Tous sont les bienvenus, quelle que soit leur langue maternelle !
Cliquez ici pour y accéder. (Il se peut que vous deviez vous connecter à votre compte Facebook avant d'être acheminé à la page.)
13 décembre 2011
Rejoignez la page Facebook d'ALFI !
Tous sont les bienvenus, quelle que soit leur langue maternelle !
Cliquez ici pour y accéder. (Il se peut que vous deviez vous connecter à votre compte Facebook avant d'être acheminé à la page.)
Un nouveau mouvement voit le jour...
Depuis plus d'un an, j'ai un projet en tête que j'ai mis en veilleuse, en attente de cette journée idéale qui viendrait où j'aurais le temps et les ressources pour lui donner naissance comme il fallait. Mais à la lecture de ce billet de Jérôme Lussier, chroniqueur à Voir.ca, je n'en pouvais plus. J'en ai assez de cette fausse idée que la défense du français et la promotion de la souveraineté sont le domaine des vieux chnoques constipés, xénophobes et anglophobes. C'est archi-faux et ce n'est qu'un bobard propagé par ceux qui doivent se donner une fausse raison de croire qu'il sont plus évolués que les autres, soit qu'il sont des fédéralistes sans meilleurs arguments, soit qu'ils sont lassés du débat et préfèrent s'en mettre au-dessus pour ne plus avoir à réconcilier l'irréconciliable. Assez de conneries ; le moment idéal, c'est tout de suite. Le public doit savoir qu'ouverture d'esprit et multilinguisme ne sont pas antonymes avec francité et souveraineté. Je vous présente donc mon bébé, en gestation depuis plus d'un an : ALFI (anglophones et allophones pour le français et l'indépendance).
ALFI est le futur rassemblement de citoyens dont la langue maternelle n'est pas le français mais qui ont adopté cette langue avec fierté et qui souhaitent voir respecter son statut de langue de communication publique, de travail, d'instruction, de publicité et ainsi de suite. C'est également un rassemblement qui prône un Québec qui prenne sa pleine place sur la scène internationale en tant que pays indépendant, projet collectif de 8 millions de concitoyens, non pour se renfermer dans sa spécificité, mais pour partager celle-ci et l'ouvrir à la collectivité humaine avec cette confiance que seule l'indépendance peut inspirer.
Beaucoup d'entre nous serons issus de l'immigration et, grâce à cette grande chance, nous voyons notre terre d'accueil (le Québec) non juste pour ce qu'elle était autrefois ni pour ce qu'elle est aujourd'hui, mais pour ce qu'elle pourrait être : un eldorado pour ceux qui rêvent d'une vie meilleure en liberté et qui veulent le faire en français. D'ici 2025, notre planète comptera plus de 500 millions de francophones éparpillés sur 5 continents. Nous voulons que le Québec les fasse rêver comme il nous l'avons fait, qu'il soit leur Amérique comme il a été le nôtre.
Nous sommes un rassemblement républicain. Nous ne reprochons pas au Canada anglais sa monarchie qui est un symbole important de son histoire et de son identité. Toutefois, nous avons une vision plus noble et moins anachronique pour la population québécoise, à savoir celle d'une république fondée sur les principes des lumières et agissant au nom du peuple qu'elle incarne et non au nom d'une reine étrangère.
Nous ne sommes ni un parti politique, ni un organisme partisan. Nous ne sommes ni de droite ni de gauche. Ces débats se font ailleurs et nous nous concentrons sur les deux enjeux mentionnés dans notre intitulé. Il est notre espoir de soulever le fait que la langue française et la souveraineté sont les enjeux de tous et pas du tout une vieille mouvance appartenant aux seuls Québécois dits « de souche ». Nous sommes immigrants comme indigènes, multilingues, cosmopolites, hétéroclites, sophistiqués, ouverts et nous avons hâte de promouvoir les deux idées qui nous tiennent tellement à coeur.
Ceci n'est qu'un début. Les prochaines étapes suivront (ex. édification d'un site spécifique, enregistrement du nom auprès des autorités, etc.). Il fallait qu'enfin j'accouche de cette petite bête. Pour l'instant je suis le seul membre, mais il s'en faut de peu que la liste d'abonnés s'allonge car je sais que les valeurs d'ALFI sont celles d'une multitude d'anglos et d'allos au Québec qui n'avaient pas le cran de l'exprimer en dehors de l'isoloir de scrutin, de peur d'être rejetés par leur communauté. J'espère même en convaincre d'autres qui sont indécis ou bien insatisfaits du statut quo.
À bientôt, j'espère !
