Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Just got back from 4 days in Kitchener and i'd say your assertions are right on the money.
Speaking with a few dozen Anglo friends and family all formerly from the Montreal area they really didnt give much thought to Quebec anymore as that aspect of their lives is over, however with me bringing up the subject they all expressed the same sentiment of thinking leaving Quebec was one of their better moves in life and no one is thinking of returning.
I havent talked to many of these people since the last referendum when most were up in arms at the prospect of Quebec separation,time has definitely changed their attitude as now when asked about Quebec and the possibility of separation their general response was = are those A..holes (Their term not mine)still going on about their stupid separation bs? why dont they hurry up about it and leave our country as they just dont really contribute anything except a never ending whining and griping welfare state..
While there i never heard any one speaking French but bilingual signs were everywhere.Even had a few French radio and tv stations.
I'm thinking Kitchener/Waterloo area is my default move to location after Quebec separates/gets booted out/ or i can rid myself of the entrenchments holding me in Quebec..
I live in KW, it's a pretty nice town. And yes there is bilingual stuff scattered here and there, especially on the buses which I find ridiculous since they're locally run (Grand River Transit); where else did you notice bilingual signage?
Hey AJ the powers of government never know when you might decide to make a surprise visit to the area and get all upset if everything isnt presented to you if not entirely in French then at least bi-lingually.
And yes it was on the buses and the train station and all products in the supermarkets had bilingual labeling.Great Octoberfest by the way, the free Breakfast on Saturday was great, wish i could have stayed for the parade but had to do the drive back to ....
Jambo: Those very people you were interacting with are the very anathema to the sovereignists. They don't realize that for every one of them they chase out of Quebec they have skewed the apathy level of the ROC one notch lower.
Very strange politics indeed when one considers they hate us but RELY upon those characteristics displayed by us that put us on the moral "higher plane".
They rely upon our Tolerance:
We tolerate the oxymoronic conundrum of our country willing to give a seat at the table of Confederation to a member who decries and vilifies the very existence of that Confederation.
We continually tolerate renewed treasonous activism from those who outrightly state their avowed ambition is to destroy the fabric of the country they've prospered in.
We tolerate the silliness of their purported special relationship with the "home" country who basically abandoned them to their fate centuries ago and for which they couldn't be bothered volunteering (not our war) to fight on behalf of during WWII. This grotesque facade of special familial relationship was most aptly displayed when that chicken-sh*t, run-and-hide-behind-the-allies De-Gualle arrives on our doorstep to bellow his stupid "Vive Quebec Libre" praise from a balcony.
We tolerate the unfairness and intrusion into our everyday lives of dual signage costs and labeling.
We tolerate things like Bombardier getting our tax money in the form of grants to further it's business interests abroad.
We tolerate a Federal system that continually attempts to appease them by awarding gov't contracts to Quebec based entities even though their bids are higher and are costing us more as taxpayers to perform this continuous "appeasement".
We tolerate them behaving in a racist fashion towards the English communities within their jurisdictions while this behaviour by the ROC towards them anywhere else would be immediately spotlighted.
We tolerate the fact that in spite of all this tolerance shown to them they remain not in the least appreciative but consider all of this their due.
We tolerate these things out of a form of Respect, reluctantly perhaps, but nevertheless, respect.
Just as we respect all provinces to have certain rights and privileges we respect the right of Quebec to determine some form of political direction in all things from education to gov't Pension.
We respect their provincial boundaries and the various rules of interaction as applicable to other provincial citizens, regardless if they may seem one sided or not. We nevertheless respect their right to enact them.
We respect their right to use their language to the point we allow them to force compliance on the rest of us in the form of "official languages" wording in Federal Legislation.
All of the above has garnered us naught in the eyes of Sovereinists and instead simply caused or at least resulted in a further ratcheting upward of the rhetoric issuing forth from their churlish throats.
Each and every one of you they successfully drive out will not be a willing participant to these "tolerance" or "respect' camps but rather an outspoken critic of these approaches to undertanding and further mollifying the separatists.
