SEX, DRUGS AND ROCK 'N' ROLL? BLAME CANADA

In the 20th century, good old boring, gray Canada was ... well, who knows
what it was? Not many Americans ever noticed or cared.

But the 21st century Canada is a fast-breaking new story, going recently in
a direction that has startled Canadians as much as it has everyone else.

In May, Canadians still shaking off the effects of winter awoke one day to
find the federal government had introduced a bill that will decriminalize
possession of small quantities of marijuana, making it a trivial violation
on par with getting a $150 traffic ticket.

Then in June, an Ontario court ruling that will go unchallenged across most
of Canada declared that same-sex marriages are legal. Gay couples started
flocking into Toronto City Hall and other municipal offices to get marriage
licenses. More than 300 of them have obtained legal licenses at Toronto
City Hall alone at last count, including 49 from the United States, even
though their ceremonies are not recognized back home.

Running concurrently was the news that the government retained the services
of the Rolling Stones for a massive outdoor concert late last month to
banish the lingering economic effect of SARS in Toronto. That's another
first; who would have thought a government would ever enlist Keith Richards
in a public health campaign?

In short order, Canada touched all three bases on the fabled road to ruin:
sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll.

The gay marriage and marijuana stories continue to develop. The British
Columbia court recently reversed itself and followed Ontario's lead. Within
an hour, a gay couple on the courthouse steps got legally married for the
first time in British Columbia (after changing bride and groom on the
bureaucratic form to spouse). They sealed it with a passionate kiss carried
on provincewide television.

Then the federal government announced the marijuana it has been growing in
a remote northern mine shaft for a pilot medical-use project will be
couriered to doctors and made available to people with medical certificates
for $5 (Canadian) a gram.

Gays getting legally married, pot decriminalized, Ottawa dealing dope --
what's the deal?

If you compare catchphrases -- the United States' "life, liberty and the
pursuit of happiness" from the Declaration of Independence versus Canada's
"peace, order and good government" from the Constitution Act of 1867 -- you
wouldn't think Canada would be breaking new ground on social-policy fronts.
This is the country that brought the world televised curling.

But it is now looking positively European in some aspects. The old, faintly
perceived image of being cold, cordial and cloistered is fading. Canada has
gone from cold to cool. From cordial to beyond friendly (look for magazine
cover teasers such as "When Mounties Marry -- Each Other"). And from
cloistered to wide, wide open.

Mild-mannered Canadians, innately polite and orderly, seem to be taking it
in stride so far. Religious leaders from various denominations have
expressed serious reservations about legalized same-sex marriages. National
organizations representing Catholics, Muslims and Orthodox Jews want the
historic Biblical definition of a union of a man and a woman retained. More
liberal faiths are going along, and some denominations are split right down
the middle.

But religion holds far less sway in Canada than in the United States. A
recent (Toronto) Globe and Mail headline about Canada's churchgoing rate (a
laggard 20 percent, half the U.S. rate) read: "God is Dead: Whatever."

It's ironic, says the minister who performed British Columbia's first legal
same-sex marriage. Tim Stevenson is the first openly gay ordained Canadian
minister, the first openly gay Cabinet minister in Canada (in a previous
government) and is now a Vancouver city councilman. Partnered for 21 years
and co-father of three children, he laughs at the new image Americans may
have of Canada: "The pot-smoking queers have taken power!"

Oddly enough, for an ordained minister, Stevenson said the lessened
religious influence is a positive in Canada. Despite the U.S. history of
welcoming people fleeing oppression, some of it religion-based, he says the
irony is the United States now sometimes resembles a theocratic, religious
republic.

But Canada is prepared to ignore its religious leaders, put aside Biblical
injunctions and redefine marriage for the 21st century. The federal
government will soon rewrite the law to recognize the court decision, and
Canada will be only the third country in the world to legalize same-sex
marriages, after Belgium and the Netherlands.

"There are very significant U.S.-Canadian differences, and these moves will
accentuate those," Stevenson said. "I don't think it's any accident that
the liberal European countries are much more aligned with us than the
United States."

Some Canadians are worried about the clout the United States can bring to
bear if it is moved to make its views about Canada felt. U.S. drug policy
director John Walters already has warned Canada against the new pot laws,
which could make for delays at already clogged border crossings.