Beaucoup d'entre nous serons issus de l'immigration et, grâce à cette grande chance, nous voyons notre terre d'accueil (le Québec) non juste pour ce qu'elle était autrefois ni pour ce qu'elle est aujourd'hui, mais pour ce qu'elle pourrait être : un eldorado pour ceux qui rêvent d'une vie meilleure en liberté et qui veulent le faire en français. D'ici 2025, notre planète comptera plus de 500 millions de francophones éparpillés sur 5 continents. Nous voulons que le Québec les fasse rêver comme il nous l'avons fait, qu'il soit leur Amérique comme il a été le nôtre.
Nous sommes un rassemblement républicain. Nous ne reprochons pas au Canada anglais sa monarchie qui est un symbole important de son histoire et de son identité. Toutefois, nous avons une vision plus noble et moins anachronique pour la population québécoise, à savoir celle d'une république fondée sur les principes des lumières et agissant au nom du peuple qu'elle incarne et non au nom d'une reine étrangère.
Nous ne sommes ni un parti politique, ni un organisme partisan. Nous ne sommes ni de droite ni de gauche. Ces débats se font ailleurs et nous nous concentrons sur les deux enjeux mentionnés dans notre intitulé. Il est notre espoir de soulever le fait que la langue française et la souveraineté sont les enjeux de tous et pas du tout une vieille mouvance appartenant aux seuls Québécois dits « de souche ». Nous sommes immigrants comme indigènes, multilingues, cosmopolites, hétéroclites, sophistiqués, ouverts et nous avons hâte de promouvoir les deux idées qui nous tiennent tellement à coeur.
Ceci n'est qu'un début. Les prochaines étapes suivront (ex. édification d'un site spécifique, enregistrement du nom auprès des autorités, etc.). Il fallait qu'enfin j'accouche de cette petite bête. Pour l'instant je suis le seul membre, mais il s'en faut de peu que la liste d'abonnés s'allonge car je sais que les valeurs d'ALFI sont celles d'une multitude d'anglos et d'allos au Québec qui n'avaient pas le cran de l'exprimer en dehors de l'isoloir de scrutin, de peur d'être rejetés par leur communauté. J'espère même en convaincre d'autres qui sont indécis ou bien insatisfaits du statut quo.
À bientôt, j'espère !
22 novembre 2011
The Death of Conversation
Knowitallism, clashing egos, hipsterish oneupmanship and merciless conformism have killed the art of interesting conversation.
This is more than a laundry list of incriminating observations; it's a list of painful confessions.
I've only been around for about a quarter century, so I can't say that good conversation ever really enjoyed widespread success. People have always generally been afraid to genuinely act and speak differently from the crowd, and it normally takes at least one or two unique characters in order to have a good conversation. Conformity may have been more pronounced in the past, such as in the era that witnessed McCarthyism, but the obsession with fitting in, somewhere, anywhere, has actually never known as many devout followers as today. In our current culture, it does a pretty remarkable job of disguising itself, but it's there more than ever.
Though I'm guilty of sometimes having participated in the hysteria, it has often astonished me, as it has many, the human capacity for imposing a norm in every aspect of life, in every epoch of our history, in every modality of our collective existence. The slightest treason to any of our innumerable protocols, no matter how insignificant the transgression may be, will inspire in many people mistrust, hate, disgust and judgement.
The quasi-totality of human beings live their lives and operate on a vast collection of prejudices which we apply and consider in order to make decisions about ourselves and others. We do this even while chanting the mantras of tolerance, free speech, social liberalism and decrying the ignorance of such unpardonable practices as racism, chauvinism, homophobia, censorship and so on. People, even those who vehemently deny it, do not hesitate to make sweeping judgements based on what actually amount to frivolities.
This tells us that people aren't actually as interested in each other as they pretend to be. When they ask you things, it's usually only in order to get enough basic information about you in order to make their final judgement about who you are, what you're about and in what slot they can fit you in their mental dichotomy of the human species. When they listen to you speak, they're really only listening selectively for that very purpose, while at the same time thinking of what they are going to say next to prove to you that they are at least worthy of your attention, if not downright better than you. All this despite the fact that in public, no one will ever dare admit that he looks more highly upon himself than upon most others. They'll even publicly joke about their most superficial and insignificant faults.
Self-deprecation has become so fashionable in the last few decades that almost anyone who declares hate for himself is telling the most obvious of lies. In reality, though everyone is aware they have weaknesses, they have a funny way of actually adoring themselves. People who have a true sense of auto-derision are few and far between, and even those who do are not totally deprived of an ego. As for those who truly hate themselves, they are genuinely miserable people and they do not talk about it so flippantly. You will only find out about the depths of their self-hatred in their suicide notes.
