[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[viper37]

It is the way White Anglos have told us and continue to tell us that if you are white only English is acceptable.

More like English is the only acceptable language in Canada, and White (Anglo Saxon Protestant) is the only way to live in Canada.

There is some resurgence lately of the White and English thing everywhere in Canada, even in Quebec <sigh>.

[crazy canuck]

It is the way White Anglos have told us and continue to tell us that if you are white only English is acceptable.

More like English is the only acceptable language in Canada, and White (Anglo Saxon Protestant) is the only way to live....

Where, or better yet, when are you talking about?

[Bauer]

That perception feels really out dated to me to be honest.  I think the simple truth is that most of anglophone Canada have poor second language skills.

[Jacob]

I heard about "speak white" in the early 90s in Ottawa - as in "this is something a bigoted anglophone may say to a francophone". I never witnessed it in action, but my francophone friends mentioned having had it directed at them on occasion. I have not doubt it was a real thing much like all the other slurs that were current at the time.

Since moving to BC in the mid 90s I've not come across it once - as a concept, as a joke, as a topic of conversation. Nothing.

I expect it was part of the vocabulary of abuse where francophone and anglophone communities overlapped. I can't speak to whether it's still a thing in more recent times.

[Jacob]

With all the ™Speak White™ (these days cyber-) jihad on French, it's hardly accepting the language.   

Where are you seeing this?

It it something where people bust in on francophone parts of the internet and spout that kind of BS? Or are you seeing it in anglophone spaces?

Honestly, my immediate reaction is to suspect online bots and agitators designed to increase conflict and hate among Canadians as a political tool, rather than a reflection of any kind of organic sentiment.

[Jacob]

Both

I don't know anything about the online jihad.

To paraphrase Wikipedia

It is the way White Anglos have told us and continue to tell us that if you are white only English is acceptable.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speak_White

It is also the title of a 1968 poem that was quite influential that help jump start la Révolution tranquille.

I want to believe it's not a thing anymore. Where are you collectively experiencing being told this?

I mean, I don't doubt that there are bunch of places where the assumption that English is the default in practice turns into significant social or institutional pressure to speak English instead of French. But you seem to be speaking of a more active, aggressive, personal pressure to not speak French? I'd like to hear more about it if you don't mind.

[Zoupa]

It is the way White Anglos have told us and continue to tell us that if you are white only English is acceptable.

More like English is the only acceptable language in Canada, and White (Anglo Saxon Protestant) is the only way to live....

Where, or better yet, when are you talking about?

Montreal, late 90s was when I last heard it personally. You don't know our old anglos.

[Grey Fox]

Both

I don't know anything about the online jihad.

To paraphrase Wikipedia

It is the way White Anglos have told us and continue to tell us that if you are white only English is acceptable.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speak_White

It is also the title of a 1968 poem that was quite influential that help jump start la Révolution tranquille.

I want to believe it's not a thing anymore. Where are you collectively experiencing being told this?

I mean, I don't doubt that there are bunch of places where the assumption that English is the default in practice turns into significant social or institutional pressure to speak English instead of French. But you seem to be speaking of a more active, aggressive, personal pressure to not speak French? I'd like to hear more about it if you don't mind.

I agree with you it's not a real life thing anymore. Old stock White Anglos of Quebec have been displaced by non-white immigration in their use of english in Quebec, especially Montreal. For obvious reason they aren't keen on using that kind of racist language.

I've only encountered it once in the street in my life and that was in Toronto in my early 20s.

But Online? In the more Anglo-Saxon progressive forums, places like ResetEra and BluSky, Québec, our institutions and our government are denounced for our protection of French, for our insistance that it be the language of the land. For our laws that enforce a French first schooling. No one is yelling "Speak White", but we know what it means.

Our governments are not perfect, right now they are dumb has bricks, but I usually feel that Canadian progressives have forgotten (or never knew?) what were the goals of the Révolution Tranquille.