And in the U.S. Supreme Court decision overturning sodomy laws, Justice
Antonin Scalia issued a dark, dissenting warning that the country is
"heading down the road for judicially imposed homosexual marriages, as has
recently occurred in Canada."

But not everyone is making much of this recent liberal lurch, or any
emerging U.S.-Canada social gulf.

Keith Martin, an Opposition Member of Parliament from Vancouver Island,
said: "There's a huge mythology that Canada is a more liberal, socialistic
place. There is an erroneous perception that the U.S. is a monolithic,
hard-right, intolerant Republican place.

"But large parts of the United States would fit comfortably into the
Canadian approach. The picture is a lot more nuanced than that."

A dozen U.S. states have relaxed pot-possession laws, and large segments of
the population don't support the administration's continued "war" on drugs,
he said. By one estimate, 30 percent of the U.S. population lives under pot
laws as or more lenient than the one introduced in Canada.

Marijuana activist Philippe Lucas, who openly sells marijuana to people in
Victoria with doctor's certificates saying they need it, agrees.

"The U.S. is actually far ahead of Canada in allowing the medical use of
marijuana at the state level," he said. Eight states, including Washington,
already recognize that special use.

Lucas dismisses the new pot law as not going nearly far enough. "The
original intent of the law was probably good, but it's a step backward. We
had a chance to do something progressive, and we took a step backward."

The decriminalization of small amounts (under a half-ounce) simply reflects
the reality; street cops using discretion opted out of arresting people for
that offense years ago. There are two cafes in Vancouver where people smoke
it openly -- no sales are allowed -- with minimal police interest.
Ticketing is actually being touted as a way to increase enforcement; cops
will issue fines, rather than lay charges.

"No one has 'gone Dutch' yet,' " said Lucas, meaning buying and selling
openly, as well. "It's not something we'll see on the West Coast for a
while yet.

"Even if the bill passes, which is very questionable, it still puts us far
behind Europe in terms of progressive reform. They are miles ahead of us."

The Liberal government's pot law could die in Parliament. Its passage
depends on whether outgoing Prime Minister Jean Chretien is serious about
establishing that as a legacy, or just introduced it to make mischief for
his likely successor, former Finance Minister Paul Martin, with whom he had
a bitter falling-out last year.

It's widely presumed that Martin will win the current leadership race and
be prime minister by early next year, when Chretien retires. In a recent
interview in Victoria, Martin said even if the pot law doesn't make it
through Parliament, he would continue with decriminalization, coupled with
a crackdown on the biker gangs who deal in it.

"Society evolves," he said. "It's the responsibility of government to
reflect that evolution. There's a book ("Fire and Ice: The U.S., Canada and
the Myth of Converging Values" by Michael Adams) talking about the
different perspectives that occur between Canadians and Americans over the
past decade.

"The argument was, contrary to what people might normally think, the
greater integration of the two economies has not led to an integration of
perspectives or insights. In fact, Canadians are clearly going the other
way. I think that's right.

"Whether this is because there's always been a greater collective sense of
responsibility in Canada than in the U.S. -- there's a different history in
the two countries -- I don't really know. But there's no doubt that that is
a fact."

One theme common to the decriminalization and the same-sex marriage issues
is that both were spurred by court rulings over the years flowing from the
21-year-old Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The country relied for its
charter on British law up until 1982, so the constitution is still in its
infancy. And gays and marijuana activists made determined and ingenious use
of it and other legal arguments over the years in pushing their respective
causes.

Americans looking northward will notice other recent developments. Canada
opted to sit out the U.S.-led war in Iraq, and the government enjoyed
considerable support in making that decision. The government is also
pursuing a stringent national gun-control regime, even though it has been
established to be scandalously inefficient and monstrously over budget.

Inside Canada, it's startling to note both the recent swerves originated in
Ontario, although the flaky Left Coast (the California of Canada) is
supposed to be in the vanguard of social change. Wherever it's coming from,
central Canada, the charter of rights or newly discovered fundamental
social differences with the United States, it's been a remarkable few
months on the social-policy front.

If some of these attitudes start creeping over the 49th parallel, Americans
are advised to start singing the Oscar-nominated song from the "South Park"
movie of a few years ago: "Blame Canada."