New Quebec Language Law silliness: "Le Magasin Walmart"

[viper37]

In the US, you have affirmative action for certain groups, like the blacks, because historically, they were denied access to decent schools.  Either we have affirmative action were French would be given preferential treatments (I can imagine the outcry in Canada), or you let the people of Quebec protect their culture.  And yes, sometimes it will give silly issues like the trademark battles.

I'm not sure if that's the best equivalent. After all, black people aren't really dying out whereas you're talking about propping up an apparently dying culture (or at least one that has to be foisted on others to survive).

well, it's a different issue, but the issue of affirmative action is to give certain groups a chance to reach the white majority who historically had access to the best education, and as such the best jobs.

But it's similar in that there was discrimination against a group in the past, and nowadays, measures are needed to help this group reach the level of the majority.

Culturally speaking, if you forbid education, health care, government services in the language of a specific group, even if that group was at one point the majority (like Manitoba), it doesn't take long for that group to become an endangered minority.

At that point, you can keep up the assimilation process, or you can decide to respect the laws of the country, namely the one about official bilinguism, wich was actually only used in Quebec by the english speaking minority.  The provincial tribunals did not recognize rights to the French community, the Federal government did not want to anger the British colonists, so it really became an issue with the 1982 Constitution wich gave more protection to minorities.

Now, you have English Canadians and Americans bitching that official bilinguism should be only effective in Quebec, and everywhere else should be english first.  You got American and Canadians bitching at seperatists and nationalists, something that is weird to me.
It is apparently ok to be a proud American, but it wouldn't be ok to be a proud Quebecois. 

It is ok to call yourself a loyal subject of her majesty, insisting you are totally not like an American, voting laws to protect your cultural identity, to protect your corporations from non English Canadian takeovers,  but it's not ok for Quebec to do the same.

And we are the weird ones?

[Malthus]

I like rugged trips in the wilderness. How's the accomodation for a 2 year old & a new born?

Heh, I've had Carl up since he was 4 or so. But a newborn? For them, I like having such luxuries as a bathroom and running water. 

[garbon]

Sorry V, but all of that sounded really weird to me. I don't know that I've ever bitched that English should be first...anywhere. People who I do see do that (often in our states that border Mexico) strike me as backwards and trying to preserve some static image they have of their "culture" which fails to recognize that such things are fluid and always changing.

[Razgovory]

It's been a bad year for Quebec. The province seems determined to live up to all the complaints made about it - strikes, municipal corruption scandals, and harsher language laws.

What's worse, is that that Anglophone news sources are willing to talk about it.  Yet another example of British colonialism.

[garbon]

It's been a bad year for Quebec. The province seems determined to live up to all the complaints made about it - strikes, municipal corruption scandals, and harsher language laws.

What's worse, is that that Anglophone news sources are willing to talk about it.  Yet another example of British colonialism.

I just saw this. Yet another blow to Quebec.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/editorials/montreals-new-mayor-defies-stereotyping-of-quebec-politics/article5462459/

It's Day Two of the administration of Montreal's first Jewish anglophone mayor, and the city seems to still be standing. Michael Applebaum was sworn in on Monday after being elected interim mayor on Friday by his fellow councillors, the majority of whom are francophone, and some of whom are noted separatists. In many ways, Mr. Applebaum's ascension couldn't have come at a better moment.

For one thing, Mr. Applebaum's election is a welcome reminder that Montreal, currently embroiled in the grotesque corruption scandal that drove Gérald Tremblay from the mayor's office on Nov. 5, is modern and diverse enough to get past Quebec's often petty politics of language and search for meaningful ways to repair itself. Mr. Applebaum is the right person for the job: He is an experienced, independent, fluently bilingual councillor who has vowed to build bridges and repair the city's shattered reputation.

Just as importantly, Mr. Applebaum has arrived in the wake of a provincial general election that saw divisive language politics rear their ugly head once again; he serves as a corrective to baser political instincts. As well, his presence in so prominent a position will give some small comfort to Montreal's aging and beleaguered anglophone community, which is never more ignored than it is when the Parti Québécois is in power.

Some will point out that politicians, when obliged to pick a colleague as interim leader, usually give the job to someone they think has no chance of winning a general election. And Mr. Applebaum has vowed not to run for mayor when the current term is over in just under a year. That may be so, but it doesn't take away from the larger significance of the moment.

Mr. Applebaum joins a pantheon of mayors who have defied stereotype and changed Canadian politics, from Glen Murray in Winnipeg, who in 1998 became the first openly gay mayor of a North American city, to Naheed Nenshi of Calgary, the first Muslim mayor of a major Canadian city. In becoming mayor of Montreal, Mr. Applebaum has shown the rest of Canada that there is much more to Quebec than any convenient stereotype.

[Syt]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XbL7lG0Su8

"Only English pig with no brain, you know?"