People often complain about how rare it is to have an 'intelligent conversation'. This complaint says a lot. First of all, it means that the person who utters the phrase, we'll call him the speaker, finds himself to be quite intelligent. Okay, that's forgiveable. To vulgarly paraphrase Descartes, even the bitchiest people never whine about not having enough intelligence; it's the best-shared resource on earth. But this frequent complaint also presupposes that, besides the speaker, it takes at least one other clever individual in order for our famous 'intelligent conversation' to take place. This is where the problems really begin, because it is not enough that the speaker's ever-so-coveted interlocutor be objectively intelligent. No. He has to be intelligent according to the speaker. In this sense, "an intelligent person" is often simply a euphemism for "someone who thinks as I do".
Another problem peaks its head out when you realise that objectively intelligent people most commonly have quite large egos. When these egos meet in conversation, the competition can be ferocious. Pride and vanity have broken up years' long friendships and have even estranged families throughout human history, so you can imagine what these to elements can do among mere acquaintances in simple social situations or among fair-weather friends (the most common kind).
The result is that, despite the fact that everyone is ostensibly starved for intelligent conversation, this prayer for conversational enlightenment is rarely answered. Everyone is already convinced they know basically everything they need to know and that, on the off chance they might be unable to offer their schoolish point of view on a given subject during a predictable conversation at a soirée, they can quickly remedy the situation with a furtive Wikipedia search on their iPhone as they step into the kitchen to pour themselves another glass of merlot. Once a consensus is apparently reached in a group conversation, almost no one has the balls to contradict the crowd. To do so and be silenced by the group is to be shamed. To do so and prove the group wrong is to divorce from them forever, and everybody needs friends even if they are only fair-weather. Disagreement is reserved for when it can be expressed sanctimoniously among a majority of the like-minded.
Why such an obsession with being correct? Because one must be at least as educated, worldly, epicurean, cosmopolitan and, most importantly, authentic as his interlocutor and, if possible, even more so. That is the new mark of social status. It used to be money, which despite its imperfect and undemocratic nature, was at least an objective criteria. Now, though wealth and good looks are still obvious advantages, it's mostly one's projected image of renaissance personhood that will determine how far he or she can climb up the social ladder. Them's the rules.
And so we are all doomed to a life of mostly mediocre conversations, whether it's because they are actually objectively mediocre despite our enjoyment of them or lack thereof, or whether we only think they're mediocre because we don't agree with our interlocutors or because we are engaging in that zero-sum game of hipsterish oneupmanship. It has been said that it is never too late to turn your back on your prejudices, but when no one can see or will admit that they have any, that isn't a very practicable aphorism.
Allow me to reiterate what I said at the beginning of this article: this is as much a list of confessions as of accusations. It is aimed at no one in particular and it is simply the product of my own free time and delirium.
This is more than a laundry list of incriminating observations; it's a list of painful confessions.
I've only been around for about a quarter century, so I can't say that good conversation ever really enjoyed widespread success. People have always generally been afraid to genuinely act and speak differently from the crowd, and it normally takes at least one or two unique characters in order to have a good conversation. Conformity may have been more pronounced in the past, such as in the era that witnessed McCarthyism, but the obsession with fitting in, somewhere, anywhere, has actually never known as many devout followers as today. In our current culture, it does a pretty remarkable job of disguising itself, but it's there more than ever.
Though I'm guilty of sometimes having participated in the hysteria, it has often astonished me, as it has many, the human capacity for imposing a norm in every aspect of life, in every epoch of our history, in every modality of our collective existence. The slightest treason to any of our innumerable protocols, no matter how insignificant the transgression may be, will inspire in many people mistrust, hate, disgust and judgement.
The quasi-totality of human beings live their lives and operate on a vast collection of prejudices which we apply and consider in order to make decisions about ourselves and others. We do this even while chanting the mantras of tolerance, free speech, social liberalism and decrying the ignorance of such unpardonable practices as racism, chauvinism, homophobia, censorship and so on. People, even those who vehemently deny it, do not hesitate to make sweeping judgements based on what actually amount to frivolities.
This tells us that people aren't actually as interested in each other as they pretend to be. When they ask you things, it's usually only in order to get enough basic information about you in order to make their final judgement about who you are, what you're about and in what slot they can fit you in their mental dichotomy of the human species. When they listen to you speak, they're really only listening selectively for that very purpose, while at the same time thinking of what they are going to say next to prove to you that they are at least worthy of your attention, if not downright better than you. All this despite the fact that in public, no one will ever dare admit that he looks more highly upon himself than upon most others. They'll even publicly joke about their most superficial and insignificant faults.
