Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Media Responsible for Raising Language Tension

At first, I was going to call this blog piece "Media Complicit in Raising Language Tension" but, in the end, changed the word 'Complicit' to 'Responsible' because upon reflection, conclude that in fact, it's the media, more than the small cadre of language militants, that is responsible for much of the language tension in Quebec.

There's no doubt that the media plays a pivotal role in shaping our view of the world, by the very act of choosing what stories we will or will not be exposed to, as well as the amount of coverage afforded to these stories.

As way of illustration let us consider a mythical story about a poor family who has been ripped off by a scam artist and finds itself destitute at Christmastime.
Invariably, after the story is aired by the media, the public reacts and money pours in to help the family out, while all the other people with hard-luck stories, just as worthy, are ignored because of a lack of media coverage.

Media shapes our opinion and forges our reactions by what they choose to report. It's as simple as that.

In science, the term observer effect means that the act of observing will influence the phenomenon being observed. Nothing can be truer than this when it comes to the reporting of news or political events.

As we all know last Saturday, French language militants held a demonstration at the Bell Centre to protest the hiring of an English coach by the Montreal Canadiens.

How do we all know this?
Because the story blanketed the television and radio airwaves for at least a week before the demonstration and for days afterward.
Before the event, Mario Beaulieu, the chief organizer was afforded dozens of opportunities to plug his demonstration through a series of interviews on television and radio in which he repeated his message, that the hiring of a unilingual anglophone coach by the Canadiens was, as he termed it,- "la goutte d'eau qui fait déborder le vase," the English equivalent being "The straw that broke the camel's back."
As the week preceding the demonstration wore on and Beaulieu continued repeating his spiel like a yoga master repeating his mantra, some reporters picked up on his tag line and started using it themselves to describe the Cunneyworth situation, an egregious act of journalistic un-professionalism.

The media reported the number of demonstrators taking part in the event at between 200 and 500 people, but the most accurate count was made by a Centre Bell security guard who actually counted each person involved and reached the unimpressive total of between 100 and 150.

100-150 people... That's it.

Over a month ago I made mention of a demonstration of over 250 people in a small Laurention community who gathered to complain about, of all things, the closure of the town's last ATM machine.
On Sunday last, over 450 people attended the funeral of a six-year old Maxime Dion, who died tragically in a river drowning.
In November hundreds  of parents and students marched on the EMSB demanding that a school be saved.
The media reported all these stories, but the coverage devoted to those stories paled in comparison to the media resources devoted to the demonstration at the Bell Centre of a paltry 150 French language militants.

If Justin Bieber held an autograph session in front of the Bell Centre, I daresay 5,000 screaming fans would have showed up and the media would have devoted about 100th of the coverage that the Cunneyworth demonstration merited.

100-150 people. That's it..

Aside from the over-reported amount of demonstrators, the media also failed to tell the truth about the protest, likely because it did not fit in with the narrative that they had been selling all week.

It was plainly evident that the protesters were actually hard-core anglophobes whose signs and placards betrayed their utter hatred of all things English. Those who came were French-language fanatics, not fans who gave a hoot about the Canadiens coach.

Real Canadiens fans arriving to the game largely ignored the demonstrators and those interviewed showed a marked indifference, more excited to get into the Bell Centre than to waste time with demonstrators.
The promised action whereby fans within the Bell Centre, would wave small Quebec flags (which were distributed by the demonstrators) as some sort of protest, fizzled badly, as well. The flags were almost invisible during the game.

As a commenter mentioned on 25Stanley.com:

"100 personnes ? Pfff! C'est 4x moins que le Fan Club de Petteri Nokelainen. Pas trop grave."

Ha! I don't even have to translate that !!!

In a city of 2 million, all that could be mustered was 150 persons, which leads me to conclude that the language file is not as important as Mr. Beaulieu and this radical cohorts would have us believe. The Montreal Chapter of the SSJB has more  than 3,000 members, and so it seems that  Mr. Beaulieu couldn't even turn out his own hardliners.

