[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[garbon]

Is that true? Is Quebec the only 'unhappy' province?

[Valmy]

Is that true? Is Quebec the only 'unhappy' province?

Well they are the fifth happiest country in the world:

[Grey Fox]

Is that true? Is Quebec the only 'unhappy' province?

The only one who does something about it atleast. Albertans pretend they are unhappy but 10 years of having a Alberta based PM has made them soft.

[viper37]

Is that true? Is Quebec the only 'unhappy' province?

Unhappy with the 1982 Constitution, yes.  All the others signed it.  For fear of being seen on the side of a former seperatist government.

[crazy canuck]

"The West" is obviously BC through Manitoba.

The more interesting question is whether "the west" includes Yukon and NWT (since they are obviously in the western half of the country), or whether they are their own separate thing called "the north" (together with Nunavut).

I don't think people in BC think it's that obvious.  My friends & family there would not want to be lumped in with Alberta or anyone else.  Maybe that's a Victoria / Vancouver / lower mainland thing as opposed to the rest of BC though.

It's funny you think Victoria / Vancouver is "the West" though.  Whitehorse is further west than both of those cities.

Go back and reread his full post.  He doesn't think BC is the West.

Neither do I.

[crazy canuck]

Is that true? Is Quebec the only 'unhappy' province?

Unhappy with the 1982 Constitution, yes.  All the others signed it.  For fear of being seen on the side of a former seperatist government.

That isnt why people signed 

[Grallon]

What relevance could that possible have on what English speaking Canadians are like today?

Not wanting to be American was the first impetus of those who left the US - and it is still very much present - in a variety of ways - in the Anglo Canadian psyche.  Much like fleeing the religious persecutions in England bred a tenacious desire for freedom in the first American colonists, finding its way into a written constitution that still rule your lives today.  We are all the product of history, even though it's fashionable nowadays to believe that we're free from the past.  So yes, it is still relevant.  Oex could no doubt expand on this.


G.

[PRC]

"The West" is obviously BC through Manitoba.

The more interesting question is whether "the west" includes Yukon and NWT (since they are obviously in the western half of the country), or whether they are their own separate thing called "the north" (together with Nunavut).

I don't think people in BC think it's that obvious.  My friends & family there would not want to be lumped in with Alberta or anyone else.  Maybe that's a Victoria / Vancouver / lower mainland thing as opposed to the rest of BC though.

It's funny you think Victoria / Vancouver is "the West" though.  Whitehorse is further west than both of those cities.

I think CC's definition is the best.  BC is "the Coast" while Alberta and the Prairie provinces are "the West".  Yukon is another planet.

[Duque de Bragança]

I've read several articles about the NDP's Leap Manifesto - and it's stupidity is just breathtaking.

In French, it's "Un grand bond vers l'avant".  While in French, Mao's Great Leap forward was "Un grand bond en avant"...

I think the similarity is not a coincidence.

J'ai bondi en lisant cette faute ! 

[viper37]

Is that true? Is Quebec the only 'unhappy' province?

Unhappy with the 1982 Constitution, yes.  All the others signed it.  For fear of being seen on the side of a former seperatist government.

That isnt why people signed 

that's certainly how Trudeau&Chrétien got the last remaining one who wanted to call Lévesque to sign.

[Malthus]

So, if language and culture are the criteria - then Nunavut, and native Canadians generally, are more "different" from the "Canadian norm" than Quebec. After all, Inuktitut and Inuinnaqtun are a lot more "different" than French and English, right? And the experience of Native Canadians differs fundamentally to that of 'English' or 'French' Canadians, no matter what language they speak.

Oh come now Malthus.

As for why politicians from Quebec are favored by the Canadian political landscape - that is easy: they have the power to demand it, and have. Native Canadians lack that power - they have neither the numbers nor the leverage. They have a unique legal status, but question whether that uniqueness has been an advantage.

Sure? I guess? What is your point? We have indigenous pseudo-nations here in the US as well.

But Oexmelin did not even discuss them so why are they being used as a hammer to attack his point? You cannot honestly suspect that Oexmilon, a historian of American history, has some kind of contempt or lack of understanding of first nation cultures? Studying them has been part of his career.

