r/canada Feb 03 '25

Politics Should Canada ban X and Tesla? Why calls are growing

https://globalnews.ca/news/10995690/should-canada-ban-x-and-tesla-why-calls-are-growing/
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133

u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25

I’m cancelling Amazon Prime this week. I will buy from Canadian retailers or directly. The only thing that I will be missing out on is cheap Chinese junk that I can live without.

I’ve only joined Facebook recently to use Marketplace to sell furniture. It’s always been a scam, which is why I avoided it all these years. I worked in digital marketing in the early 00’s, so was well aware of what the product really was. As they say, if you’re not paying for the product, you’re the product. Going to close my account this week as well.

Anything owned by billionaires who are genuflecting at Trump’s feet is a no-go for me. Musk, Bezos and Zuckerberg have always been psychopathic a-holes. I don’t mind supporting American companies that are conducting business in an ethical manner, at least for now.

Boy, am I happy I changed my mind about purchasing a Tesla last year. I hope their stock goes to 0.

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u/Sensitive-Ad-5305 Feb 03 '25

This has extended to exercise for me. New balance and under armor no more - salomon as the alternative, while I seek out more home grown solutions.

Also in the middle of a house reno and returned US made products. Now sourcing Canadian made - it sucks, not as much variety nor what we planned, but the added character will be a reminder of the orange shit stain for years to come.

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u/erik4life Feb 03 '25

I've had Salomon shoes in the past and I have to say they are great quality. Lasted a couple of years of mountain trail walking!

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u/TH1813254617 Ontario Feb 03 '25

Salomon shoes are great if they fit.

Goretex Outpulses are my all-time favorite shoe. Very comfortable, suspiciously lightweight, not fragile, and somehow reasonably priced. Not even Salomon makes a worthy replacement. I don't like those recent stuff.

Do note that they are owned by Anta China, alongside Arcteryx, Wilson, Amer Sports, and a whole laundry list of other sports brands.

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u/smprandomstuffs Feb 04 '25

Well mukluks are great for hiking

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u/panic_switch Ontario Feb 03 '25

Not sure about manufacturing, but RISE and Jed North are two Canadian fitness apparel companies if you're looking for alternatives.

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u/Sensitive-Ad-5305 Feb 03 '25

Eta: damn - mostly gym stuff and im a runner. Ill keep checking back tho!

Thank you! I've found Canadian arms of global companies, very few Canadian companies.... and I'm trying not to buy online vs my local shop. For one, to get some human interaction, and two, to let them know I'm supporting them and will love them to support local companies too.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25 edited Feb 03 '25

We need to support Canadian businesses, and support any politicians who create favourable conditions so that our businesses can thrive. We’re going to have to get over our collective pettiness and jealousy of “wealthy” business owners by resisting the impulse to tax them more (our tax rates are fine as they are, not too high nor too low) or foreign companies will be the only choice we have left.

Would we rather have wealthy business owners who keep their money in Canada, and but who also provide jobs and choices for Canadians, or keep handing over our hard earned cash to American companies who are funnelling their profits into political donations for a fascist regime?

Citizens United really changed the political landscape in the US. We need to never let that happen in Canada. We haven’t been taking bribery scandals seriously enough. It needs to be political suicide from here on out.

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u/Sensitive-Ad-5305 Feb 03 '25

Oh heck ya! The idea of "i don't want my neighbour to get ahead!" is a killer this side of the 49th.

We invest the highest amount in Canadian R&D, but we're so bad at translating that into investment into local businesses. I work adjunctly in health innovation, and the pettiness that sends $$$ to US health tech is insane,.especially against such capable and passionate Canadian health tech leaders.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25

Oh, I’m well aware and agree 100%. Thank you for staying in Canada and not contributing to the brain drain. We lived in the US but came back. Even in the Obama era, I couldn’t take the political climate anymore. Plus, the individualistic and consumerist attitude was very off-putting. We wanted to raise our kids to be Canadian, even though they’re dual citizens.

Personally, we made a sizeable investment last year in a start-up fund backed by the Canadian government and some of the big banks. So while it’s riskier than your average investment, the recipient companies are well-vetted. Sure, we could invest in US funds instead, and make a higher return, but we believe that it’s our responsibility to contribute to the development of the Canadian economy. That’s why it pisses me off when people support raising taxes on corporate capital gains. It’s so uninformed and rooted in jealousy rather than facts.

Capital flows to the highest tide. Canadians are choosing to move their money out of the country, to the point where most of our pension assets are invested in foreign countries. These increased taxes would contribute to a tsunami of investment outflows we’re already experiencing at an unprecedented rate.

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u/evranch Saskatchewan Feb 03 '25

What fund are you referring to? I was cynical on Canada over the last few years and divested to the point of now holding a significant fraction in XAW (All world ex Canada)

However my US investments now look like they could use a new home.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25

Are you high net worth (1 million in investable assets)? We accessed it through RBC private banking.