If people were as concerned over the 'so-called' decline of the French language, as Mr. Beaulieu tells us they are, there'd be thousands upon thousands drawn to these types of demonstrations, but none of these 'language' demonstrations ever garner more than two hundred people, regardless of the media hype before and after.
With the widespread publicity that Beaulieu benefited from in the run-up to the demonstration, one would conclude that the 150 demonstrators represented a complete catastrophe, but you'd never hear that from the media!

Nowhere and never is the paltry size of these protests ever considered or the relevance thereof debated by journalists. Never.
Nobody ever calls Mario Beaulieu out on the utter failure of his movement to fire popular support.

Without the overblown support of a media driven by its own agenda, the movement would remain a coffeehouse phenomenon.
To be fair, let us remember the dismal turnout to the anti-Bill 101 protests as well.

And so I have to conclude that the language debate is a lot less important to Quebecers than we are led to believe and that the media is responsible for over-hyping these supposed tensions.

If the media afforded the language issue the weight the story actually merits, we'd hardly ever hear of it. But because it is an attractive issue, especially on 24 news channels that have hours and hours of programming to fill, we are subject to an overdose of language nonsense.

Quebecers, on both sides of the debate, by their non-action, testify to the weight they place on language issues.

Or can it be that Quebecers are just lazy and not interested in demonstrating, even on issues which are near and dear to their heart?
I don't think so, remember that demonstration in favour of a NHL team for Quebec City.
50,000 people showed up for it.....yep....50,000.

It isn't laziness that leads Quebecers to skip language demonstrations, it's just a lack of interest, the issue being far less pressing and urgent than portrayed.

It seems that English, French and Ethnics have pretty much made up their mind to accept the language status quo, as is. While none are perfectly happy, few except radicals seem to be overly upset, as we can conclude by the pitiful turnout for all language demonstrations, both English and French.

Perhaps this theory will upset some readers on both sides of the language debate, but it iss worth discussing.......

Here's the only piece that made any sense of the situation. The link to it was posted in the Comments section on Monday.
In this YouTube piece, a bilingual Anglo, absolutely slays in this sarcastic take on the demonstration. 
It's half English/half French (like Montreal) so watch it even if you don't speak French, but unfortunately, you'll miss a lot, he is devastating in French! 


And so readers finally, a brave soul who is ready to tell us that this emperor hath no clothes, that the whole thing is a sad farce, a movement which has no popular support.

BTW, I think this guy is hilarious....I hope he posts more on the language situation, we all could use a good laugh, otherwise we'll just cry.....

Off subject but, here's another funny video by Abdul Butt on Occupy Montreal. ENJOY!





For other funny videos check out Abdul Butt's YouTube Channel

61 comments:

  1. The media is no longer in the business of informing people. They are there to sell media. That's why you will see bad news stories so that we pay attention and buy their newspapers, magazines, etc. If there is no tension, then media don't think they can sell adspace or ad time.

    So, now we have FOX news in the US, which twists news to fit the conservative agenda, we have SUN news up north, and we have pundits everywhere who "interpret" the news for us.

    The situation is worse in Quebec because we all know that Le Devoir is a separatist rag with basically no readership and we only have 2 competing news agencies for each medium: Quebecor and Gesca for print and Radio Canada and Quebecor for TV. There is a concentration of media where basically everybody has the same opinion and they have many columnist/pundits whose only reason to exist seem to be to create language tensions.

    Unilingual francophones, who form the majority in this province, thus get misinformation and they base their opinions on these pundits. The media really is to blame.

    Imagine how much different this province would be if we didn't have such media concentration and a diversity of opinions were available on the francophone side.

    P.S. The Abdul Butt video is pretty funny. I found that Nordiques guy with the headlamp to be an enormous whack job, lol.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Such is the situation in this era of sound bytes. Nobody really goes beyond the headline. Why should they? Many of us are all too ready and willing to be told what to think and how to vote in the form of easily digestible news breaks and calling it "being informed".