[Razgovory]

Actually, no.  The French weren't there first.  Call 'em Indians, Native Americans, First Nations, or whatever, they were there first.

True, and we try to make things right, but it's difficult with so many languages now extinct.

I guess that really, the heart of the problems that many Americans have with your language laws is that we are more comfortable with the idea of individual rights, not group rights.

The problem is what do you do once a group has been pushed to the brink of extinction? 
Choice A: keep doing what you did, let it die. 
Choice B: allow some compromises to help them survive.

Choice B was decided as a way to keep Quebec into Canada.  The day it stops entirely is the day Quebec gets out of the Federation, and Canadians fear that, for some reason.

In the US, you have affirmative action for certain groups, like the blacks, because historically, they were denied access to decent schools.  Either we have affirmative action were French would be given preferential treatments (I can imagine the outcry in Canada), or you let the people of Quebec protect their culture.  And yes, sometimes it will give silly issues like the trademark battles.

Actually, why should the government be involved at all?  What language a person speaks really isn't something the government should care about.  Question:  Were Quebecistani denied access to decent schools or access to French language schools?  That's sort of a difference.

[Grey Fox]

Because that's why you have a government.

[Razgovory]

Because that's why you have a government.

Not it's not.  I have government prevent the strong from harming the weak, and to use collective effort where individual effort is insufficient.

[Grey Fox]

Part 2 applies.

[dps]

So Quebec government sucks, and this is just an examle of that?

When I tell you I live in a socialist hell, do you think I'm lying?

See, a real case: my notary made a simple mistake last year.  She made all the paper work to dissolve two of our companies, but forgot the file the final documents with the government, after everything else was registered.  So, for the government, I still have 2 active companies, beside the others.  These two companies have produced tax fillings every year, one of them never had any revenues.

So, I received a letter last month, telling me I owe the government 8000$ in income tax for one of the companies because the company is still registered and did not file an income tax report.  Now, I have to prove to my government there has been no activity for this company, that it was dissolved, that the notary simply forgot to file the last paper (electronic form actually, in a system for wich the government has had many problems... so it might just be that they lost it).

For another company, I made a mistake, many years ago.  They changed my GST&PST declaration period from trimestrial to monthly, but I did not noticed it.  See, despite me writing and phoning, telling them to use the office adress for any correspondance, they are still sending all documents to my father's adress for this enterprise.  So, I keep getting stuff late.  Anyway, I made the mistake, I made my declaration for 3 months instead of one month. 
Never mind that my documents were correctly filled with the proper dates, the government assumed I did not make any declaration for 3 months of the year.  Now, do they base themselves on an annual mean to estimate the amounts I owe them?  Of course not   They took my declaration for 3 months in a specific period, assumed it is representative of all months in a year, and say I owe them 2900$ in unpaid tax for this company, plus the penalties, plus the interests.

I sent the document twice, twice I was called back to tell me they lost it, I had to resend it.  3 years later, they credited me with one month, insisting I owe them 2000$ for 2 months.

That has been lasting for 4 years, trying to correct a simple mistake.  When I call, I'm told these things take time.


So, yes, our government is filled with assholes, the bigger ones working for the Office de la langue française and Revenu Québec.

Nobody here is more anti-socialist than me, I don't think, but that doesn't sound so much like socialism as typical bureaucratic b.s.

You got American and Canadians bitching at seperatists and nationalists, something that is weird to me.
It is apparently ok to be a proud American, but it wouldn't be ok to be a proud Quebecois.

Don't know about English-speaking Canadians, but given that it cost us a few hundred thousand lives to get rid of the destructive notion that being more loyal to Virginia or South Carolina was more important than being loyal to the US, I'm not sure why it should seem weird to you that Americans (Lettow excepted) are not, in the main, sympathetic to separatists

[Grey Fox]

Oh. That's a great point you make there. You cannot regard Quebec to akin to a US State. It's more akin to a different country/culture imprisoned in another country.

[garbon]

That's some dramatic rhetoric.

[viper37]

Sorry V, but all of that sounded really weird to me. I don't know that I've ever bitched that English should be first...anywhere. People who I do see do that (often in our states that border Mexico) strike me as backwards and trying to preserve some static image they have of their "culture" which fails to recognize that such things are fluid and always changing.

Another language or culture is not see as a threat until it reaches critical mass.  Right now, Vermont is a french friendly state, promoting bilinguism everywhere in the public and private sector.  Back up 100 years ago, French speakers were forced-sterilized like the Afro-Americans, among other things.

A brief history here:
http://bostonlanguage.wordpress.com/2012/07/05/the-bilingual-u-s-french-vermont/

Now, French is no longer a threat, so it's enjoying a revival.  If it threatened the dominant language, if it became more than something for the tourists, you can bet there would be a movement aiming for "English first".

[Grey Fox]

That's some dramatic rhetoric.

Also reality.