Canada's Carney called out for 'utilizing' British spelling | Hacker News Reader

Canada's Carney called out for 'utilizing' British spelling

bbc.com

90 pointshaunter234 comments

I've never heard anything about a change to British spelling. Sounds like nonsense.

Carney is the most popular politician Canada has had in decades. The opposition party is starting to fall apart (two members defected, which means Carney's party is one seat away from a majority).

Whole thing sounds like an attempt to manufacture an 'Obama beige suit' moment.

> Carney is the most popular politician Canada has had in decades.

All thanks to Trump's silly tariffs. There's a silver lining to everything. I hope that the association makes protectionism politically taboo for decades to come.

> All thanks to Trump's silly tariffs

The tariffs were just half of it, the attacks on national sovereignty were the other, and Pierre being his usual shallow and despicable self on the campaign trail were the third.

If Carney (or almost anyone but PP, really) were the head of the CPC, they'd have had a majority today. But looking at where the party's going, it's doubtful that the CPC will ever again elect a leader who can both read and write.

> I hope that the association makes protectionism politically taboo for decades to come.

That is waaaay too black and white. Trump's actions != protectionism, Trump's actions ⊂ protectionism (and have been stupid). Free trade and globalization has failed most of the world in pretty serious ways (though it's been great for the much of the elite, floating on top of big piles of capital). Protectionism is important, it just needs to be conducted in a smarter way (instead of indiscriminately tariffing everyone all the sudden)

>> I hope that the association makes protectionism politically taboo for decades to come.

> That is waaaay too black and white.

We're talking about Trump here: of course it's black and white.

> Free trade and globalization has failed most of the world in pretty serious ways (though it's been great for the much of the elite, floating on top of big piles of capital).

I don't know: extreme poverty has been driven down quite effectively AFAICT:

* https://www.gapminder.org/questions/gms1-3/

* https://www.gapminder.org/data/documentation/epovrate/

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_China

Wealth inequality dropped after the Gilded Age and post-WW2 until the 1970s (in the US); nothing said it couldn't have been kept down (say, if Reagan was not elected). There's nothing inherent to free trade and globalization that should lead to it if are willing to redistribution (e.g., through taxation and social programs).

> We're talking about Trump here: of course it's black and white.

Trump might portrait things that way, but that doesn't mean we need to analyse anything involving him that way.

> Wealth inequality dropped after the Gilded Age and post-WW2 until the 1970s (in the US); [...]

Well, if you take on a more global perspective: global inequality absolutely skyrocketed until the 1970s and has only gradually been climbing down since then. Numerically, the biggest contributor was Mao strangling the Chinese economy (and people) until his death, and then Deng Xiaoping took over and relaxed the grip around their throats. But outsourcing and container shipping and lower tariffs helped a lot, too. Not just in relation with China, but for everyone on the globe.

I'm sick of portraying the era until the 1970s as some kind of golden age. It was the nadir for most people on the globe in terms of equality, not the zenith.

> Well, if you take on a more global perspective: global inequality absolutely skyrocketed until the 1970s and has only gradually been climbing down since then.

Probably because pre-WW2 and globalization most people on the planet were equally poor.

> I'm sick of portraying the era until the 1970s as some kind of golden age. It was the nadir for most people on the globe in terms of equality, not the zenith.

The 1970s were mostly the zenith of recent technological advancement: certainly personal computing and the Internet came after, but there really hasn't been any major invention.

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rise_and_Fall_of_American_...

Post-1970s technology has become more equally distributed (à la Gibson), and that has been through globalization.

> Free trade and globalization has failed most of the world in pretty serious ways (though it's been great for the much of the elite, floating on top of big piles of capital).

Globalization benefits capital in rich countries and labor in poor countries. As someone who is from a poor and corrupt country, I have seen many people around me come out of poverty due to globalization.

I can agree that globalization can be bad for labor in rich countries.

Edit: Ironically your comment is also waaaay too black and white.

> I have seen many people around me come out of poverty due to globalization.

This is definitely true and Phil Knight of Nike fame even said that without the opportunity to join his slave workforce in Vietnam, those people would be worse off.

> without the opportunity to join his slave workforce in Vietnam, those people would be worse off.

I am not sure if you are being sarcastic here. But without Amazon many people in my country will be worse off, however bad the working conditions maybe.

Yes it is tongue-in-cheek. I know it's a good proposition for the poor people of that country. But it is pretty widely viewed as exploitative through a wider world lens.

> But it is pretty widely viewed as exploitative through a wider world lens.

If so, I hope we get exploited even more :)

I remember Planet Money doing a pretty good story on this where they spoke with sweatshop workers in Bangladesh.

Relative to the labor wage of employees in the US, they were earning absolute pennies.

Relative to the places they came from? They doubled their income and were functionally free from concerns about things like famine and infected drinkable water.

Exploitation of labor is a complicated topic (and really, the meta-fight is, as is so often the case, not between nations; it's between labor and capital. Offshoring is just another form of scabbing, but the world is not yet small enough that one should expect a fresh-off-the-farm factory worker who just had their prospects opened up to join a global strike because people in the US want to make $15/hr).

(Related: As is so often the case, if you want things better for your folks back home, lift everyone out of poverty and make everyone safe. People are less likley to take "slave-wage" jobs if the alternative is not subsistence and high risk of unpredictable outcome due to localized supply disruption, disease outbreak, or war).

Bangladesh is a fascinating case story. They had a few decades of solid growth largely due to the textile industries, yes.

They went from dirt poor to merely poor. That's to be celebrated, and I hope we see Bangladeshis continue making themselves richer through their own hard work.

> (Related: As is so often the case, if you want things better for your folks back home, lift everyone out of poverty and make everyone safe. People are less likley to take "slave-wage" jobs if the alternative is not subsistence and high risk of unpredictable outcome due to localized supply disruption, disease outbreak, or war).

I assume by 'folks back home' you are referring to people who live in rich countries? Having people in Bangladesh and Vietnam become richer is definitely good from a moral point of view, but it has only second order effects on the 'folks back home'. To a first approximation, it doesn't matter economically how well off or poor foreigners are. As a second order effect, if an economy is booming next door (ie they are getting richer), some positive effects often spill over, and global security probably goes up, too.