Self-deprecation has become so fashionable in the last few decades that almost anyone who declares hate for himself is telling the most obvious of lies. In reality, though everyone is aware they have weaknesses, they have a funny way of actually adoring themselves. People who have a true sense of auto-derision are few and far between, and even those who do are not totally deprived of an ego. As for those who truly hate themselves, they are genuinely miserable people and they do not talk about it so flippantly. You will only find out about the depths of their self-hatred in their suicide notes.
People often complain about how rare it is to have an 'intelligent conversation'. This complaint says a lot. First of all, it means that the person who utters the phrase, we'll call him the speaker, finds himself to be quite intelligent. Okay, that's forgiveable. To vulgarly paraphrase Descartes, even the bitchiest people never whine about not having enough intelligence; it's the best-shared resource on earth. But this frequent complaint also presupposes that, besides the speaker, it takes at least one other clever individual in order for our famous 'intelligent conversation' to take place. This is where the problems really begin, because it is not enough that the speaker's ever-so-coveted interlocutor be objectively intelligent. No. He has to be intelligent according to the speaker. In this sense, "an intelligent person" is often simply a euphemism for "someone who thinks as I do".
Another problem peaks its head out when you realise that objectively intelligent people most commonly have quite large egos. When these egos meet in conversation, the competition can be ferocious. Pride and vanity have broken up years' long friendships and have even estranged families throughout human history, so you can imagine what these to elements can do among mere acquaintances in simple social situations or among fair-weather friends (the most common kind).The result is that, despite the fact that everyone is ostensibly starved for intelligent conversation, this prayer for conversational enlightenment is rarely answered. Everyone is already convinced they know basically everything they need to know and that, on the off chance they might be unable to offer their schoolish point of view on a given subject during a predictable conversation at a soirée, they can quickly remedy the situation with a furtive Wikipedia search on their iPhone as they step into the kitchen to pour themselves another glass of merlot. Once a consensus is apparently reached in a group conversation, almost no one has the balls to contradict the crowd. To do so and be silenced by the group is to be shamed. To do so and prove the group wrong is to divorce from them forever, and everybody needs friends even if they are only fair-weather. Disagreement is reserved for when it can be expressed sanctimoniously among a majority of the like-minded.
Why such an obsession with being correct? Because one must be at least as educated, worldly, epicurean, cosmopolitan and, most importantly, authentic as his interlocutor and, if possible, even more so. That is the new mark of social status. It used to be money, which despite its imperfect and undemocratic nature, was at least an objective criteria. Now, though wealth and good looks are still obvious advantages, it's mostly one's projected image of renaissance personhood that will determine how far he or she can climb up the social ladder. Them's the rules.
And so we are all doomed to a life of mostly mediocre conversations, whether it's because they are actually objectively mediocre despite our enjoyment of them or lack thereof, or whether we only think they're mediocre because we don't agree with our interlocutors or because we are engaging in that zero-sum game of hipsterish oneupmanship. It has been said that it is never too late to turn your back on your prejudices, but when no one can see or will admit that they have any, that isn't a very practicable aphorism.
Allow me to reiterate what I said at the beginning of this article: this is as much a list of confessions as of accusations. It is aimed at no one in particular and it is simply the product of my own free time and delirium.
3 novembre 2011
Quand il faut prier l'État québécois de parler français....
Prenons l'exemple de la RAMQ qui, en dépit du fait que je lui ai signalé mon retour au Québec par téléphone, en français, auprès d'un agent francophone, m'envoie sans cesse des documents en anglais. Je n'ai jamais demandé qu'on communique avec moi dans une langue autre que le français, mais on voit mon nom très anglo-celtique et on se permet de prendre cette décision à ma place.
La semaine dernière, j'ai eu une expérience sublime au bureau local de la SAAQ (à Sherbrooke, même pas à Montréal). J'y vais pour mon rendez-vous d'échange de permis et je m'adresse à la première employée que je vois pour lui signaler que j'ai rendez-vous à telle heure pour effectuer tel échange. Il est utile de préciser que, même si je suis Texan, j'ai un accent très français et je me fais prendre pour un français par tout le monde, partout. La première question que me pose la dame est de savoir si je suis citoyen canadien, tout en s'attendant à une réponse négative du genre « non, madame, citoyen français ». Or, lorsque je lui réponds affirmativement, elle est surprise et elle prend bien soin de répéter, plus fort cette fois-ci, « citoyen CANADIEN ? ». Je réitère ma réponse positive. Finalement elle me demande de m'asseoir en attendant qu'on m'appelle au guichet.
