Cakers love talking about immigration. Whether it’s the unique blend of garbage and idiocy that usually comes after the words “this isn’t politically correct, but” or the shameless self-promotion of Laurentian fucks looking to get a booster shot of caker mythology while finding more people to fleece, immigration is one of Canada’s stupidest talking points. One of myriad manifestations of ersatz compromise between the stupid and the slippery is Canada’s interest in taking professional immigrants with degrees and accreditations, promising them steady work and a better life in Canada, and then immediately bailing on the recent migrant by denying the validity of their degrees and certifications. Cakers don’t even accept caker accreditations; how likely are they to understand the merits of foreign degrees?
The beauty of this shafting mechanism is that it allows for both the red-meat racism of the kind that really gets the “swills beer while standing in garage” demographic and the mythological “faire Canada” of the shameless Laurentian to stand in the same place. See? There’s totally work in Canada! Migrants are coming from all over with all sorts of skills and talents! And when the migrant either can’t find work at all or join the ranks of the underemployed masses like the 53% of migrant cabbies with degrees Marty the Beer-Swilling Moron can have his go at the “dem dam migrents arr takeing our JOBS!!!!”. Cakers win, education loses. Just another day in Canada.

It doesn’t help that Canada has a nightmarishly complicated screening process and migrants are frequently not told of the complexities awaiting them. And it’s not like the government is helping; take a look at the website for the Canadian Information Centre for International Credentials. Are you not fluent in English or French yet? Hope you can read this in one of those languages because the fuck if Canada’s gonna put this information in languages that migrants are more likely to understand! Nothing says “welcome to Canada, where we will help you towards a new life” like a wall of complex instructions laden with exceptions and requirements.
The result? Stressed-out, pissed-off people who bail at the first chance and leave with the battle scars associated with trying to exist in Cakertown. One-third of male immigrants to Canada leave after fewer than 20 years; of those, most will bail out within the first year. And in so doing they affirm the two-headed hypocrisy of Canadian thinking about migrants. They came seeking hope to satisfy the Laurentian twit; they “couldn’t tough it out” and “didn’t keep their sticks on the ice” to satisfy the Below-Average Hockeymans Caker-Brigades. Even better, we can slam the door on people who are waiting without a lick of transparency for God-knows-what forms to be filled. Want to go home and visit family? Well, fuck you – if you leave, you’re not coming back. Even if you were educated in Canada on a student visa, confusion and complication end up sending people away. We’ll take you money, folks, but Canada doesn’t exactly have a track record of holding up its end of a bargain. Ask the Indigenous.
This has a sad, personal dimension that I want to hammer in before I sign off. Canada isn’t just ruining the lives of abstracted individuals. These are human beings, people with goals and hopes and dreams who were duped and ended up as cabbies, cashiers, temporary help – dreck-work that in no way meshes with the visions and promises they were given. I got shit out of the caker university system grizzled and pissy enough; Lord knows the pain of people who came so far for so little. Want to see some victims, people who were duped and deceived into leaving friends and family to come to a concrete bog? Here’s a big ol’ list of ’em, each one a stark reminder of the human costs associated with caker mythology not even remotely meshing with Canadian reality.
And as you flip through the link just remember – cakers are proud of their concept of multiculturalism.