> Exploitation of labor is a complicated topic (and really, the meta-fight is, as is so often the case, not between nations; it's between labor and capital. Offshoring is just another form of scabbing, but the world is not yet small enough that one should expect a fresh-off-the-farm factory worker who just had their prospects opened up to join a global strike because people in the US want to make $15/hr).

I'm not sure what you mean by exploitation? In any case, labour and capital are working together, you need both to produce anything in a modern economy. In fact, you need labour, capital and land working together.

If you want to get worked up about anything, it's not labour vs capital. But it's labour+capital vs land. In recent decades in the US the share of GDP going to labour has dipped a bit, capital's share has stayed stable, and the share of land went up.

Many economic analyses mix up land into capital. But that's misleading at best. We can produce more capital to compete with the old capital. We can't make more Land. (Well, not until we are building space habitats.)

(By Land with a capital L, I'm including the oceans. The Netherlands (or even more Singapore) reclaiming big swaths of land just means they are converting ocean floor Land to dry Land.)

See https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LABSHPUSA156NRUG for the US labour share. I'm not sure if Fred has a graph that drills into the non-labour share and tells you what goes to capital and what goes to Land. But see eg https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/2015a_r...

It's ironic that USA lost 60-some thousand troops in Vietnam trying to prevent a communist takeover, only for American companies just to enslave them all anyway. I wonder how different the dynamic with Vietnam would have turned out if it had been more of a Korea situation. USA certainly never enslaved South Korea.

Huh? What do you mean by 'enslave'? If you mean that people work for low wages in the export sector, well then I have news for you on South Korea.

The reason South Korea graduated to higher wages quicker than Vietnam seems to be doing, is partially because South Korea is more capitalist, so they see more economic growth quicker.

Nothing ironic about any of that.

> Globalization benefits capital in rich countries and labor in poor countries.

Globalization is about benefiting capital in rich countries, any benefits to people poor countries is an unintended side-effect.

> I can agree that globalization can be bad for labor in rich countries.

It may seem that way if you restrict your view to say, China, but it's more complicated than that, and there's more to the world than the "developed world" than Asia.

For instance: IIRC, Africa has had problems with local producers getting run out of business by Chinese knock-offs (e.g. https://www.dw.com/en/how-nigeria-lost-its-textile-market-to...), without the "benefit" of foreign sweatshop employment you've seen in Asia.

My understanding is protectionism would probably be better for Africa, as cheap imports block development of local industry and agriculture, trapping it a low level of development.

Edit: And maybe the problem is worse than I understood: https://www.semafor.com/article/11/13/2025/chinas-everything...:

> China is now competing head-on not just against other advanced economies but the most vulnerable ones. In effect, it is blocking the ladder to prosperity for countries in the Global South.

> Indonesia lost 250,000 jobs in its backbone textile industry between 2022 and 2024 because of a deluge of Chinese imports, according to the Indonesia Fiber and Filament Yarn Producer Association — and another half-million may now be at risk....

> In Thailand, the Chinese export tsunami has precipitated a crisis among smaller firms making car parts, electrical equipment, and consumer goods, stoking fears of deindustrialization. Village-based cottage industries are particularly at risk; for example, makers of hand-painted ceramic “rooster” bowls have been idled en masse by Chinese fakes that sell for one fifth of the price.

> China’s exports to Southeast Asia are now larger than those to the US. Malaysia’s semiconductor industry, a key growth-engine, is feeling the pressure. Electronics manufacturers in the Philippines are struggling. Vietnam has erected tariff barriers to Chinese hot-rolled coil steel products....

> Yet China keeps piling on the trade pressure. Africa is the new hotspot for Chinese exports: In September, Chinese shipments to the continent surged 56% year-on-year. In the same month, shipments to Latin America were up 15.2%. Some of China’s exports to emerging economies, particularly in Asia, are being rerouted to the US to get around US tariffs, but they also compete with local manufacturers in those firms’ home markets, while displacing their overseas sales.

> My understanding is protectionism would probably be better for Africa, as cheap imports block development of local industry and agriculture, trapping it a low level of development.

It's not like protectionism and the government directing economies hasn't been tried in Africa..

> I hope that the association makes protectionism politically taboo for decades to come.

I thought it already was, before Trump. I still can't believe they ended de minimus and tariffed everything.

> I thought it already was, before Trump.

Not in the US, at least. Every administration since at least Bush jr slapped tariffs on a few things here and there, and mostly kept the previous admin's ad hoc tariffs in place.

In more practical places, like Singapore where I live, you'd be right: tariffs are by and large unthinkable.

Trudeau was more popular at his start, but we saw where that led us…

The press wrote more about Justin Trudeau, but his peak approval rating was lower than Carney's.

Peak approval for Trudeau was over 64% - Carney hasn't hit that high water mark yet. Now peak to trough - I think Trudeau probably had the biggest fall.

Using nearly the exact same rhetoric and party platform, with the exception of austerity measures. Only difference really seems to be that he knows how to pass a budget, but hasn't really offered anything substantial in terms of hope to the working age population

It was used in the recent budget documents.

> Canadian English has been the standard in government communications for decades. But eagle-eyed linguists and editors have spotted British spellings — like "globalisation" and "catalyse" — in documents from the Carney government, including the budget.

The entire world has already wasted enough calories on caring about this.

I should clarify.

My assumption is that any instances of British spelling in the document(s) were accidental.

The petition, otoh, implies that Carney's office has adopted a policy of using British spelling.

The 'new policy' explanation is more surprising than mine.

It makes a difference.

If the conventional explanation is the right one, then this fuss is over a few minor spelling mistakes, as opposed to Carney exercising poor judgment.

Apparently it was acceptable to use s or z in words like catalyse or analyze in British English until Microsoft Word came out with a British English spellchecker that picked the s spelling as its standard. Whether this is just myth or fact seems to be a point of controversy.

I learned British English starting in the 80s and using s whereas z was used in American English, together with tre instead of ter (eg. theatre), was a big difference. And I can tell you that MS Word back then was just not there so this sounds like an urban legend but let the British people in HN chime in.