    P.S.: you shoulda stuck with "complicit". It does, after all, take two to tango.

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  3. This positing is a dead ringer of what former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura (real name James Janos) has said in the media, i.e., the news is no longer broadcast by the media, it's made up by the media.

    Ventura decided not to run a second term as governor, in part because he was tired of fighting the media and being vilified when he was trying to do the right thing. I think the same can be said for Quebec-born players who don't and won't sign as free agents with the Canadiens.

    In Quebec, there are three V's to describe the French media: Vicious, vitriolic and vindictive. You can even call them the three "viz" as they are start with the same first syllable! In fact, you can add a fourth word to that list: Villifying, but enough of synonyms.

    The simple fact of the matter is, considering the quantity of demonstrators about a gross, I can only conclude one of three things:

    (1) The French media was that desparate for a story;
    (2) There are too many language fascists in the media;
    (3) Both of the above.

    I thought that young fellow who put a blog on Youtube about the protestors was joking like the show This Hour has 22 Minutes with Rick Mercer. They are proof there really is a QQQ in Quebec similar to the KKK pea brains in those hickish Southwestern U.S. states like Alabaya-ma and Miss-ss-sippeh. We have Lac-St-Jean and the Saguen-ninnies! From what psycho ward did they dig up these dregs of society? Maybe we should have it put on The Daily Show or the Coal-bear Report. Then again, they'll lump all Canadians into this embarrassment, and 34 million don't deserve the ridicule this putrid 144 (a.k.a. the gross gross) does.

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  4. IMO, the out-of-proportion media cover had to do with the hockey/Habs angle. Being able to tie in the Habs to the "anglicization of Montreal" story is like Christmas come early for the militants.

    Without a doubt, there are myopic language morons in the media, but if you want to get noticed, find the hockey angle. Same in the rest of Canada, too.
    Hockey + anything = media coverage

    Abdul Butt's piece is hilarious.

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  5. Les médias agissent comme des détecteurs de fumée.Aux Québécois de juger si il faut alerter les pompiers.

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  6. @Roger Rabbit January 11, 2012 12:35 AM, you mention Le Devoir - I remember hearing somewhere that it has a circulation of something like 10,000, which is paltry by any standards. One must wonder how it survives financially. It seems a bit fishy. Richler once called it the party organ of the PQ. Maybe he really was on to something...

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    Replies
    1. Well, definitely is an ORGAN of the PQ. That's why it's so small :)

      Delete
  7. Pour la période 2010-2011 Le Devoir a connu une augmentation de 22 000 lecteurs soit un joli 11% de plus :)

    La Presse : Un mince 2% :(


    http://www.touchephd.com/blog/2011/09/hausse-du-lectorat-des-quotidiens/

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  8. La C.A.Q sera le prochain parti au pouvoir...Ho non!!!Encore des Seppies :D

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  9. @ Anon 11:47

    Trolling attitude ...

    There will always be seppies in Quebec. And Spanin,France,Belgium,Great Britain ... but as long as they stick to their 100 people rallies, no problem.

    ReplyDelete
  10. And Spanin ?Where is it?


    Et 4 militants(sic) contre la loi 101 avec un drapeau canadien et une boîte de donuts.

    Moi non plus je n'ai aucun problème.

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  11. @ 12:23
    "And Spanin ?Where is it?"
    Small minds ...

    "Et 4 militants(sic) contre la loi 101 avec un drapeau canadien et une boîte de donuts.
    Moi non plus je n'ai aucun problème. "

    True.

    It is obvious that people in general don't give a crap about this debate, and the only language they speak is "moneyglish" or "argentais" :)

    They don't pay much attention to this issue, because they like their confort, their Canadian confort, their Quebec confort, their english/french/allo confort.

    As long as everybody is living in peace no matter the language, your cause is lost !

