Last month, the thoroughly stupid Anglo-bashing book "ANGLAID" by Michel Brulé, made its appearance in bookstores across the province. The book makes some pretty dumb claims about the English language including the assertion that the language itself, is racist and ugly. I would have ignored the book, but for the fact that several nationalist organizations have begun promoting the book as a valid intellectual exercise.There's nothing in the book remotely interesting or intellectually stimulating. It's mean and nasty tenor speaks more to Mr. Brulé obvious inferiority complex, than to any inference upon the English language.
About the only thing I agree with Mr. Brulé is that French is a beautiful language, which I heartily admit.
It is without a doubt a pleasure to be able to listen the fluid, rich, rhythmic and lyrical language that is French.
It's too bad that Mr. Brulé doesn't speak French.
No, what Mr. Brulé actually speaks is 'Quebecoise', a bastardized version of the language of Moliere, more closely related the incomprehensible crap that is spoken in Haiti, than what is spoken in France.
Listening to Quebecoise is as painful as is listening to the 'Ebonics' of the American black ghetto. Both groups make the argument that their version of their mother language is meritorious and rich, but nobody in France or in America would agree with that nonsense.
Both represent a dumbing down of a language which they clearly are unable to master properly. French is a difficult language to master and with a high school dropout rate of over thirty percent in Quebec, it's no wonder that the language has degenerated, exactly as has English, in the poor black ghettos of the United States.
While the French (in France) can still understand what Quebeckers say, they don't particularly like what they hear. Quebeckers who visit France are well-attuned to the snickers their language receives when they open their mouths.
If you think there are language purists here in Quebec, try visiting France and speaking Quebecoise.
In fact Quebec movies that do make over to France are usually dubbed into 'Parisian French' and if that isn't the ultimate insult, I don't know what is.
One of the problems of keeping French alive and relevant is the fact that there are so few nations still speaking it. The world-wide 'Francophonie' (as the brotherhood of French nations is known) is made up of just a few civilized countries that include France, part of Belgium (where 40% of the people speak French), part of Switzerland (where 20% of the people speak French) and part of Canada (where 22% of the people speak French). The rest of the membership is made up largely by a motley assortment of banana republics in Africa. The days when French was a common second language or used in trade and diplomacy are long gone. With just over 120 million speakers (less than speakers of Malay-Indonesian), French no longer has the critical mass to maintain itself as an international language and to maintain a world-wide culture. It is predicted that Quebecoise and French will be unrecognizable to each other within twenty-five years.
French is bad because ... Blah...blah... blah
Had enough?
I could go on and on and I could even write a book like Michel Brulé , only this one, bashing the French language instead of English.
But to what end?
If you are a francophone and still reading this post, let me apologize. I'm sure you didn't enjoy what you just read.
The purpose of the above rant was not to denigrate or humiliate your language, but to make the point that in life there is an argument to made for anything, that's why we have so many lawyers.
Writing a book insulting someone else's language is about as wise as telling your mother-in-law that she is ugly.
Why? Why? Why?
ANGLAID is such a book, stupid and cruel in every respect.
It is written expressly for French language racists, nobody other than a fanatic would bother reading such drivel.