Both -ise and -ize are UK spelling. One is favoured by Oxford and the other by Cambridge.

Most academic and technical writing in the UK still uses the z form, and the OED and Collins dictionaries tend to prefer it, too: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_spelling

In popular writing, the s forms dominate - I've not heard the MS Word explanation before, but the most popular UK-produced word processors and spellcheckers in the 1980s (eg. Locoscript/Locospell, Protext/Prospell, 1st Word) tended to come from companies in the Cambridge area or which were founded by Cambridge grads, so would naturally have used the s spellings by default.

> Most academic and technical writing in the UK still uses the z form

'z' forms are generally used for writing for an international audience, it hasn't really caught on more generally than that.

I'm British, but when submitting papers for blind review, always use American spelling for obvious reasons. I suppose I could change it after acceptance, but that would just be pretentious.

No, see (even the new) Fowler's Modern English Usage. British usage is -yse, but right-and-proper Oxford spelling uses -ize, not -ise, for words with a Greek root.

My pearls, they are clutched!

So "colour" and "centre" are ok but "catalyse" is where the line is drawn?

The line is drawn where ever the public puts it.

Generally, the correct spelling of a word is determined by those that use it. Canadians have used 'colour' for a long time. If enough people start using 'color', that will eventually be the correct spelling in Canada.

It's not a line that's crossed. It's just the standard in Canada.

In Britain, aeroplanes are made of aluminium and they have tyres. The Ministry of Defence sends them out on manoeuvres in theatres of combat, where the pilots have generally excelled due to regular practice.

In America, airplanes are made of aluminum and they have tires. The Department of Defense sends them out on maneuvers in theaters of combat, where the pilots have generally exceled due to regular practise.

In Canada, airplanes are made of aluminum and they have tires. The Department of National Defence sends them out on manoeuvres in theatres of combat, where the pilots have generally excelled due to regular practice.

Small correction: In UK English, practice is a noun and practise is a verb. In America, practice is both and we don't have practise.

Thanks for clarifying. I'm American and I had never heard of practise in my life.

Same difference as licence vs license (vs licence)

Funny I'm Canadian and I thought it was aluminium and maneuvers

I love this, however, in America we write excelled. I checked with Merriam-Webster, the Oxford Advanced American Dictionary, and with ChatGPT.

Ah! Perhaps it's only words like to counsel (counseled) or to libel (libeled); up in Canada here people usually write counselled or libelled.

Yes, in American English it depends on which syllable has stress. Compare:

dueled, paralleled, canceled, pedaled, but controlled, compelled, extolled, appalled

levered, snickered, but occurred, deferred

focused, biased, censused, but compressed, embussed, outgassed

worshiped, but entrapped (although even in America kidnapped seems more common than kidnaped—one of Webster’s less successful reforms)

How do you do italics in HN?

I've been here for more than a decade and can never figure out the formatting syntax.

> Text surrounded by asterisks is italicized. To get a literal asterisk, use \* or **.

See Formatting Options: https://news.ycombinator.com/formatdoc

This makes me wonder if Canadian use full stop or period.

It's a bit of both!

"Period" tends to be used in day-to-day speech when referring to the punctuation; you'll hear "full stop" if it's meant to emphasize a previous statement (though not universally), like with "you'll do the dishes, full stop."

What are the most notable differences between Canadian and American English?

More u, and mixing around tre.

You set the thermometer in C (usually), and cook in F. You can measure in cm or inches.

> More u, and mixing around tre

Oh! Didn't know! Is there regional variation in that?

I was forced to unlearn centre when we moved to America in my second grade. But everyone–from Virginia to New Jersey to California–was cool with me keeping analyse and defence.

Heh, it’s -11C here right now and my thermostat is set to drop to 65F overnight.

Also, with respect to the metric/imperial systems of measurement… officially the government is all metric, but due to the history of it all there will be a bunch of regulations that say things like “the toilet must be at least 228.6mm away from the wall” because the pre-metric standard was 9 inches.

And a final one for the prairies: in the 1800s there was the Dominion Land Survey, which carved us up into 1 mile x 1 mile squares. They did a truly impressive job of it. However, the edges of these squares is where the road allowances are, which means that despite the speed limit being in km/h, you are almost certainly going to be travelling N miles down the highway to get to your destination.

> Carney is the most popular politician Canada has had in decades

That's just blatantly untrue?

I'm basing that on the Prime Ministers, anyhow.

Jean Chrétien is the most recent Canadian Prime Minister that I remember a wide spectrum of Canadians liking (and by 2000, not as much). Justin Trudeau appealed many American journalists, but only to some Canadians.

If I missed an obvious politician, I will happily concede.

By gut feeling I’d agree on Chrétien, and there is some polling on this (which I think backs that up). This article compares favourability after first election for PMs going back quite a ways and Carney looks similar but slightly worse off than Trudeau or Harper.

https://angusreid.org/prime-minister-mark-carney-first-month...

Well then, I concede! To stick to my guns would require us to trade competing survey results from different pollsters. That's no fun, and unsatisfying, in any case.

Yeah but without that your just making stuff up and nobody wants that except you.

That is reasonable, and why I conceded the point. Unfortunately, I cannot remember where the notion got into my head, and it's a bigger pain then it might seem trawling search results to find current articles with peak approval for both men.

Actually.. Wikipedia to the rescue!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_rankings_of_prime_m...

  Highest approval rating
  1. Mark Carney — 67% (June 2025)
  2. Jean Chrétien — 66% (September 1994)
  3. Justin Trudeau — 65% (September 2016)

I'm sorry spark advocacy doesn't qualify as a good source (that's wikipedias source).

Then I concede a second time. Please pretend I originally wrote just 'Carney is popular enough that the opposition can use what help they can get'

I'm not an expert on Canadian pollsters, and poll numbers are not a subject of debate for which I have much enthusiasm.

Justin Trudeau when he was elected was the most popular politician in the country by a lot.

It's a huge drag to debate this issue because multiple pollsters have published polls of both Justin Trudeau and Carney, and the results are seldom identical. Consequently, there's a lot of research involved both of polls and pollsters, and the end result won't be conclusive.