    Always remember: "moneyglish" or "argentais" ! This is your real problem !

    Of course, he who collects welfare today will collect also tomorrow, either it's in Canada or in a free Quebec ... so , nothing to lose.

    But the rest of us .... well, "moneyglish" or "argentais" ...

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  12. "Les médias agissent comme des détecteurs de fumée.Aux Québécois de juger si il faut alerter les pompiers. "

    The media egg you on and encourage you do make an idiot of yourself, so they wouldn't have to.

    You do their dirty work. You work for nothing for their interests, and they don't even have to get their hands dirty. Neither does Marois, as she watches it all from a safe distance of her mansion.

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  13. Editor, RE: 'To be fair, let us remember the dismal turnout to the anti-Bill 101 protests as well.'
    As you have pointed out sufficiently regarding ‘la brimade’ of only 150 Versus 22 thousand at the game this past weekend, (and a big thank you André Pratte also), the Media has not helped the situation.
    For our three protests last year, there was very little media help, at all, even CTV only wanted to show the assault by RRQ member Renaud Leger (which the Crown Prosecutor didn’t consider ‘important’ enough to press charges) –incidentally, the same day the PQ voted to ban all EN signs in QC, which was rolled back shortly afterwards, praise God.
    The Gazette has some lucid writers that point out the fact that 80% of Montrealers know this City is Bilingual, and you have dedicated several posts to this, even the revisionist history lie in the City’s Charter. I have had to keep copies of these articles (Editors, Marianne White, ) which have disappeared, as just about all contentious ones do, as you can see in the comments from several blog posts (scroll to the bottom): http://www.sqlservercentral.com/blogs/hugo/2009/07/14/i-am-a-champion-for-canada-et-le-qu-233-bec-est-inclus-dans-mon-pays/
    http://www.sqlservercentral.com/blogs/hugo/2009/03/15/weeding-out-racism-in-the-workplace-a-letter-to-government-institutions-in-quebec/
    http://www.sqlservercentral.com/blogs/hugo/2010/02/15/first-public-hearing-against-quebec-s-pension-fund-manager-the-beginning-of-proof-multiple-laws-were-violated-before-sabia-took-over/
    Who is controlling the Gazoo? Why are these articles disappearing systematically?

    Where are Diane Francis’ Trainwreck articles now? Only on Vigile.net ? Or from a smart writer here only:
    http://pensionpulse.blogspot.com/2009/02/caisses-40-billion-train-wreck.html
    One day you write I am a Hero (HS is Vindicated) for standing up to the language fascists you constantly deplore and their street thug terrorists, that threaten our families, people in the street and attempt to contact their place of work to have us dismissed (Yvan Major said he did, although it was a lie), and the next day you say good riddance and tell us that our protests mean nothing? Many of us who were openly declaring ourselves against this discriminatory legislation had attacks that were similar, and the noticed the futility of seeking provincial police help – unless you were subject to a death threat!
    Does this sort of gang attack happen to the Anglophobes Abdul was chatting with the other day? No, their positions are secure thanks to a good generation of the politics of bigotry, a complicit media and the widely held Myths that the Senate Report Committee attempted to debunk: http://www.parl.gc.ca/Content/SEN/Committee/403/offi/SubsiteMar11/Report_Home-e.htm