I'm not sure what your point is. I'm not accusing anyone of contempt or lack of understanding of first nations.  The fact that the US has first nations as well as Canada is neither here nor there - not sure of the relevance of that fact to this discussion.

In fact, your whole post is a series of odd non sequiturs.

The issue (to rephrase it) is: why does our system favour politicians from Quebec?

Two answers have been proposed:

1 - Because the unique circumstances of Quebec - particularly, different modes of thought and culture provided by language - mean that politicians from outside Quebec are incapable of understanding the realities of Quebec, while presumably the reverse is not true;  this is the explanation favoured by our Quebec posters; and

2 - that Quebec politicians have power simply because people from Quebec have successfully demanded it. This is my explanation.

I realize that the two are not necessarily incompatible. However, I strongly resist the notion that the differences in language and culture make such an assumption of power natural. My point is that there are lots of places in Canada that have differences that far outweigh the differences between "English Canada" and Quebec (I have mentioned some) - that these differences include differences of language, lifestyle, economy, interests, etc.

The difference, and why these places cannot do what Quebec has done so successfully, is that they lack the power to do so, not because the situation with Quebec is somehow more righteous: Nunavut is tiny in population; Newfoundland is broke; Alberta is suffering from low oil prices. Quebec has created a very potent mythology of discontent and victimization that it has used, successfully, to take a larger share of the already-considerable political power that it would have anyway, as a populous province; its population largely believes it is true, and it has proved in their self-interest to do so. Similar strategies of discontent have been mobilized elsewhere - as in Alberta, versus the National Energy Program: in that narrative, Quebec along with Ontario were the "oppressors". That's all.

Now, you may agree or you may disagree, but I think all this talk of "contempt", not to mention Drakkan threatening a drunken beat-down upthread, is a trifle excessive, no? 

[Valmy]

I'm not sure what your point is. I'm not accusing anyone of contempt or lack of understanding of first nations.

My point is why do you keep bringing up the first nations?

The difference, and why these places cannot do what Quebec has done so successfully, is that they lack the power to do so, not because the situation with Quebec is somehow more righteous

Yeah and the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_Lakotah would love to exist right now as well but it lacks the power to do so. So what? Oex said nothing about righteousness. Zero. He was only trying to explain what a barrier the language thing is in creating a united political culture.

Nunavut is tiny in population; Newfoundland is broke; Alberta is suffering from low oil prices. Quebec has created a very potent mythology of discontent and victimization that it has used, successfully, to take a larger share of the already-considerable political power that it would have anyway, as a populous province; its population largely believes it is true, and it has proved in their self-interest to do so. Similar strategies of discontent have been mobilized elsewhere - as in Alberta, versus the National Energy Program: in that narrative, Quebec along with Ontario were the "oppressors". That's all.

Ok. Still not related to what Oex was saying.

Now, you may agree or you may disagree, but I think all this talk of "contempt", not to mention Drakkan threatening a drunken beat-down upthread, is a trifle excessive, no?

I just do not think it is relevant to what he was saying. The accusation seemed to me that somehow Oex didn't care about the First Nations.

[Malthus]

My point is why do you keep bringing up the first nations?

Because they are an example of a group with more significant differences of language and culture from the mainstream? I thought that was obvious.

I also keep bringing up Alberta, BC, and Newfoundland ...

I just do not think it is relevant to what he was saying. The accusation seemed to me that somehow Oex didn't care about the First Nations.

Well, I've explained it as best I could.

As I said, you can either agree or disagree. I think it is highly relevant.

[Valmy]

So...Democracy means when you have more people supporting something you are more likely to get what you want. Hardly an interesting point.

[Malthus]

So...Democracy means when you have more people supporting something you are more likely to get what you want. Hardly an interesting point.

You keep alternating between "your argument is totally wrong" and "your argument is so obviously right it is trivial". 

Look, I have no qualms about people attempting to get the best deal politically that they can in a democracy. I'm attacking the justification this particular group is advancing for why they are right to do so.

Look, I'll make this totally simple.

Justification: differences in culture and language.

Attack on Justification: other groups have differences that are of equal or greater import. 

Make sense to you?