All of this I fear will end badly for them but also, have never been more ambivilant to that unhappy ending. Let's just get it over with.
All of this I fear will end badly for them but also, have never been more ambivilant to that unhappy ending. Let's just get it over with.
Nice post Bru My sentiments exactly..
I guess for them the old adage of be careful what you wish for eh! ya just might get it applies .
Getting it over with unfortunately is in the hands of the Quebecers themselves and how soon they can achieve a successful referendum on sovereignty and fulfill their dreams of leaving Canada ,cant come too soon as far as i'm concerned,they are lucky i dont control the power or there'd be a Canada wide referendum on whether to keep them within the Canadian collective as i really dont see the point of their continued status as part of Canada, they dont like the English,they dont like Canada,They are doing everything the can to ensure linguistic purity,they want their own little linguistic utopia where only French is spoken, solution is crystal clear to me = Quebec=
Just got back from 4 days in Kitchener and i'd say your assertions are right on the money.
Speaking with a few dozen Anglo friends and family all formerly from the Montreal area they really didnt give much thought to Quebec anymore as that aspect of their lives is over, however with me bringing up the subject they all expressed the same sentiment of thinking leaving Quebec was one of their better moves in life and no one is thinking of returning.
I havent talked to many of these people since the last referendum when most were up in arms at the prospect of Quebec separation,time has definitely changed their attitude as now when asked about Quebec and the possibility of separation their general response was = are those A..holes (Their term not mine)still going on about their stupid separation bs? why dont they hurry up about it and leave our country as they just dont really contribute anything except a never ending whining and griping welfare state..
While there i never heard any one speaking French but bilingual signs were everywhere.Even had a few French radio and tv stations.
I'm thinking Kitchener/Waterloo area is my default move to location after Quebec separates/gets booted out/ or i can rid myself of the entrenchments holding me in Quebec..
You don't hear french to much in the ROC: that's normal. Huge efforts have been made to eradicate french over the years. Some examples:
1864, Nova Scotia, education act
1871, New Brunswick, Common school act
1873, Price Edouard Island, Official language act
1912, Ontario, Règlement 17
1890 , Manitoba, official language act
1909, Saskatchewan, School act
1905, Alberta , School act
1892, North West T., Loi sur les territoires du Nord Ouest etc etc etc...
Canadians are soooo open, and generous, as long it's in english. How many french universities do you have in Ontario ? In the ROC ? How many french hospitals ?
Some interesting stats jack but they are mostly from the 1800's, surely we arent going to rationalize that because there were some injustices to the Francophones 200 years ago then its ok to perpetrate injustices on todays civilians who played no part in prior contentious issues, with your logic all the black people would be within their rights to enslave all white folks and force them out in the fields to pick cotton.
I'm sure any rational Canadian would agree that some injustices were done to the French in the past but its 2012,its over, you dont now need to do the same injustices on the non Francophone residents of Quebec just to prove a point or get some form of revenge...or maybe you do. thought we might have raised the bar in 200 years.
You don't hear French to much in the ROC: that's normal. Huge efforts have been made to eradicate French over the years. Some examples:
1864, Nova Scotia, education act
1871, New Brunswick, Common school act
1873, Price Edouard Island, Official language act
1912, Ontario, Règlement 17
1890 , Manitoba, official language act
1909, Saskatchewan, School act
1905, Alberta , School act
1892, North West T., Loi sur les territoires du Nord Ouest etc etc etc...
Canadians are soooo open, and generous, as long it's in English. How many French universities do you have in Ontario ? In the ROC ? How many French hospitals ?
How many French only universities and hosptials do you think we should fund in the ROC?
Were those acts efforts to eradicate, as you surmise, or clarify responsibilities of the various provinces as applicable to languages? How many were simply responding to syllabus formatting demands from their constituents? How many were demanding French be included as compared to today's requests for English in Quebec?
Now; if generosity is the haulmark of a caring society; how's Quebec measuring up for ya?
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
My sentiments exactly..
.
solution is crystal clear to me = Quebec=