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  14. Even Kai Nagata takes a big jab at QC Media and Govt, but does it only from BC…why didn`t he stay in QC to help us fix the situation? Sure apathy, etc., greener pastures, escape from the QC bubble are motivating factors, but we need real leadership to fix these sociological problems. Thankfully, there are many more bloggers now who discuss these issues with clear evidence (you know who you are : ).
    Let's be Fair then and realise how our community is suppressed by a castrated media, attacked openly by septard militants, (back to the numbers game) sort of like saying they walked up a Mountain and yelled hard, when only they had to do was get up on a hill, whereas on our receiving end of the discrimination we have a whole Govt machine against us also, such as a Judicial system (at least at the CRT) that is run by Nationalists or Sovereigntists that attack those who speak the truth, as I commented in this post: http://www.bloggingcanadians.ca/ConservativeBlogs/anglophobia-a-cautionary-tale-for-head-offices/
    For months, videos you have posted regarding the Arrest of Serge Provost are raided by commentators that post my phone number and address constantly - yet nobody calls to harass us anymore (apart from 30 calls over a few days in July). It is clear to me these militants are nothing more than cowards who wish to attack someone, who even shares their same blood, only until the Cops get a dossier on them.
    So I do not care if you think that three protests to end language discrimination had low turnout (we will have more, wait for it!), you're not the one taking the risk because you do not reveal yourself (and your reasons are justified, no problem with that), but let's get one thing straight, to be ‘fair’, you cannot compare Apples with Oranges, as you have simplistically stated, and Lord knows you, of all people, should understand this clearly by now.

    Considering the Everest that lies in front of our community, and well documented by the Chaput-Champagne report, we must continue our struggle to return the Rule of Law to Quebec, for the improvement of the Quebec`s entire population, not just a certain malfeasant political faction which is simply trying to pull a fast one on the public by reforming as the CAQ.

    ReplyDelete
  15. When I first checked out the YouTube page of Adbul Butt, the above video about the demonstration at the Bell Centre had about 400 hits.
    Today 50,000 plus.
    The CBC's 'This hour has 22 Minutes' did a similar piece to Adbul's, but was nowhere near as funny...

    ReplyDelete
  16. Cournoyer makes some very good points, and maybe the Kultuurkamph Minister Ste-Pierre should stick her nose elsewhere :
    http://www.cyberpresse.ca/sports/hockey/le-canadien/201201/07/01-4483760-cournoyer-estime-que-sport-et-politique-font-mauvais-menage.php?utm_categorieinterne=trafficdrivers&utm_contenuinterne=cyberpresse_vous_suggere_4483683_article_POS1

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  17. ...to Hugo: Your points all have strong merit, but the simple fact of the matter is, there is too much complacency on both sides. There were postings on the thread dated Jan 9th and Roger Rabbitt and I exchanged views on this.

    Roger, and another respondent, have dual English/French identity, and I accused them of being guilty by association for standing idly by while all this anti-English sentiment has been spewing around for more than a generation. One of them shot back about there being too much complacency in the Anglophone community, and I couldn't argue with that; in fact, seeing how my late parents talked a good fight, when push came to shove, they were complacent as sitting ducks.

    I very vividly remember a conversation I had with my mother on this, stating if the separatists were to win, my parents would just stay and take it. My mother admitted they (her and her cohorts) were sitting ducks, so they took their chances and hoped for the best. Luckily, their gamble paid off, but had it not, I shudder to think how things would have gone.

    I knew at age 16 how this was going to go seeing how my parents and other family members reacted, amongst a host of others. My mother even said time and time again there was no future for Anglophones in Quebec, so all she did was reinforce my aspirations to leave. Fortunately, I knew in 1980 the Referendum would not go the separatist way so this gave me an opportunity to finish my cheap university education for which my parents paid a plenitude of taxes.

    Two years later, I graduated, and as I promised myself years earlier, I left. I have no regrets, but I am to this day resentful that I really had litte choice. I was not willing to stay and fight because too little of the community that should have up for the fight, didn't.

    Hugo, you and I discussed this over this blog a few weeks ago. I think your fight is admirable and inspirational, and your passion is real; unfortunately, it's too little too late. Howard Galganov gathered far more people than you did, had a radio show to rile up the troops, and even HE could not pull off that much because too many people left. That was 20 years ago.

    On the positive side, some good things have happened. Quebec relies much more on French speaking immigrants to fortify the linguistic demographic, but few of the newcomers, despite being dogmatically fed vindictive vitriol about how les maudits anglais ripped them off in every direction and in every way, don't get the newcomers to support this maligned drivel, with few exceptions.