Une dizaine de minutes plus tard, on m'appelle. J'arrive au guichet derrière lequel se trouve une jeune femme qui m'adresse illico la parole en anglais. « So, it's for a licence exchange from Ontario ? » Surpris, je m'obstine à répondre en français en disant « C'est ça, oui. Vous parlez français ? » La discussion commence alors à se faire en français.
Au bout d'un moment, par contre, elle s'absente pour quelques instants afin de vérifier une affaire auprès de sa chef d'équipe et, à son retour, elle recommence à m'expliquer la situation en anglais. Je lui fais signe, histoire de lui rappeler ma préférence linguistique, et elle s'excuse sottement comme quoi « excuse-moi, j'ai tellement l'habitude de parler anglais... ».
C'était de la pure frime ! Elle se la racontait à fond ; elle avait tellement envie de me montrer qu'elle pouvait parler anglais. Qu'attendait-elle de moi comme réaction... ? « Ah bon, tu parles anglais ? Super ! Mais comment tu fais pour être aussi balèze ? » Comme si j'allais être impressionné que quelqu'un puisse parler anglais en 2011...
Où en est-on rendus quand c'est un type du Texas qui doit rappeler aux fonctionnaires québécois, et ce plusieurs fois, que la langue commune au Québec est le français ? Je pourrais comprendre si j'avais été incapable de parler français qu'on me dépanne en recourant à l'anglais, mais ce n'était pas du tout le cas. On me poussait carrément à employer l'anglais dans ma communication avec l'État. Incroyable ! Du foutage de gueule !
Je n'ai rien contre la dame, qui était très gentille d'ailleurs, mais si elle veut pratiquer son anglais, qu'elle s'abonne à un groupe de conversation ou passe un week-end au Vermont (qui est, en passant, à moins d'une heure de route d'ici).
Il y en a qui me trouvent plus royaliste que le roi quant à la question du français en tant que langue commune des diverses communautés culturelles au Québec. Ces détracteurs, je les emmerde car ils ne savent pas ce que c'est que d'immigrer dans un pays dans le but précis de pouvoir vivre et parler telle langue, seulement pour se ramasser entouré de gens qui cherchent à te faire des accommodements dont tu ne veux rien savoir. Si j'ai un avantage certain là-dedans, c'est que normalement mon français est nettement supéreieure à l'anglais de mon interlocuteur, donc la paresse de ce dernier m'aide finalement à gagner la mini-lutte linguistique.
Dans la vie de tous les jours, auprès de monsieur et madame Tout-le-monde, je m'attends à buter contre certains inconvénients en matière linguistique. Ça ne me dérange pas trop, mais ce serait quand même pratique que l'État québécois au moins me parle en français.
31 août 2011
The Gazette : Here we go again...
I seriously should not be writing this, but god damn is it just about time I contributed to this blog again. It's not that I'm lazy, it's just that I've been waiting for the right moment. That moment has come.
I've decided to neglect my reading assignments to quickly point out some more bullshit in the Anglo-Canadian press.
The subject, as usual, is Quebec. More specifically, it's the Parti québécois and it's leader Pauline Marois' decision to hold a meeting on the general condition of the soveregnty movement. Our friends at the Montreal Gazette have jumped at the opportunity to once again share their anti-sovereignist bias.
In a tragic attempt at erudition and to live up to the cosmopolitan, bilingual image that (mostly Francophone and Allophone) Montrealers have earned for the city, the anonymous online editorial writer for the city's flagship Anglo paper has proven that he or she, despite ostensible efforts to the contrary, doesn't really know shit when it comes to French language and culture.
The point of contention rests on the author's (mis)understanding of the French term 'états généraux'. A quick Wikipedia search on the subject, which is obviously the only attempt at research the nameless author made when he or she saw the term and didn't know what it meant, will give you the history of certain famous états généraux. Specifically, Wiki will speak to you of the French revolution and the Ancien Régime, during which famous états généraux were held to discuss matters of national importance.
The author's understanding and familiarity with the term basically ends there, which leads him or her to erroneously conclude the following: The PQ must be pathetically attempting to draw parallels between the French Revolution and its own political cause.
WRONG !
The term 'états généraux' is used quite frequently in the French-speaking world to refer basically to any large assembly or meeting called to discuss the current general condition of a particular domain, be it in art, literature, politics, social issues, etc. The topic of the meeting really isn't important at all. Hence, there has been and continues to be a countless number of 'états généraux' meetings on a myriad of subjects. To name a few that I can remember off the top of my head :
Les états généraux du cinéma
Les états généraux de l'alphabétisation des enfants
Les états généraux du Canada français
Les états généraux de la bioéthique
Les états généraux de l'éducation
So the implication in this Gazette article that the PQ has some sort of pretentious revolutionary complex in calling such a meeting is preposterous to say the least.