It is worth noting, polls aside, that the Carney election both finished off the NDP, and resulted in Conservative Poilievre losing his seat. And recently, Conservatives have started crossing the floor to join Carney. Justin Trudeau was popular with Liberals. Carney is generally popular.

Justin Trudeau actually appealed to many younger Canadians as well, until he severely didn't, but that's how he got elected afaik. I don't think the numbers are out yet, but it was largely boomers who voted Carney in, everyone else that I've spoken to under the age of 40 is like "meh", and some regret voting him in after the Liberals' predictable reaction to the Air Canada strike.

Much like the rest of the g7, we have an aging population and a mega generational class divide. Our youth unemployment rate is high, jobs have dried up, it's a shitshow, and Carney hasn't tried to address this much.

So whether he's popular or not needs more context. He'd certainly be most popular with the richest and most populated generation ever, and potentially business owners, but we'll see.

Considering how much government spending goes to the elderly, either directly via programs like OAS and tax benefits or indirectly via healthcare, and it was only a matter of time before young people question their position in it all (higher schooling tuition/debt, bad job market, expensive housing, etc). OAS doesn't even start getting clawed back until personal income is over $90K and is only fully clawed back at $150K! And it's double that for a couple!

The timing of the last election was perfect for Carney when there was a window where the whole country was going WTF with Trump and PP was still railing against various "woke" grievances and mentioning Trudeau by name. The fact that he wasn't turfed after not only losing the election that was his to win, but also losing his seat, is everything wrong with the myopic federal Conservative Party (whose core members refuse to "compromise" with the rest of the country).

There is a real generational tilt happening and young Canadians no longer defaulting to left leaning ways of thinking (not that they ever were as much as people thought).

Yep agreed on all points. I like that there are a few local orgs (GenerationSqueeze, Missing Middle) bringing light to things like the portion of the federal budget allocated to OAS and how it's structured, and generally being real about present day inequities.

Carney will (hopefully) have to reckon with those in the coming year, while Pierre seriously missed a (the?) boat. It does feel like something big is shifting slowly.

> There is a real generational tilt happening and young Canadians no longer defaulting to left leaning ways of thinking (not that they ever were as much as people thought).

It's my impression that the balance between economic prosperity and social good needs to be constantly curated and revered as an inherent virtue of a democracy with strong social safety nets. It's much easier to get working age people to compensate for the ails of generations past if there's no doubt in their mind they'll have a roof over their head next year.

Progressive, often barely tangible issues, necessarily become internalized as luxurious if the people who could support them can't even pay for food.

The opposition party is falling apart because, despite being a Liberal government, the Liberal party is being a better Conservative party than the Conservatives were while the Conservatives have no platform or plan other than 'Liberals bad, lol' (or, somehow, 'Trudeau bad, lol').

Yes. Additionally, Poilievre's attitude is tone deaf. Canadians are fearful of and anxious about Trump's foreign policy. Most Canadian politicians have been savvy enough to know voters crave a reassuring, united front. Poilievre's combativeness is a bad fit for the current moment.

While Poilievre is unpopular, the Conservative party has been essentially neck-and-neck with the Liberals for months. https://338canada.com/polls.htm

Conservatives will shift their strategy but parent's claim of Carney being the most popular of PM of all the time is blatantly false.

Conservatives have had best showing at a federal election in decades. 41.3% of the popular vote. Over 3.1 million CPC voters in Ontario alone.

The first conservative MP to defect said that the caucus has a "frat party atmosphere"[1]. The last MP to defect used to be CIO at Royal Bank of Canada. My suspicion is that the conservatives are being run internally like a boys' club revolving around PP and the Liberals are having no difficulty peeling off MPs who went in expecting a professional workplace. Disaster.

1: https://www.thestar.com/politics/political-opinion/is-pierre...

But, does he use the Oxford comma?

This is as stupid as starting a war over cracking the big end or little end of an egg. Or, using whatever book was about that subject as a spelling style guide.

> But, does he use the Oxford comma?

Bro don't even joke about that

that's much less important than where he places a full stop when there are parenthetical remarks (such as here).

you crack the ends of eggs?!

When boiled, for example (this a reference to Swift's Gulliver's Travels)

And hence big endian and little endian byte orders.

(Yeah, but somebody doesn’t know that.)

Guess I am one of the lucky 10000 today.

Soft boiled eggs are put in an egg cup and cracked to eat the soft yolk. I believe it’s not a thing in the US.

What surprises me is that someone would consider cracking the big end of the egg. And have it sitting upside down in the egg cup?

Ludicrous! Absolutely ludicrous! :)

> Whole thing sounds like an attempt to manufacture an 'Obama beige suit' moment.

I'd never heard about that until now. Crazy what gets attention. Who cares what color his suit is?

Let's be clear. It was never the suit's color they had a problem with.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama_tan_suit_controve...

Was it his skin color???

Nope, he was a Democrat and Republicans and their propaganda outlets like Fox news use the disinfo technique "accusation in a mirror" to discredit complaints about things they plan to do by poisoning discourse early. So they can point back to their bad faith complaints and say "they're copying me" and then the rest of the media just goes "ho hum he said she said." because corporate media doesn't care to actually separate fact from fiction when they can just make boatloads of money from ad views.

So they complained about Obama "destroying presidential norms"

"Destroying Presidential norms"?! Heh. Wait until Fox News hears about the next guy. Oh, right. It doesn't work that way.

To me it feels less like a controversy and more of an indication of Canada becoming more culturally European to spite the Americans.

I was gonna say, I miss when this is what headlines looked like in my country.

> Carney is the most popular politician Canada has had in decades?

Liberals didn't win majority and it was a close race, I'm not sure where you are getting your data from.

TRUMP managed to change the election results but it was close.

Getting in bed with Trump was a bad idea. Seeing the right wing in Canada scramble to appear patriotic while everyone knows the conservatives would start a Vichy government.

Canadian spelling has always been a mixture of UK and US.

Much ado about nothing.

Due to my somewhat international career, I had to learn to code-switch between American and British English. My default is American but can do British as needed. Spelling, vocabulary, dialect to some extent, etc.

