Spitz had a huge impact on swimming. Who to say what is more significant? Right now I could say that Brett Favre or Payton Manning (football players for you) impacts more people in America right now, and most probably for a number of years, than the number of people that actually know anything about Aristotle.

 

[Astral Poetry]

I'm in agreeance with Ben Franklin as the greatest American, well, it's either Franklin, Emerson, Faulkner, Thoreau, or someone else of that like. The greatest Greek would have to be Homer (assuming it was one person), the greatest German, perhaps Nietzsche.

 

[xfer]

You're essentially making the argument that those people who said, "Who cares about the Presidential election?! THE RED SOX ARE IN THE WORLD SERIES! Sports trumps politics!" have a shred of merit to what they said.

If someone thinks that Brett Favre is more significant or great than someone of historical importance, that doesn't mean he is; it means they're very misguided.

 

[xfer]

I think Astral Poetry is on the right track in that he's named a lot of artists, which--even if they're divorced from the mechanics of history (politics), etc., are still colossally significant figures (if they're good enough!).