Flags, of course, are more than just mere designs, what goes on them usually has some significance to the country it represents. Some are known better than others, so what does the design of your country's flag represent?
I'm sure the bulk of you are familliar with what the Canadian flag looks like, so I won't bother adding a picture of it (though I'm sure any Americans here will need to have it pointed out which end is up
).
Our current flag came into being in 1966 and it replaced the original flag known as the Red Ensign. Most of you are probably too young to remember it, it was a typical Commonwealth flag, it was red with a Union Jack in the upper left corner and the Canadian coat of arms in the lower right.
Anyway, the Maple Leaf has been Canada's symbol as long as we've been a country, I guess because there are Maple trees everywhere here (even though the Maple is not exclusiove to Canada). The two bands at either end represent the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans (adhering to Canada's motto "A mari usque ad mare", meaning "from sea to sea").
The colour scheme was based simply that red and white are Canada's official colours since the 1920s, red was chosen to represent the blood of the Canadian soldiers who fought in the First World War (historically a coming of age moment for us), and white to represent, you guessed it, snow.
The choice of colours actually sparked what was probably the most heated debate the House of Commons has ever seen. The party in power at the time, the Liberals (aka Grits) chose this colour scheme based on the official colour reasoning. The main opposition party, the Progressive Conservatives (aka Tories) were insistent on the bands being blue, arguing first that since they represent the oceans blue is the obvious choice, and that the flag should keep the same colour scheme as the British. Coincidently, the Grits' party colour is red, and the Tories' colour is blue, so it's pretty obvious what the debate was really all about.
I'm sure the bulk of you are familliar with what the Canadian flag looks like, so I won't bother adding a picture of it (though I'm sure any Americans here will need to have it pointed out which end is up
).Our current flag came into being in 1966 and it replaced the original flag known as the Red Ensign. Most of you are probably too young to remember it, it was a typical Commonwealth flag, it was red with a Union Jack in the upper left corner and the Canadian coat of arms in the lower right.
Anyway, the Maple Leaf has been Canada's symbol as long as we've been a country, I guess because there are Maple trees everywhere here (even though the Maple is not exclusiove to Canada). The two bands at either end represent the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans (adhering to Canada's motto "A mari usque ad mare", meaning "from sea to sea").
The colour scheme was based simply that red and white are Canada's official colours since the 1920s, red was chosen to represent the blood of the Canadian soldiers who fought in the First World War (historically a coming of age moment for us), and white to represent, you guessed it, snow.
The choice of colours actually sparked what was probably the most heated debate the House of Commons has ever seen. The party in power at the time, the Liberals (aka Grits) chose this colour scheme based on the official colour reasoning. The main opposition party, the Progressive Conservatives (aka Tories) were insistent on the bands being blue, arguing first that since they represent the oceans blue is the obvious choice, and that the flag should keep the same colour scheme as the British. Coincidently, the Grits' party colour is red, and the Tories' colour is blue, so it's pretty obvious what the debate was really all about.