For a global audience, I find American is the best default. Nonetheless, actual Americans barely notice if you use British English-isms in American contexts. They may notice but no one cares. Everyone knows what you mean. Using British dialect may confuse them occasionally but even then no one cares. Canadians should do what is natural for Canadians.

It boggles my mind that someone from a Commonwealth country using British spelling would even warrant a news article. Why is anyone talking about this?

Where I grew up in the US, in grade school, our neighborhood school in the small city had teachers from both Quebec and Ireland. So we learned non-US spelling first. That caused a pain when I and my friends ended up in high school and had to use US spelling.

But to me, who cares, there was a time ages ago people spelt a word the way they wanted and no one cared. Just look at old documents from the 18th century in the US.

Even decades later, once in a great while, I end up using colour instead of color :)

I never grew up in a British family, or had any sort of close proximity to British things. But I still somehow ended up using "grey", "colour", and "behaviour". They just look more correct.

Grey is an English spelling? I had no idea it was.

Both the spelling and the dominant colour of the sky.

>Why is anyone talking about this?

A "news" article was written, doesn't mean any real people actually care.

It usually means rich people care about stirring up pointless outrage and/or getting clicks from people making a stir about the frivolity of it.

Or the writer needed to fill their quota for the day

No, the parent was right. A huge amount of "news" is meant to keep people distracted from anything meaningful that actually affects them. This is because the people with power have long understood how to keep the rest fighting amongst ourselves.

Pfft. Spelling differences is minor league stuff. Try code-switching on silence.

Pointed out to me by a Kiwi, that Americans take silence after a statement to mean general agreement, but in Britain silence implicitly asks, "Are you _really sure_ you want to be doing that?"

> Nonetheless, actual Americans barely notice if you use British English-isms in American contexts.

Try this in rural communities with people who dropped out of college.

Saying "note" instead of "bill" will be noticed.

Same with "petrol" instead of "gas".

Probably a whole list of others.

"Pants" (clothing) is a good one, means something different depending on location.

It's all pants to me.

– not understood outside the UK even across the Commonwealth.

One persistent problem is that there isn't a Canadian English spelling option in most software with spellchecking functionality. Often we are forced to choose between US English and British English spelling defaults, when neither is quite right. I suspect that this was a stylistic choice not of Carney himself, but whoever proofread the document. There has been considerable erosion in Canadian orthography in of late, which has only been made worse with the widespread adoption of UFLI English language learning materials in our schools' elementary curricula, which emphasizes American spelling and pronunciation.

The reality is quite complicated. Canadian English is a version of North American English, with a distinctive pronunciation and sub-dialect, but still has vestiges of British English that are lost in America.

I feel like Canada is of two minds, awkwardly and indecisively straddling North American English and British English. It wasn’t until I worked overseas that I realized North America has a very distinctive English that imprints on people, even if they lived there a few years. As in Londoners who spent a few years in North America as toddlers have obvious North American tonality, which is baffling to me.

I have native relatives in Canada and the UK and I find the language dynamics across the anglosphere fascinating.

> The reality is quite complicated. Canadian English is a version of North American English, with a distinctive pronunciation and sub-dialect, but still has vestiges of British English that are lost in America.

Does Canadian English still use "gotten"? IIRC, that's a vestige of British English that's been lost in Britain.

Yes (though I feel it's always had an awkward air about its use, and it feels more polite and high class to use received)

The rest of the world doesn't consider 'gotten' a proper word?

Except ill gotten gains?

New Englander here. Gotten is normal vocabulary. If it's not used in British English, then it's probably a feature of North American English, since most North American linguistic differences are snapshots of common features of 16th-17th century British English that somehow ossified over here.

Edit: It appears my conjecture was correct: https://www.sarahwoodbury.com/on-the-use-of-the-word-gotten/

What I'm most interested is not usage of "gotten", but whether somewhere in the English-speaking world, using "I've" standalone (without a follow-on got, been, had etc) is normal.

I see it from time to time online, and immediately assume they're a non-native speaker who doesn't understand the nonsensical nuances of the language.

Eg people will say something like "I've 3 apples", which is just "I have 3 apples", which is perfectly gramattical. But, for some reason, we use "I've got 3 apples". But I think we'd also say "I have 3 apples" and not "I have got 3 apples".

Language is weird.

I'm from England and I'm pretty sure gotten is a normal word here?

> I feel like Canada is of two minds, awkwardly and indecisively straddling North American English and British English

or it's got it's own dialect, which has inherited features from both british and american english but is now evolving on its own.

I'm British and I have sometimes chosen Canadian English as my OS language so that it will not constantly try to correct my usage of z in words like this.

en_CA is used for localization but I have almost never seen it for dictionaries or language, unlike fr_CA.

> "So far, bless him, he has not resorted to 'gaol' for 'jail.'"

Some parts of Canada inexplicably used "gaol" for "jail" until fairly recently. For example, the "Headingley Gaol" near Winnipeg. The jail has been renamed to Headingley Correctional Center, but the road to it is still Gaol Road, preserving the linguistic curiosity.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headingley_Correctional_Instit... [2] https://www.google.com/maps/place/Gaol+Rd,+Headingley,+MB,+C...

> For example, the "Headingley Gaol" near Winnipeg.

Why is that inexplicable? It would have originally been called that with that spelling.

> For example, the "Headingley Gaol" near Winnipeg.

Fellow Winnipeger here! I remember driving by that sign as a kid and being baffled by that word.

Canada is not just english-speaking, but also french speaking. We have TWO national languages, with equal importance.

This being said, I would suspect the english word gaol comes from the french word geôle.

According to Wiktionary (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/gaol), gaol and geôle have a common shared ancestor in Old French/Latin. It's not the result of Canada's multilingual nature.

I stayed in the Ottawa Jail Hostel in the former Carleton County Gaol. The receptionist sure acted like a warden.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottawa_Jail_Hostel

I mean even in British English this is no longer common.

Canadian English is what you get when a country moves out of England’s attic to attend university and ends up with America as a roommate.

I think it’s more share a wall with America but rooming with France.

He spent 7 years (2013-2020) in London running the Bank of England though - as the first foreign head in its 300+ year existence - he would have been very careful to avoid using Canadian/American spellings in official documents - has he just got used to it?