    They are not assimilating the way the Quebec government and its separatist minions desire them to do so, thus they are weakening the separatist cause and zealots who try to preserve French with the vigor they do. Many either already also speak English, or have the sense to know that in a sea full of English in North America, a gated jurisdiction trying to shut out English is futile! As the Old Guard bitter pills die off, maybe a fragrant flower will blossom out of the asphyxiating manure we're enduring now. Time will tell.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sure, valid points, however it is never too late to right a wrong.

      Delete
    2. Well, to tell you the truth, I don't have a dual identity. I am a visible minority, born in Montreal, and an anglophone who does speak some French, although not as much as I would want.

      I have lived here for all but 6 years of my life.

      My parents are pretty much unilingual anglophones but they came here before bill 101 and both had good jobs working in the English language. I don't think it's fair to expect older people to pick up a language as easily as a younger person.

      So, I strongly disagree with Anglophobe language hardliners. I think their language is protected throughout Quebec and it should be accepted that Montreal is bilingual...because in fact, it is.

      As for protests, as I said before, anglophones have to be able to stand up for themselves, but at the same time not be too hardline. You can't expect francophones to stand up for you if you don't stand up for yourself.

      And you're in another province right now. So, it's easy to tell others to fight but if it concerns you, then come back to stand up for your rights.

      One more anglophone is always welcome :)

      Delete
    3. Great points, many bilingual francophones have joined the cause (FB me and I can send you loads of documentation to prove this - or google 'How to Deal with Quebec’s Extremists: Expose Their Malfeasance Publicly?'), but are cautious since there are so many violent racist militants out there.

      We will have more protests and their size does not matter, we want our Human Rights respected by all departments of the QC Govt, not just the HRCommission.

      Delete
  18. @ Froggy,

    "Of course, he who collects welfare today will collect also tomorrow, either it's in Canada or in a free Quebec ... so , nothing to lose."

    Quebec is already the fifth or sixth most indebted jurisdiction in the world despite receiving billions of dollars in transfer payments every year from the rest of Canada. Quebec would go bankrupt shortly after separating from Canada and it could no longer afford to dole out welfare payments. Then our resident welfare troll (Press 9) will end up on the streets where he will have to beg for money in order to pay for his poutine and pepsi.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Nice modif's to site Editor...

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  20. Slightly off-topic, but I can not understand the losing mentality of the separatists. Remember the other day, I posted what Louis Prefontaine wrote about Canadiens:

    "Non, gagner n’est pas suffisant."

    Then I read again in La Presse about the protest at Bell Center.

    "Présent au rassemblement avec sa conjointe Édith Cochrane, le comédien Emmanuel Bilodeau a demandé qu'une sorte de discrimination positive soit faite à l'endroit des joueurs francophones. «Je me désengage progressivement du Canadien, a déclaré celui qui a incarné René Lévesque au petit écran. Si c'était une équipe de francophones perdante, je serais quand même là à tous les matchs. Je les supporterais et j'adorerais mon équipe. La Coupe Stanley, ce n'est pas une fin en soi. L'important ce n'est pas de gagner ou même de faire les séries. L'important, c'est qu'à chaque match, on ait de grandes émotions et qu'on s'identifie à l'équipe.»"

    http://www.cyberpresse.ca/sports/hockey/le-canadien/201201/07/01-4483683-manifestation-devant-le-centre-bell-pour-le-respect-du-francais.php?utm_categorieinterne=trafficdrivers&utm_contenuinterne=cyberpresse_B4_manchettes_231_accueil_POS1

    Hmmm... So for the separatists being a loser and being poor is fine as long as they, we suffer in French? And winning is not the goal but the the emotion felt in each game? Sounds like an elementary school ball game, is it not? Winning or losing does not matter. Participation does.

    As this is the NFL playoff week, let me remind readers one more time the words from the legendary Vince Lombardi:

    "Winning isn't everything; it's the only thing."