To say more, this is just another example of the ridiculous situation of the Anglo community of Montréal. The Gazette and other Anglo media make them out to be some sort of oppressed minority when in fact, despite swearing up and down that they can speak French and that the good old days are long gone, they continue to display a shocking lack of knowledge about the French language and culture inside and outside of Québec and all while living in the second most important Francophone city in the world.
In my estimation, these people should normally be completely and utterly fluent, even natively so, in the French language and well versed in the culture before they reach an age high enough to be writing editorials for a major newspaper. This should be the prime concern of the English public schools paid for by the Quebec government. I hear and read bitchy, whiny rants about how all the Anglo youth are leaving the Province for the West or for the States, yet how can you expect them to stay here when they never bothered to learn the language well enough to succeed?
Those who are up to the challenge and do master the language and stay end up being among the happiest Anglos anywhere in the world, in my experience.
Anyways, point is, fuck the Gazette. It's a rag. I'm going back to my case outlines.
Peace.
The subject, as usual, is Quebec. More specifically, it's the Parti québécois and it's leader Pauline Marois' decision to hold a meeting on the general condition of the soveregnty movement. Our friends at the Montreal Gazette have jumped at the opportunity to once again share their anti-sovereignist bias.
In a tragic attempt at erudition and to live up to the cosmopolitan, bilingual image that (mostly Francophone and Allophone) Montrealers have earned for the city, the anonymous online editorial writer for the city's flagship Anglo paper has proven that he or she, despite ostensible efforts to the contrary, doesn't really know shit when it comes to French language and culture.
The point of contention rests on the author's (mis)understanding of the French term 'états généraux'. A quick Wikipedia search on the subject, which is obviously the only attempt at research the nameless author made when he or she saw the term and didn't know what it meant, will give you the history of certain famous états généraux. Specifically, Wiki will speak to you of the French revolution and the Ancien Régime, during which famous états généraux were held to discuss matters of national importance.
The author's understanding and familiarity with the term basically ends there, which leads him or her to erroneously conclude the following: The PQ must be pathetically attempting to draw parallels between the French Revolution and its own political cause.
WRONG !
The term 'états généraux' is used quite frequently in the French-speaking world to refer basically to any large assembly or meeting called to discuss the current general condition of a particular domain, be it in art, literature, politics, social issues, etc. The topic of the meeting really isn't important at all. Hence, there has been and continues to be a countless number of 'états généraux' meetings on a myriad of subjects. To name a few that I can remember off the top of my head :
Les états généraux du cinéma
Les états généraux de l'alphabétisation des enfants
Les états généraux du Canada français
Les états généraux de la bioéthique
Les états généraux de l'éducation
So the implication in this Gazette article that the PQ has some sort of pretentious revolutionary complex in calling such a meeting is preposterous to say the least.
To say more, this is just another example of the ridiculous situation of the Anglo community of Montréal. The Gazette and other Anglo media make them out to be some sort of oppressed minority when in fact, despite swearing up and down that they can speak French and that the good old days are long gone, they continue to display a shocking lack of knowledge about the French language and culture inside and outside of Québec and all while living in the second most important Francophone city in the world.
In my estimation, these people should normally be completely and utterly fluent, even natively so, in the French language and well versed in the culture before they reach an age high enough to be writing editorials for a major newspaper. This should be the prime concern of the English public schools paid for by the Quebec government. I hear and read bitchy, whiny rants about how all the Anglo youth are leaving the Province for the West or for the States, yet how can you expect them to stay here when they never bothered to learn the language well enough to succeed?
Those who are up to the challenge and do master the language and stay end up being among the happiest Anglos anywhere in the world, in my experience.
Anyways, point is, fuck the Gazette. It's a rag. I'm going back to my case outlines.
Peace.
16 mars 2011
La St-Patrick : Boule de cristal pour les Québécois ?
Anglophone au nom de famille gaélique, j’ai toujours eu l’habitude de fêter haut et fort la St-Patrick. Je n’ai jamais manqué de porter le vert ; j’adorais et adore toujours la musique celtique traditionnelle ; je peux même tenir une conversation en irlandais, même si elle ne sera que brève et simple (difficile de pratiquer une langue quasi morte dont tous les locuteurs sont parfaitement bilingues, si vous voyez où je veux en venir). L’un des grands films de ma jeunesse était « War of the Buttons », un remake irlandais du film français « La Guerre des boutons ». La télé irlandaise a aussi marqué ma vie, que ce soit la grande classique anglophone « Father Ted » ou des séries produites par TG4, seule chaîne de télé irlandophone au monde, comme « No Béarla », « Teenage Cics » et « Aifric ».
