Cultural Genocide..... Where?

In a pamphlet entitled "Le génocide culturel des francophones au Canada" the author argues that Canada has undertaken a program of 'cultural genocide' against Quebec Francophones.

"The figures speak for themselves: Since 1867, Francophones in Canada have suffered a decline that will ultimately lead to their disappearance. In Quebec, the future of the French is threatened."

(Les chiffres parlent d’eux-mêmes : les francophones au Canada subissent depuis 1867 un déclin qui les mènera à terme à la disparition. Au Québec même, l’avenir du français est menacé.

The author uses a table to show that French, as a mother tongue has declined in Canada from from 29% in 1861 to 22% today.

When I saw the reference and read the arguments made to describe Francophone Quebeckers as the subject of cultural genocide, I decided to use the same test and applied the same criteria to the Anglophone minority in Quebec.

Let's re-phrase the statement and exchange the word 'Francophones' to the word 'Anglophone Quebeckers.'

"The figures speak for themselves: Since 1867, Anglophone Quebeckers in Quebec  have suffered a decline that will ultimately lead to their disappearance. In Quebec, the future of  Anglophones is threatened."

Just as the pamphlet shows that French has declined in Canada, I too can use a chart to show how precipitously English has fallen in Quebec.

From a high of 25% in 1844, English as a mother tongue, has declined to just 8.5% in Quebec today.

 So which group if any, has suffered cultural genocide?

Now I'm not going argue against the assertion by French language militants that they are the subject of cultural genocide, it's a nasty term that indicates racism and hate, by it's very definition.

The United Nations describes "cultural genocide" in part, as;

"the deliberate destruction of the cultural heritage of a people or nation for political, military, religious, ideological, ethnical, or racial reasons." LINK

The assertion that Canada is deliberately trying to 'cleanse' the country of Francophones is nonsense, but even if it were to be true, what do militant Quebeckers have to complain about when their own actions towards the minority English community in Quebec actually fits the terms of 'cultural genocide' a lot better than any actions by Canadians.....

For militant and even mainstream Francophones Bill 101 has become a sacred cow, an untouchable and unassailable 'necessity' required to save Francophones from what they perceive as the inexorable fall and decline of the Francophone fact in Canada and Quebec.

Bill 101 was conceived back in 1977 to make French the one and only official and working language in Quebec and one of it's many provisions was to restrict access to English schools narrowly, resulting in French and immigrant families losing the right to send their children to English schools. The definition by which families could send their children to English schools was somewhat complicated, but ultimately came to mean that if any parent or sibling spent a reasonable amount of time (one year) in an English school anywhere in Canada, that family was eligible for English schooling. The law however only applied to public schools and so a loophole was left open.

Ineligible parents could still choose an English education by sending their children to a private English school. Worse (or better) still, some parents sent their children to a private English school for as little as one year and them switched them to a public English school, claiming eligibility under the terms of the law that allowed children to attend English school if they had previously been schooled in English!

Then in 2002, along came Bill 104, an amendment to Bill 101 meant to close this loophole. It was passed unanimously by the Quebec National Assembly, to specifically bar the use of these 'bridge' schools to circumvent the spirit of Bill 101 and it immediately faced a constitutional challenge by English rights activists. Portions of that amendment were struck down in Quebec courts and in response, the Quebec government appealed the decision all the way to the Supreme Court, where the issue was finally decided last year in favour of the Anglo rights. The court allowed the province one year to revise the law so that it fell in line with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

This of course sent French language militants into a linguistic rage. They were furious that the 'evil' Supreme Court  thwarted the will of the Quebec people, and it's National Assembly, conveniently forgetting that the law was shot down twice in Quebec courts before ever seeing the docket in Ottawa.

Today militants are demanding that Bill 101 be amended to cover both private and public schools and that no child be allowed into any type of English school if he or she doesn't qualify under Bill 101. Some are even proposing that the law be extended to college and universities and comically, even to daycare centres.

 
The language law was passed thirty-three years ago and since then, Canada and the rest of the democratic western world has suffered from a catastrophic decline in it's birthrate, with immigration the only option available, to shore up the population base. LINK

In Quebec, both the English community and the French community cannot maintain their numbers strictly by reproduction.
So immigrants make up the difference.
But since immigrants are not allowed to go to English schools, how can the English community remain viable?

I put this question to a militant acquaintance of mine and asked him, that in fairness, "Shouldn't 8.5% of immigrants be allowed to enter English schools, so that the community can maintain itself?  Otherwise, isn't the community doomed to wither and die?"

"Nope!" he answered and went off into a lengthy convoluted explanation as to why it was fair to restrict any access to English schools by immigrants.

"French is so badly under attack, that the English minority may very well be sacrificed if need be.  After all the whole continent is English and Anglos can all immigrate if they don't want to live in a French society..."

Hmmmm.......Now that sounds to me, painfully like 'Cultural Genocide," with a generous spattering "Ethnic Cleansing!"

That being said,  I don't like using any of these terms, they infer a level of hate that doesn't exist, except in the minds of a very small minority.

 This whole brouhaha over Bill 104 and the closing of the loophole is another great big discussion about something very small.
Over the last thirty years only 10,000 students have used the loophole to gain access to English schools and this fact, according to Pauline Marois. In the meantime over 30,000 Anglophone students have chosen voluntarily to attend French schools themselves, so what's the big deal?

Now 10,000 people out of almost 8 million Quebeckers, what does it mean demographically?

Only that the English community will decline at a little slower rate, that's all. 
If immigrants aren't allowed to bolster Anglo numbers, the writing is on the wall.

But even a slower decline of Anglo Quebeckers infuriates certain French language militants. They want to destroy the English community once and for all and by any means possible. They firmly believe that Quebec can never be truly French, until the English are gone.

If they can't do it through sovereignty, they will use the back door.

By screaming about 'cultural genocide' they attempt to spread fear throughout the mainstream Francophone community and hope to artificially boost support for militant positions. It's high time that these "Chicken Littles" whose "sky is falling" refrain, be outed for what they are.

Bill 104, or the whatever law will eventually replace it, may make it illegal to use the back door to get into English schools, but the real issue is that the front door remains firmly locked.
That is the injustice.