Is the prime minister typing out official documents himself?

Maybe just don't utilize "utilize" or "utilise" at all. There are very few cases where utilizing "utilize" or "utilise" is better than using "use".

I think they have slightly different meanings where “use” is more direct like a tool and “utilize” is more indirect like a system but that could be more about context than meaning. The words “usage” and “utilization” show this more where I would expect “usage” to be binary or integer and “utilization” to be fractional or percentage. That context and expectation is important for clear writing.

I agree that utilize is distinct from use, in that it makes something useful in a novel way; you might utilize a flat stone to dig, where you would otherwise use a shovel.

But I also agree with GP that many words like this are chosen just to sound more impressive, in the same way that people say 'at this time' instead of 'now.'

This helped me understand what I was getting at so I’ll try explaining again now with that.

The words are typically used in two different contexts, one more professional (utilize) and one more casual (use). The words can be chosen to hint at which context we’re in or shift the context locally if needed.

For example, a story about a group of drunk guys could say that one of them utilized a flat stone to dig, to add humour since we’re clearly not in that professional context.

It's just different meanings. "Utilize" means to put something to a use which doesn't normally have that use.

I'm sure a lot of people would like this to be true, but it's right there in the definition of use: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/use. Anywhere you can use "utilize" you can also equally use "use." One subsumes the other.

Personally, anytime I see the word "utilize" it makes me think the writer is just trying to sound smart or "put on airs." For me it has the opposite effect that the writer is trying to achieve.

“Never use a longer word when a shorter one would suffice” - a “joke” repeated many times by one of my high school English teachers.

"The passive voice is to be avoided."

It doesn't have the same utility.

strictly better than "uze" though

«Use» and «utilise» are not always interchangeable. «The burglar utilised the door to escape» would sound comical at best, or it would have the domain knowledge intrinsic to the forensics.

But «utilise» is almost always interchangeable with «employ», which almost always has the same meaning.

As an ESL immigrant, as it happens, I agree with this! Agree with sticking to a "Canadian" spelling. You'll prise the "u" in things like "colour" out of my cold, dead fingers, but just as Canada is a cultural melting pot, so is the language and spelling and the "z" in "utilize" belongs there. We're not British here, we're not 'murricans. This is Canada.

Oh god, the 'z' in everything is grating. It feels like so try-hard, and I will not utilise it.

> the "z" in "utilize"

As a native spanish speaker, the "utiliZe" spelling makes it easier for us to learn the word, as it's almost the same as the spanish version "utilizar"

As a native French speaker, I have to interject and push for the use of "utilise" as it's closer to our own "utiliser"!

So it is war you say :P

*pry, not prise

I agree that Carney should use Canadian English. However, this does not seem like a major enough issue to me, to worry about much, nor is it important enough to fine or sue anyone or anything else like that.

Asked to comment, Carney's office stated that they had told those hosers to take off.

Asked to comment, Carney's office stated that they had told those buds to mind their own beeswax.

Asked to comment, Carney’s office stated that they were mildly unconcerned.

Canadian here.

I use American spellings wherever they make sense and don't gratuitously mess with the Latin roots.

Such as "behavior", "neighbor".

But: "centre" and not "center" (it's from Latin "centrum": the R goes after the T, and there is no need whatsoever to revise that.)

The shift to Z in the -ise Latin-derived suffix is not just in American English. European languages are split about it. For instance, let's look at "to synthesize"

German: synthetisieren

French: synthétiser

Dutch: syntetisere

But:

Polish: syntetyzować

Hungarian: szintetizálni

Italian: sintetizzare

Romanian: sintetiza

I think the sound is Z in all of them? It's partly a question of whether the orthography of the language uses S for a Z sound or not. If they don't have that feature in their orthography then they don't have the choice of retaining an S spelling with a Z sound.

> (it's from Latin "centrum": the R goes after the T, and there is no need whatsoever to revise that.)

Why does it matter how it was spelled in Latin? English is not Latin.

In the era of ubiquitous access to dictionaries, I'm not sure the benefits of having spelling reflect etymology rather than pronunciation outweigh the cost.

The first part of my argument is this: the word centrum still has a cognate in numerous modern languages, which use the TR letter order:

French: centre

Italian: centro

Czech: centrum # identical to Latin!

Swedish: centrum

[... numerous others ...]

The "TR" order of the letters in the "centrum" cognate is still alive in modern languages and their orthography, and so is even the "centrum" word itself.

The second part of my argument is that some contemporary dialects of English itself, like British and Canadian, use "centre"; using the "centre" spelling is a contemporary practice, and not a retrogression toward Latin.

The third part of my my argument is that changing "centre" to "center" is a gratuitous change that brings no benefit; it has no redeeming value.

Spelling it center provides the significant benefit of removing foreign orthography from English, making it easier to learn to read and write.

I see no value spelling it centre. That some other languages spell the word doesn't matter as they're pronouncing it without a vowel between the t and r which is rather different than English.

In French it's pronounced santr. In Italian it's sen-tro. In Czech it's tsen-troom. In Swedish it's sen-trum.

Languages that, like English, pronounce it with a vowel between the t and r? They spell it that way.

In Albanian it's qendër pronounced very close to rhotic English sen-ter.

In Norweigian it's senter (sen-ta) which is pretty close to non-rhotic English.

In Croation, it's centar (sen-tar).

In Lombard it's center.

In Swedish, the other word for center (meaning a center (place) or sports position) is spelled... center.

And even Czech, which spells it centrum, changes the spelling to center in the genitive plural, to match the pronunciation.

So even if we're going to choose spelling based on other languages, there's plenty that spell it similarly to center to argue for it in English - though I would still argue that other people are doing it isn't a compelling argument.

According to Etymonline (i.e. Douglas Harper), quite curiously, the "center" speling in English is actually older!

Quote:

The spelling with -re was popularized in Britain by Johnson's dictionary (following Bailey's), though -er is older and was used by Shakespeare, Milton, and Pope.

At the same time, it Etymonline traces the origin to Old French (14th century) which had it as centre.