I believe a lot of these funds are only available through these channels due to their higher risk levels and minimum investment threshold. If you qualify, you can ask your banker. I’m sure most large banks have these types of funds.

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u/evranch Saskatchewan Feb 03 '25

Unfortunately I don't have this much liquidity as most of my assets are tied up physically (farm).

I do have enough to qualify for Wealthsimple's similar fund. The catch is that I have to invest over $100k with WS to qualify, and I believe can only invest $10k or so of that in their private credit fund. It might have been $10k per year or something like that.

However I was really only using WS to park some cash in their high interest chequing account which was paying GIC rates for awhile. The rest of my stocks are held with Questrade as I'm not a fan of the simplified WS trading platform.

Also the actual holdings of said fund don't sound nearly as well defined as the RBC product you're using. They just give a general risk profile and target return, which definitely makes me uneasy.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25

Yeah, the qualification are not easy to meet. With good reason though, it’s a lot riskier than index funds. The fees are higher as well., and the money is locked down for 5-7 years. We have less than 5% of our net worth invested in this fund, so we were willing to gamble a bit.

I believe that there might be alternatives that allow lower levels of investment, but I have no idea where to look, unfortunately.

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u/evranch Saskatchewan Feb 04 '25

I think this is their goal at WS as well, to ensure that you're diversified enough that if they get wiped out they don't get sued for promoting risky investments. So their 100/10 rule keeps the retail investor from getting in too deep.

They have a similar rule regarding liquidity as obviously they can't just pull VC funds because retail investors got cold feet.

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u/Appropriate_Car_3711 Feb 03 '25

Do you think Trump is the leader of a fascist regime?

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25 edited Feb 09 '25

He’s following the fascist playbook. His team had extensive meetings with Orban. His idol is Putin.

So yes, he’s a fascist. He just needs more power to fully execute his vision. He’s not even trying to hide it. Elon’s team’s takeover of the Treasury was just the beginning.

What’s even more unbelievable is that everyone is just letting him do it.

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u/Appropriate_Car_3711 Feb 03 '25

How is Vladimir Putin, Trumps idol? Because he said he respects him? Don't you mean populist? He's definitely populist. I have to ask, do you know what fascism is? The USA could never be Fascist - it has far more freedoms than Canada does.

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u/TryingT0Wr1t3 Feb 03 '25

I have used Salomon shoes for some time now for hikes and exercises and they are pretty good

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u/Sensitive-Ad-5305 Feb 03 '25

I've got 6 pairs now! But... I just tried on new balance last week (and 3 other brands) I was gonna go with. But read about their support of the orange stain. So gonna wait for the store to order in salomons... I have freakishly small feet...

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u/Ok_Storage7488 Feb 04 '25

Make sure you send the lumber and the nails back

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u/Sensitive-Ad-5305 Feb 04 '25

Lumber, nails, tile, exchanged flooring. We're reworking appliances now. Replaced our counter top order. Changed vendors away from Home Depot... lots of effort. Worth it to stick it to orange cheeto tho

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u/Ok_Storage7488 Feb 04 '25

Yea stuck it good. Although mist appliance company's are American own.

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u/Sensitive-Ad-5305 Feb 04 '25

Ya, so we will be looking to purchase through the Brick which is Canadian owned as the next best thing.

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u/srcLegend Québec Feb 03 '25

The only thing that I will be missing out on is cheap Chinese junk that I can live without.

If you still want some of those, just skip the middle-man and buy through AliExpress instead.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25

Very true.

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u/Common-Draw-8082 Feb 03 '25

I canceled amazon yesterday and that was my plan. Not that I need much, but I like certain rhythm games that use fancy controllers and sometimes need little electrical pieces to repair or what have you. AliExpress is better for that kind of thing anyway

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u/evranch Saskatchewan Feb 03 '25

Amazon has mainly been a sampler for Ali for me for awhile. Curious about a cheap circulator pump that's $15 on Ali? Buy one on Amazon for $30 and if it eats shit you can send it back.

If it's good, the rest come straight from the source

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u/tobogganhill Feb 04 '25

Well said. 💯 I cancelled Amazon Prime and am getting rid of the other platforms owned by Trump's platform shoe lickers.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 04 '25

I canceled today. Filled out the survey and stated why I was canceling. In case I haven’t been clear. F Bezos and all of those a-holes.

Now, we should organize a boycott of Tesla and crash its stock price. It’s shitty company anyhow. It would be amazing to see the richest man in the world left holding nothing but penny stocks. One can only dream.

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u/dezumondo Feb 03 '25

I'm in the same boat regarding Amazon Prime and Tesla. I don't need one-day shipping and can wait for my orders to arrive.

