Trolling and Shopping: What Canadians are saying about the 51st state on BlueSky and Reddit

From Trolling Trump to National Pride, Canadians Speak Out on Being Called the 51st State

In honour of Canada’s 4 Nations overtime win last week, we took a quick look at how the conversation played out online.

Just before the Thursday game, both White House Press Secretary Leavitt and Trump himself on Truth Social took the time to troll Canada in the upcoming finals, again calling Canada the “51st state”. But, immediately after McDavid’s overtime goal, Canadians flipped the switch and trolled right back by calling the US Canada’s 11th province and referring to Premier Trump.

Should the White House start to be concerned of a union between Canadian politicos and sports fans?

 After looking at Twitter/X in the first part of our series, this week we are exploring what’s been said by Canadians on both BlueSky and Reddit.

A substantial amount of the Bluesky user growth came just after the US election, as Democrats exited an increasingly far-right X/Twitter. Still, the Bluesky userbase is about 10% of the size of X/Twitter, and heavily biased towards the US. The 51st State conversation on BlueSky is relatively smaller than X/Twitter with X/Twitter users posting almost 4 times more on the topic than Bluesky users on a per user basis.

The tone on Reddit is noticeably different than the other two channels. X/Twitter and BlueSky is where Canadians are going to express their opinion, but Reddit is where people are going to share tips and information about what to do about it.

Our Key Takeaways

1)       Understanding how Canadians leverage different channels to talk and share about the 51st state is necessary to unpack the complexity and nuance of the social conversation: for example Canadians' love and frustration with their healthcare system.

2)       Brands concerned about how the Buy Canadian campaign could impact their reputation and revenue should pay close attention to what is being said about them and their competitors on Reddit. Below, you will find both risk (Amazon) and opportunity (Costco) examples.

Insights from BlueSky

• Healthcare Focus: Healthcare is the second most important topic (17%) on BlueSky, which is a departure from the other two channels we looked at where healthcare ranked 4th or lower in importance. Overall, Canadians reject Trump’s claims of the potential of better healthcare as the 51st state.

  
  

• Maybe our healthcare isn't so bad? Canadians love to complain about the weather and our universal healthcare. But no one within this discussion mentions the traditional healthcare pain points of wait times or access to primary care.  It's possible Canadians remain very proud of our healthcare system, despite loving to bash its flaws in “everyday” conversations.

  
  

• Pro-51st State Swag: Amazon is being called out for selling pro-51st state swag as very disrespectful to Canadians. Though this remains a small conversation so far, it’s a risk flag for Amazon and other brands to be aware of.

Insights on Reddit

• Surge in National Pride: Compared to the previous month, there is a 627% increase in posts about buying Canadian and boycotting American products, peaking in early February.

  
  

• Costco is a popular topic: Owning 2% of the conversation, highest of any other retailer, consumers are justifying their loyalty to Costco because of its reputation as a responsible employer with good prices. Reddit users are actively sharing detailed shopping lists and product recommendations to focus their buying power on Canadian products.

  
  

  

  
  

• The conversation around Amazon: People are identifying complications finding Canadian alternatives to the ecommerce giant. Made in Canada storefronts are seen as a way to be patriotic while still benefiting from Amazon’s convenience. Reddit users are also highlighting the importance of companies like Walmart, Amazon and Costco as major employers in Canada as a reason not to punish them too harshly.

What you need to know

Economic Blackout: The campaign for the February 28 Economic Blackout is not gaining significant traction with the Buy Canadian crowd. It will be interesting to watch if this,  or other international or local campaigns picks up steam in the future.

American-owned Platforms: The irony of having to talk about boycotting American businesses on American-owned social platforms is not lost on Canadians. The lack of Canadian options and our dependency on American companies is hitting home for many people.

Canadian Backlash: We have been monitoring for any backlash against Canadian brands who support Trump and his 51st state proposal. Canadian honourary team coach Gretzky has been feeling the brunt of the attacks following the 4 Nations tournament with calls to boycott his companies.