Just because Milton, Pope and Shakespeare wrote "center" doesn't mean it was a good idea. The latter couldn't spell his own name the same way twice!

It's a good idea because spelling words how they're pronounced was one of the biggest achievements of the Western world and our broken orthography impairs literacy.

Only English has this insanity driven by people who simply don't like change, like the aesthetics of older spellings, or because they're a closet francophiles/latinophiles like Johnson, but try to justify it with nonsense about etymology because how weak the personal preference argument is.

You need to retain Latin and Greek spellings for interoperability with other languages.

The problem with English is that it messed up its vowels and started changing the pronunciations.

It's very helpful to newcomers to English that a word like psychology is written in a way that is similar to theirs. But, yiles, the butchered pronunciations, /saɪˈkɑːlədʒi/, is unrecognizeable.

Other languages don't have problems with old spellings. In Czech, psychologie is pronounced the way it is written, pretty much letter for letter: /psɪxologiɛ/

We really don't need to retain interoperability, but if that is truly more important than English literacy, then perhaps we should be consistent.

If we're going to argue that centre is the correct spelling because for some reason r needs to go after a consonant instead of the vowel due to etymology, then surely we should extend this:

- Filter should become filtre (Latin: filtrum)

- Trimester should be trimestre (French: trimestre, Latin: trimestris)

- Perimeter should be perimetre (Latin: perimetros)

- Diameter should be diametre (Old French: diametre, Latin: diametros)

- Chronometer, manometer and a hundred other words that end in -meter should largely be changed to -metre like chronometre, manometre, etc.

- Copper should become coppre (Latin: coprium)

- Tiger should become tigre (Anglo-Norman: tigre, Latin: tigris)

- Cylinder should be cylindre (Middle French: cylindre, Latin: cylindrus, Ancient Greek: kulindros)

- Coriander should be coriandre (Anglo-norman: coriandre, Latin: coriandrum)

- Monster should be monstre (Old French: monstre, Latin: monstrum)

- Member should be membre (Old French: membre, Latin: membrum) - along with, of course, dismembre, castmembre, membreship, etc)

I could go on and on.

In the future, we could be entring (Old French: entrer, Latin: intro) pubs while sobre (Old French: sobre, Latin: sobrius) eagre (Old French: aigre, Latin: agrus) to drink cidre (Old French: cisdre / sidre) and get plastred (Latin: plastrum from emplastrum).

We shouldn't have to alter the spelling of more than a few thousand words to proprely (Old French: propre, Latin: proprius) retain Latin and Greek spellings (or rather, a Latin transliteration of Greek given the different alphabet).

> I think the sound is Z in all of them? It's partly a question of whether the orthography of the language uses S for a Z sound or not.

I'm confused here. What you call "the Z sound" in "synthetisieren" or "synthétiser" does not sound the same as "the Z sound" in "sintetizzare", for instance. The letters Z and S both exist in those languages, but they pronounced differently.

I worked in Canada for 18 years still have Canadian clients 3 years after coming back to the US, no one bats an eye over whether you use American or British spelling in documents. No one. Ever.

This is more manufactured outrage. I wish the media was not incentivized to amplify nonsense all the time.

I wish this was the level of scandal we were dealing with in the US. Canada is so lucky to just be squabbling over spelling choices.

Once there were like 3 police cars and a swarm of people in a neighbours driveway. Someone got shot, I thought, are we turning into America? Turns out a raccoon got stuck in a trash can and they were helping it out.

I am still fuming about Obama's tan suit.

Time for a classic Canadian joke:

Canada was supposed to have British Culture, French Cuisine and American Technology. Instead we ended with British Cuisine, American Culture and French Technology.

As a Canadian, we should work on improving our productivity and incorporate more automation and tooling. Whatever impacts our GDP in times of tariffs and economic uncertainty.

Not collectively waste time on the useless debates on how to spell things.

Once got taken to a Canadian shopping mall for books in Canada. There discovered the history of Canada in early-2000's. Now, reading the amusing headline of technology–editing software. This seems there they are now accepting this person; given their change once more? Colour spelled color is fun to discover.

in edits: losing different spellings; loses more than simply identity, helpful parts of language. In 2025, AI* LLM** sure does sound amazing. * Artificial Intelligence Software ** Large Language Models

you'd think text-replacement in-editors also helpful? Given auto-correct happens OK ;P

Long before spellcheck was everywhere, I used to use the British spelling of words when posting on the internet to catch over eager "spelling nazis".

I was a fun bit of trolling that most people didn't notice, could still stay on topic ... but man it triggered some folks.

> In an open letter, they asked Carney to stick to Canadian English, writing that it is "a matter of our national history, identity and pride".

A bit touchy, aren't we?

There are much better things to be proud about than using "z" instead of "s" in a few words.

I had thought Canada spelled words like the UK more often than not.

Reading this, I wonder how this became an issue to become big enough to have an article written about it.

Then hearing the justifications about why it might be, in turn, pitting a few characters in text on the canadianness of a politician, or not.

If you can imagine a word processor somewhere writing this, maybe it didn't have it's language set to English (Canada)?

Some folks here have said sometimes it can feel like there might be folks trying to grasp at straws.

At least in my experience in early 2000s BC we still used British spelling in grade school and all over Vancouver, the Lower Mainland, and the island (eg. Harbour Centre)

That's the Canadian spelling, which is why when you take the taxi to the Harbour Centre it drops you off at the curb, rather than the kerb.

...and what are those rubber things rolling under the taxi called in BC? ;-)

My teachers called it British and I kept with it. BC back then was also much more "British" than much of Eastern Canada tbh - most of my classmates either had grandparents or parents who immigrated from the UK or UK dependencies (eg. the Hong Kong exodus after 1998).

They were wrong. Canadian English has the very unique word colourize, for example.

That was some 4000 years ago.

Style over substance seems to be the order of the day. It would be refreshing to see people debate of substantive issues, ones that make a difference. It's a symptom of the broader crises in competence. Our leaders are chosen because they aren't good at anything, so we can only argue about their spelling and word choice.

Come to think of it, why is this in HN and why am I commenting on it? The outrage trap gets me when I let my guard down. It's even come for me here on HN.