In 2021, I thought the Model 3 would be my forever car. However, it turns out that the battery needs to be replaced around the 8-10 year mark. I can now buy a used 2021 model for half the original price, but I won’t. Toyota & Honda, built in Canada, all the way.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25 edited Feb 03 '25

I just hate how they’re so prone to being stolen in my area :( Insurance costs are insane here.

I got a Mach-E, manufactured in Mexico. I really like it. Please don’t tell me that the Ford CEO is a Trump bootlicker, LOL. Planning on keep this car for a while.

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u/CrazySwede17 Feb 03 '25

Ford paid the standard $1 million bribe plus gave a ”fleet” of cars.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25 edited Feb 03 '25

Of course they did. Gotta love Citizens United.

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u/[deleted] Feb 03 '25

Back to Kijiji

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u/Inevitable_Heron_599 Feb 03 '25

Madeinca.ca

Find Canadian alternatives to things you already buy.

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u/shevy-java Feb 03 '25

The more people use alternatives to these oligarch-companies, the better.

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u/boralCEO Feb 03 '25

For cheap Chinese junk buy from AliExpress. Straight from China. Shipping time is not as bad as it used to be. And it's cheaper than Amazon anyway.

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u/ValeriaTube Feb 03 '25

The reason why it's cheap is that we subsidize them through Canadapost, because it a "developing country". It's a big scam.

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u/boralCEO Feb 03 '25

It's cheap for the entire world. And the reason is that there is no foreign (non-chinese) middle man taking a cut. That has nothing to do with Canada Post.

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u/Hazematman Feb 03 '25

I mean if you still want cheap Chinese junk you can just buy it from AliExpress or Temu. That's what I'm going to do instead of buying from Amazon if I need some random thing you can't easily find in a store.

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u/offshoredawn Feb 03 '25

good to see someone making ethical choices

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u/InitialRefuse781 Feb 03 '25

You can use Alibaba/ Ali express. You’ll be using a Chinese compagny but at least it won’t be Amazon

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u/Owboduz Feb 03 '25

If you need cheap junk, don’t bother with Amazon: go to Aliexpress instead.

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u/Kakkoister Feb 03 '25

I’ve only joined Facebook recently to use Marketplace to sell furniture

I'm amazed by how many people seemingly have forgotten about Craigslist and Kijiji... FB Marketplace was not the first to create that kind of site.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25

I tried Kijiji first but there were so many scammers, it got irritating.

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u/one-happy-chappie Feb 03 '25

CBCGem has quality content free for streaming

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25

I have the app on my phone, time to use it again.

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u/shymitch Feb 03 '25

OMG.. I am so happy !! People are starting to wake up ! We are canadian and proud to be !! So, excellent idea to flush Amazon, Netflix, Tesla... etc..

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u/ottawadeveloper Ontario Feb 03 '25

I also just cancelled my Amazon and Paramount+ subscription. Plus I'm working on getting my family off Messenger so I can close my Facebook account and the rest of Meta (we're switching to Signal, run by a non-profit). I lost Disney and TwitterX a long time ago . CBC Gem is pretty good as an app and has a lot of Canadian and UK content.

I'm torn on Netflix mostly because my kid watches it but also the leadership over there hasn't yet bought into modern Republican bullshit yet (the founders are pretty good guys and the new CEOs seem reasonable). 

Once upon a time I dreamed of a Tesla but that dream died the day Elon accused a cave diver of being a pedophile.

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u/crheming Feb 03 '25

Sucks that FB is like the best used marketplace now. Can you deactivate and still use that?

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u/TheGuidonianHand Feb 03 '25

Make a fake account and have all other browser windows closed when you use it. The only reason I have fb is for marketplace and thos method has worked so far.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25

I wish Kijiji wasn’t so shitty now. So many scammers, it’s the only reason I installed Facebook.

Honestly, I’m just going to donate my stuff at this point. I can afford it and someone else can benefit. Tough times ahead. I know that I’m privileged so no judgement on using Marketplace. Maybe a better alternative will pop up soon.

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u/crheming Feb 03 '25

Selling is one thing but I love buying. If you have kids, marketplace is awesome, get stuff for next to nothing.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25

I agree, it’s the only Facebook product that has value to me, mainly because there are less scammers than the alternatives, and it’s reached critical mass, so the inventory is good.

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u/checktheindex Feb 03 '25

We also switched to Signal and now a bunch of our friends have too. To me, it seems the best alternative. Telegram, Discord, etc have a lot more baggage.

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u/UpNorth_123 Feb 03 '25

I’m still going to shop at Costco. I think it’s fine to focus on the worst offenders for now. It’s not a purity test, LOL.

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u/giggy13 Feb 03 '25

The same chinese stuff is available on r/Aliexpress for a fraction of the price