You have to wonder, though, why they are happy to have a foreigner as their unelected head of state.

But it's a tradition of subservience and colonialism. Why would you have someone who doesn't even bother to live in your country as your head of state?

It’s a symbolic title, The Queen is a figurehead and cannot interfere in State affairs, purely symbolic and has been since 1982.

I can only speak for myself and not to presume to speak for all Canadians but as someone of British ancestry I feel a twinge of, let’s call it nostalgia for the Empire; indeed Canada as an idea would never have happened without it so we kind of owe them for that.

Colonialism has gotten an extremely bad rap in the new normal of political correctness overreach and some aspects of it are richly deserved but it did lead to formation of a country I love and an economy and rule of law that benefits it’s citizenry so I’m not too upset, and as for subservience, that hadn’t been the case since WW2 and that subservience directly impacted how we freed ourselves from Colonial rule and into a Nation, so it paid off handsomely but at a tremendous cost.

How did Canada free itself from English rule?

It started in the aftermath of the First World War, our Prime Minister Robert Borden was instrumental in using Canada's tremendous losses, especially at Vimy Ridge to his advantage in getting Canada a seat at the table with Lloyd George (British Prime Minister) this was the start of Canada's journey to independent Nationhood, this was followed up after the second world war by Prime Minister Mackenzie King and then finally culminated by Pierre Trudeau in 1982 with The Canada Act, also called Constitution Act of 1982, Canada's constitution approved by the British Parliament on March 25, 1982, and proclaimed by Queen Elizabeth II on April 17, 1982, making Canada wholly independent.

So you owe something to the Queen.

More like they owed us and we capitalized on it.

That’s a better way to look at it.

Symbols are important. It's a symbol of colonialism and subservience...you put her on a pedestal and call her "highness".