As a Canadian, I describe my country as, "Proudly Not England, Not France, and Not America, since 1867."

It's a wonder he doesn't use American spelling. Carney went to Harvard undergrad, as did his rival in the Liberal leadership contest to succeed Trudeau earlier this year before the election.

Put another way, neither Carney nor Freeland has a post-high school degree of any kind from a Canadian school.

Is the NHL on a holiday break? This seems like the sort of thing one runs in a dead news cycle.

How does one go to the Governor of the bank of England to the PM of Canada? Pretty much overnight?

Well you start as the governor of the Bank of Canada for 5 years, then the governor of the Bank of England for another 7. After that you spend about 5 years in private finance. In parallel you spend that time acting as an economic advisor to multiple governments. Then the day comes where a major party needs a new leader, all the existing senior leadership either doesnt want it or is some manner of "problematic" and anyways, its not like they're going to win. Then whaddaya know, turns out Canadians like the idea of someone whose spent their whole life in macroeconomics at a time when global economics are all kinds of fucked up.

So it wasn't overnight, but it was a case of just the right person at just the right time.

Be the leader of the liberal party and not be Trudeau

5 years is overnight?

As a British person working for an American company, my spelling at work is an inconsistent mess.

It's very refreshing to see political news be about how someone misplaces their letters.

Incidentally, both 'utilize' and 'utilise' are 'code smells' in writing. One can almost always go with 'use' instead which is an older and simpler word.

Over here we spell it "uze", so I think there's still some ambiguity.

Also, he should use Times New Roman instead of Calibri.

If I work for a US multi-national and based out of London, and work with team members in both USA and UK, which language should I use for my emails?

If you're Canadian, working in Canada, just use Canadian English. The Americans probably won't even notice, and if the Brits complain, then just point out that you're using the proper English for the country you're in now.

This assumes your company doesn't have an official policy on the matter.

I am also based in London. When I work for American companies I attempt to use American spellings in code and documentation, because consistency matters. For general communication I use British English because I won't get American English right, humans and search mechanisms can cope with the difference and I can express myself most effectively that way.

Incidentally, isn't "based out of" mostly an American idiom? I usually use "based on" or "based in" and find "based out of" and "based off" conjure images of poorly constructed buildings. (Don't get me started on "based off of".)

Nice catch! It never made sense to me either, to say "out of" when actually it is "in", quite the opposite. I guess I worked mostly with American companies, while educated in British English.

I think "based out of" refers to the work communication going "out of" where the person is "based in". But still, it is far cry from the natural "in".

I'm in the same situation. I use American spellings for code comments, documentation and internal documents, but British spelling for chat and email.

I write color when I'm talking to my American colleagues and colour when I'm talking to my Canadian ones lol.

If you are multi-national, use where you are based in i.e. London.

>Prof Dollinger told the BBC, noting how CanWada's language has evolved from its past as a British colony.

Whos face is on the Canadian 20 dollar note?

* whose

pedantic , but thank you i often get that one wrong.

It’s topical on a thread about spelling, wouldn’t you say?

Unlike the US, Canada does have official languages so this is very much a request that the PM comply with the law.

Typos are illegal? Are the documents in Swahili or something?

The Official Languages Act doesn't specify which spelling or dialect you need to use for either French or English. There might be internal federal directives on which to use but its not a legal issue.

I'm Canadian. My parents are British. I always thought we spelt all words the same until now

Is "gossip news" accepted now HN, as long as the celebrities are connected to finance?

He did work in Britain for decades, if I was him I’d just completely own it and say something like “if this is the weak stuff they are trying to get me on I must be doing a great job with things that actually matter. Everyone, especially the people whinging about this, also make mistakes!”

As a canadian, sheesh. Don't we have better things to worry about?

If this has to be his biggest flaw, so be it, and I envy Canada a lot.

And the gen-text-speak will conquer all with 'utlgng'.

Really, what is under the bonnet in Canadian policy making?

An odd choice, for sure. Not much else to be said really.

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ge%C3%B4lage

English is my second language and I feel free to use either 'analyze' and 'analyse'. 'Analyze' looks slightly cooler though.

Why is this on hacker news exactly?

Probably because there's a bunch of English speakers on here from Canada, the US and the UK. TBH I think it made it to the front page because of interesting discussion in the comments, not because of the content of the article itself

This is a very important matter....

Can anyone give me an example how Canadian English spelling differs from American English?

Harbour. Centre. https://www.babbel.com/en/magazine/canadian-english-vs-ameri...

> But Canadian English takes from British English in other ways, like using 'ou' in colour, rather than the American 'color'.

We pronounce epitome as "epitome" and not "epitome".

Reminds me of the legendary flow chart "How to measure things like a Canadian": https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinfuriating/comments/18xbabx/...

It's honestly more complicated than this.

as a canadian, i always thought the official canadian spelling was to arbitrarily switch between the british or american spelling of words whenever you felt like it, including interchangeably in the same writing.

Keeping track of "-ize" versus "-ise" is a PITA, mainly because (a) American English uses both, altho not interchangeably, and (b) on teh interwebz there's always an inconsistent grab bag of dialectical usage. For those reasons I for one have settled on "-ise". My 0,02€, ymmv

British-born Canadian here. Strong spelling pedantry courses through my veins.

But... this is just the next chapter in Canadian media (ha! it mostly belongs to the southern dictatorship) having a go at non-Trumpish politicians.

Life continues.

If this is the worst this guy has done, well done Canada !

As an old-stock Canadian (one side of my family settled in Upper Canada in 1782 because of the revolution, so I have very thick British loyalist roots)...I use British spelling. I explicitly reject the use of American English.

This is a nothing burger.

Sounds like something his opponents would use to try and gin up fake outrage. So dumb.

slow news is good news i guess.

sorry

It's silly for there to be such a thing as Canadian Spelling.

British spelling, USA spelling... just pick one and move on.

Ideally all English-speaking countries would go for something more phonetic, but economic power and inertia trumps simplicity.

Everyone should use Canadian spelling as it's the intermediary between both British and USA spelling it makes the most sense for the Americans and Brits to adopt it.

As befits our new position as the begrudging leader of the free world.

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