1) Freedom from religion.
2) Ability to live and thrive in French.

and criticized along the same anti-imperialism/anti-colonialism lines that they criticized their our government. 

[Duque de Bragança]

With all the ™Speak White™ (these days cyber-) jihad on French, it's hardly accepting the language.   

Please, you'd be the first to tell a  quebecois to speak proper French if you ever met one, so I don't think you're the best to speak on the matter

You are the one who should stay quiet (calado serias poeta)    the Anglo-Azorean-Brazilian-Lisboete pidgin "speaker" who claims to speak proper Portuguese.

Already met them, and it never happened. Plus, I already used a Québécois dub (not into dubs be them French or Québécois generally) for terminology purposes.

The strangest bit of Speak White Propaganda Staffel was not online, or Speak White cyber jihad if you will, but from a really Anglo-Americanised German in Frankfurt (!) no less, criticising Québécois for clinging on their old-fashioned "language". Auf Englisch, of course.

*edit* also, free Bretagne!

Good luck with that.  Le Pen family is from Bretagne and too keen on separatists, yet has nothing agains the language. Try the jacobinist left.
 
Azeri interference in New Caledonia vibes for the Anglo-Azorean-Brazilian-Lisboete pidgin "speaker" who claims to speak Portuguese? (bis)
I know you claim to be a Moor, mixing it up with muslim (hence jihad triggering you), and Azeris are Turks, but that's a new low for you. 

[crazy canuck]

It is the way White Anglos have told us and continue to tell us that if you are white only English is acceptable.

More like English is the only acceptable language in Canada, and White (Anglo Saxon Protestant) is the only way to live....

Where, or better yet, when are you talking about?

Montreal, late 90s was when I last heard it personally. You don't know our old anglos.

Thanks

[Bauer]

So was this a thing Montreal anglos did?

[viper37]

It is the way White Anglos have told us and continue to tell us that if you are white only English is acceptable.

More like English is the only acceptable language in Canada, and White (Anglo Saxon Protestant) is the only way to live....

Where, or better yet, when are you talking about?

It as some revival online now in far right group, but it was mainstream in the 19th century up to 1970s.

According to a widely circulated story, the first known use of the expression speak white dates back to October 12, 1889. During debates in the House of Commons of Canada, anglophone MPs allegedly shouted "Speak White!" at francophone MP Henri Bourassa.^[2] However, according to Canadian anglophone journalist William Johnson, this account is a myth.^[3] Quebec francophone linguist Gabriel Martin concurs with this interpretation.^[1] According to him, the expression speak white is attested in Canada starting in the 1920s and its usage intensified during the 1942 conscription crisis:

According to the linguist, testimonies from francophone Canadians reporting being told to speak white stretch into the 1980s, although the expression has become marginal in the 21st century.^[1]
On March 7, 2007, journalist Larry Zolf published an article entitled "Speak White" on the CBC News website, stating that in his childhood in Winnipeg, anglophones would often shout "Speak white!" at his mother when she spoke to him in Yiddish.^[4] In the same article, Zolf also criticized then Liberal Party candidate Stéphane Dion—who is francophone—by addressing the same "speak white" insult to him.^[4]

Explanation of the poem:
https://www.erudit.org/en/journals/ttr/2018-v31-n2-ttr04947/1065569ar.pdf

[viper37]

Since moving to BC in the mid 90s I've not come across it once - as a concept, as a joke, as a topic of conversation. Nothing.

It's like the n* word.  You don't hear often until you see a black person.

Then racists might blurp the n* word.

[Jacob]

So was this a thing Montreal anglos did?

Pretty sure it was also prevalent in Ontario.

[HVC]

With all the ™Speak White™ (these days cyber-) jihad on French, it's hardly accepting the language.   

Please, you'd be the first to tell a  quebecois to speak proper French if you ever met one, so I don't think you're the best to speak on the matter

You are the one who should stay quiet (calado serias poeta)    the Anglo-Azorean-Brazilian-Lisboete pidgin "speaker" who claims to speak proper Portuguese.

Point proven, thank you