Je me demande combien parmi les millions de soûlards dont fourmilleront les grandes rues des villes anglophones à travers le monde demain se seront intéressés à plus que la simple bière verte et le leipreachán, ou pire encore les horreurs américaines que sont les Flogging Molly et le film culte (de merde) « Boondock Saints ». C’est ce qu’il y a de mieux dans la culture dite irlandaise pour ces picoleurs ballots. C’est le produit d’une folklorisation d’une culture pourtant disparue ou presque.
Sur les quelque 40 millions de personnes au monde qui revendiquent une ascendance ethnique irlandaise, un peu plus de 4 millions sont encore citoyens irlandais, dont seulement 60 000 parlent couramment et quotidiennement la langue irlandaise. Le reste sont plus ou moins 100 % anglicisés. C’est exactement ce que risquent les Québécois, qui n’ont connu qu’un succès mitigé à préserver leur langue et culture. Je dis « mitigé » parce qu’on oublie trop souvent tous ceux qui auraient pu être québécois ou au moins francophones mais qui ont été anglicisés après une émigration souvent forcée ou presque.
Sur peut-être 20 millions de personnes au monde d’ascendance québécoise, seulement 8 millions parlent encore le français, dont 7 millions vivant encore sur le territoire québécois. La St-Jean-Baptiste ne jouit pas du même engouement que la St-Patrick, mais il est facile d’imaginer l’identité québécoise réduite à une bande d’ivrognes hurlant quelques slogans typiquement québécois flanqués de leur anglais populaire (ex. TABARNAK, man, fuck yeah !!!, ou VIVE LE QUÉBEC LIBRE, MOTHERFUCKER…. WHOOOOOO !!!) juste avant de s’envoyer un gros verre de bière bleutée. Tout le monde habillé en bleu et blanc, parlant anglais, arborant la ceinture fléchée et le lendemain, business as usual. La littérature, les beaux arts, la musique, le cinéma et surtout la langue des Québécois seront totalement étrangers à ces gens-là, comme leurs équivalents irlandais le sont aujourd’hui à l’hyper-majorité des fêtards de la St-Patrick.
Ça c’est le grand avenir américain de la nation québécoise une fois que le français devient facultatif au Québec, puis minoritaire, puis moribond. Les Québécois se battent d’arrache-pied mais en vain pour assurer la pérennité du français dans la très anormale situation où ils se trouvent actuellement. Au lieu de vivre tout naturellement en français dans un pays francophone, ils s’épuisent dans cette tâche de Sisyphe que de lutter tous les jours pour rester francophone dans un pays anglophone. Pourquoi ?
Il n’y a que les chefs politiques et les aveugles naïfs qui croient que le Québec saura franciser les dizaines de milliers d’immigrants non francophones qui arriveront dans ce pays anglophone les prochaines années, alors qu’on n’arrive même pas à le faire actuellement. Je rencontre tous les jours des gens de Montréal, issus de familles immigrées, qui ont fait l’école en français conformément à la loi 101, mais qui parlent un français de merde et qui préfèrent travailler et vivre en anglais. C’est leur choix dans ce pays bilingue, alors c’est difficile de leur jeter la faute. C’est le choix évident pour l’immigrant que d’adopter l’anglais. Pourquoi parlerait-il une langue de ploucs comme le français ? Car c’est ça que redevient le français, tranquillement mais inévitablement puisqu’on a refusé de prendre les mesures qu’il faut pour contrer la tendance. Il n’y a qu’un seul geste sans équivoque pour que le français devienne d’un coup sec la vraie langue nationale qui s’impose d’office (et non par l’Office). Vous savez de quoi je parle.
Alors si vous sortez le soir du 17, souvenez-vous d’une chose : si vous ne faites pas gaffe, c’est ce que deviendra un jour le 24 juin. Qu’un paquet de soûlards qui n’ont plus aucune appartenance réelle à la culture fêtée, juste un nom, un T-shirt, un sacre, etc. Du folklore, quoi.
Je vous laisse alors avec une très jolie chanson irlandaise, « An Spealadóir », chantée en irlandais par Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh. Dommage qu’une si belle chanson soit confinée à une salle quasi vide. L’avenir de la chanson québécoise ? On verra.
1 mars 2011
More bullshit from the Canadian media's anti-Quebec free-for-all...
I don't want the blog to be necessarily about this, but it's just so damn easy. Why is it that one does not even have to make a concerted effort to find such gratuitous manipulation and distortion in the Anglo media when it comes to Quebec (its favourite subject, second only to it's other obsession: the US)?