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Dans le cas des anglos de Montréal ce serait plutôt:

      "Whining isn't everything; it's the only thing."

      Tissshhhh!!!

      Delete
    2. Oh no, we're a society of 7 million francophones surrounded by 360 million anglophones! I'm so scared! lol

      Delete
  21. "Winning isn't everything; it's the only thing."

    Belle mentalité de minable.Cette affirmation typiquement de mentalité anglo saxonne laisse sous entendre les plus basses mesquineries pour atteindre son objectif.Rien de surprenant.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. 1. Does the name Vince Lombardi sound Anglo-Saxon to you?
      2. Do you know that Anglo-Saxon actually refers to the Germanic tribes who settled in Southen England?
      3. If you were right, did it surprise you that the British beat the French in so many wars they were engaged?

      Delete
    2. That's right Troy, this guy is just another ignorant when it comes to the history of Great Britain. C'est Grande Bretagne traduit directement - why? Because my ancestors, on one side of the family, arrived from Normandy and Brittany - it was the Franco-Normans and their descendants who formed the modern United Kingdom - practically the entire Anglo-Saxon leadership was wiped out in Hastings. But well, facts mean nothing to the Losership.

      Delete
  22. @ Anonymous 6:32PM above

    On veut gagner tout tout tout. Tout les referedums. Tout. On est des gangantes. On est des federalistes. On va toujours gagner.

    Vous pouvez continuer a perdre :)

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  23. We love yooooou!!!Don't leave us Qweeeeebec!!!!(Merci aux bâtards de Chrétien et Charesssst)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Merci bâtards de Parizeau et amies pour avoir perdu encore! lol

      Delete
  24. @ Apparatchik Jan 10, 2012 10:13 PM

    It's true that it should be our responsability to be informed but not everybody has the time to go behind the headlines. Not only that but if you are a francophone, there is always misinformation in all the francophone media about the French language being under attack. There is no diversity of opinion really. They must always make francophones the victims.

    As well, you could say the media is complicit in raising language tensions in the case of the hockey protest but the media was giving 1 guy a platform for his anti-English cause in order to boost it. They exagerrate the crowd and they pretend that it's about the hockey coach while the signs point to Anglophobia. That same tiny crowd will come out to anything anti-English.

    What about the J de M having a reporter going out looking for a job claiming to be a unilingual anglophone. Oh my how terrible it is that an anglophone would be able to find a job that pays minimum wage! In that case and in many other cases, the media is not merely complicit but RESPONSABLE for raising language tensions.

    ReplyDelete
  25. @ AnonymousJan 11, 2012 07:57 PM

    Ca marche!!! mouhahahaha

    Canada 4ever!!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Vous n'avez pas encore compris ce que veut dire "Reply"?Besoin de lunettes?

      Delete
    2. Canada 4ever!!!

      4ever 8 milliards/Année en cadeaux pour le Québec?Merci canada :)))

      Delete
    3. Ah okay "reply" veut dire "repondre."
      Ton anglais est mieux que le mien.
      Bravo! You're learning more and more English everyday :)

      Delete
  26. Relations publiques et français 101:

    http://lejournaldemontreal.canoe.ca/journaldemontreal/sports/hockey/archives/2012/01/20120112-031356.html

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This is what people write when they have no subject whatsoever...

      Soooo, the guy said, what misery should I write today? Oh, I know...shit about a poor guy and more shit about english. That should satisfy my boss...

      Delete
    2. Again the issue vis a vis the Montreal Canadien interim coach has nothing to do with the fact that he's unilingual English speaker... it is about the fact that he isn't " un gas de Chez Nous" ... Even if he were fluent in French, they shit on him because he's from Toronto... RACISM pure and simple.....

      Delete
    3. C'est quelle race un torontois?