Here's the latest piece of shit from the National Post (which is otherwise usually at least an interesting national media outlet, if only for its admitted conservative bias). It starts out making a legitimate point about the public finances in Quebec, asking why the province denies over-stretched Crown prosecutors a well-deserved raise to make their salary competitive with the salaries in other provvinces and at the federal level, while at the same time earmarking $200 million for the construction of the new Quebec City amphitheatre.
But of course, as with many an article on Quebec affairs, the legitimate melds almost seamlessly into a series of poorly researched value judgements and armchair gripes about those damn Frenchies. Ladies and gentlement of the jury, I present you...
Exhibit A
'Quebec only gets by thanks to the $8 billion to $10 billion it receives in equalization payments annually. This sum the province puts towards lavish social programs, such as cheap university and college tuition and inexpensive day care. Left to its own resources, Quebec could not afford these benefits.'
OK. So you think Quebec gets too much equalisation money and that its welfare state would be untenable in an independence situation. Fair enough, but at least be honest about your figures. The numbers mentioned above do not take into account all the money Quebec taxpayers send to Ottawa every year. The author makes it sound like Quebec gets a cool 10 billion every year, no questions asked, which would be an outrage if only it were true.
The whole truth is that after the provinces contributions are taken into account, Quebec doesn't net even half that figure. For example, in 2007, Quebec's net equalisation benefits totalled $627 per inhabitant, or about $4.38 billion. Not ideal, by any means, but Manitoba, Saskatchewan, PEI, N.B., N.S. and the Newfs all received drastically more money per capita than Quebec in that same year, and that is actually consistent. Yet we don't ever see articles about how the Maritimes and Prairies need to get their shit together, do we? In the same year, 2007, Nova Scotia for example, with less than a million inhabitants, got over $5.6 billion in equalisation! Quebec got over a billion less and it has 7 times the population! Has anyone ever seen an outrageously critical article about Nova fucking Scotia? Never!
Exhibit B
'With plentiful natural resources and lots of cheap electricity, Quebec should have one of the strongest economies on the continent. Yet because of its high personal and corporate taxes, intrusive regulations and strict, complex labour codes – which favour unions and local workers – the province is a needlessly difficult place to do business.'
OK for the high personal taxes, I agree. The corporate taxes are among the lowest in North America (lower than Ontario's). This is where I have the impression that this fucking moron is just writing whatever the hell he feels like without even the most minimal research. And the regulations aren't really any more 'intrusive' than in the rest of the country, but whatever.
As flagrantly wrong as all that is, I can still sort of stomach that, as they are at least would-be semi-legitimate critiques that travel in the same general order of ideas, being that Quebec should adopt more classically liberal economic policies to improve its overall competitiveness in the free market. Note taken.
But the very next sentence has absolutely nothing to do with economic policy whatsoever and has little or nothing to do with Quebec's economic performance; however, by neglecting to mention that, the author clearly wants the reader to make that intellectual leap of faith he himself has errantly made. Observe...
'Quebec’s restrictive language laws require business be done in French and make it difficult for English-speakers moving to the province to educate their children in any language other than French.'
So, here we are supposed to assume, as the author does, that a requirement to conduct internal business in the official language is somehow helping to impoverish Quebec. Same for the fact that it can be difficult for English-speaking newcomers to send their kids to school in English. So, let me get this straight: In order for a territory to perform well economically, its government must pay for English-speaking foreigners' children to be educated in English? Big shot American businessmen don't do business in countries whose governments won't school their kids in English? Well, I guess that wipes out just about every non-anglo country on Earth then, doesn't it?
I guess I can see some businessman saying something like: Sorry, Germany. As an English-speaking investor, I'm unwilling to benefit from your workforce's impressive expertise and your sizeable market because I'm just not cool with the fact that you won't pay for my kid to go to an English school while I'm living there. Yeah, that makes total sense.
The author continues: 'Language police, of course, monitor the prominence of French on signs and packaging.' By 'language police', he is of course talking about roughly 5 civil servants who are paid to investigate citizen-lodged complaints pertaining to infractions of the Charte de la langue française, almost all of which are rectified gladly without issue. Wow, what a totalitarian commie hell-hole!
Do you see what I'm talking about here? The ridiculous hyperbole employed when discussing Quebec in almost any capacity has never been more bogus than it is these days in the pathetically predictable Canadian editorial press. A shrewdly dishonest media informing a grossly under-informed public about a subject they both already love to hate.
Too bad the Post isn't printed on softer paper. Then it would at least be useful for something.
I'll end the article with something you'll never find in a National Post editorial blogpost: sources!
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