      Delete
  27. Haïti chérie dit:
    http://www.cyberpresse.ca/le-droit/actualites/ville-dottawa/201201/10/01-4484636-le-prochain-chef-de-police-dottawa-devrait-etre-bilingue.php

    Un nouveau chef de police bilingue dans la capitale du Canada, voilà une bonne idée !

    Selon le recensement de 2006, 62 % des citoyens d'Ottawa ont déclaré l'anglais comme langue maternelle, alors que 15 % d'entre eux ont coché le français. http://www.fr.canoe.ca/infos/regional/archives/2012/01/20120111-123444.html

    On va compter comme les angryphones du Québec, avec 62% d'anglophones, ça doit bien faire 38 % de francophones ??? Ce n'est pas de cette façon que Le Banlieusard (The Suburban) et La Gazette (The Gazette)le font lorsqu'ils parlent de Montréal ? C'est de l'ironie (Irony) !

    « Nous avons osé être libres, osons l'être par nous-mêmes et pour nous-mêmes » Dessalines, Jean-Jacques (1758-1806)
    Héros de l'Indépendance

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

      Delete
    2. @ Haiti Shitty,

      I live in Ottawa and there is no way that 38% of the population is French. We don't need a bilingual police chief. The other qualifications of the potential candidates are much more important.

      Gatineau is also part of the National Capital Region. When it planned to give bilingual employees a bonus, there was an uproar in Quebec because it would supposedly cause discrimination towards unilingual Francophones. So, it's okay to discriminate towards unilingual Anglophones but not towards unilingual Francophones? Another double standard from the Franco-fascists.

      Delete
    3. Haiti Cherie said:

      "Selon le recensement de 2006, 62 % des citoyens d'Ottawa ont déclaré l'anglais comme langue maternelle, alors que 15 % d'entre eux ont coché le français. http://www.fr.canoe.ca/infos/regional/archives/2012/01/20120111-123444.html
      On va compter comme les angryphones du Québec, avec 62% d'anglophones, ça doit bien faire 38 % de francophones ???"

      You are stupid! You're obviously a product of the school system in Haiti. There is a large number of immigrants in Ottawa whose maternal language is neither English nor French, and most of them adopt English as a second language.

      Delete
  28. The mayor of Huntingdon fends off the OQLF:

    http://www.ledevoir.com/politique/villes-et-regions/340075/en-bref-le-maire-de-huntingdon-contre-l-oqlf

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. "Qu'arriverait-il si lors d'une élection municipale, M.le maire était remplacé par un anglophone uniligue comme ce fut le cas pour l'entraineur chef du Canadien?"

      Louis16

      Effectivement,beau colonisé de service.Bonjour les contraventions!

      Delete
    2. Le maire d'Huntingdon, c'est gros comme Sackville en Nouvelle-Écosse, pas très pesant dans la balance... Stéphane Gendron, maire d'Huntingdon, pourquoi pas Don Cherry à la tête de TO ? :P !

      Delete
    3. Je fais confiance à l'O.Q.L.F pour le remettre à sa place.

      Delete
    4. "Je fais confiance à l'O.Q.L.F pour le remettre à sa place."

      Counting on le gouvernemaman to sort it all out? That's the true Quebec spirit.

      While at it, le gouvernemaman will wipe your ass too for you too.

      Delete
    5. "Counting on le gouvernemaman to sort it all out? That's the true Quebec spirit."

      C'est la méthode la plus pacifique.Ce type d'accroc à la loi ne se règle pas entre citoyens.Le bat de baseball est proscrit comme objet de persuasion par les autorités.

      Delete
  29. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. To the Editor,

      I thought you weren't going to accept simple quotations from simpleton separatists, i.e. Haiti cherie, Jan. 12 at 5:30 PM, and Anon., Jan. 12 at 6:42 PM?

      Delete
  30. AnonymousJan 12, 2012 06:47 PM

    Je fais confiance à l'O.Q.L.F pour le remettre à sa place.

    as if, the OQLF won't do shit

    ReplyDelete