The Anglos of Montreal represent a community ten times smaller than Franco-Quebecers and are subject to ferocious forces of assimilation, with their own government overtly hostile to their language and culture.
And yet the Anglo community endures. Why?
In response, I've been told that my comparison isn't fair, because the English community is but an integral offshoot of the 'golden' English hegemony that more or else rules the world.
But if that were true, why is it that small communities, pockets of English located in the Townships, the Pontiac or the Gaspe are disappearing at an alarming rate, not dissimilar to what is happening to small francophone communities around the country?
The realty is that the dynamic forces of assimilation work the same way on English communities as they do on French ones and those that disappear or survive do so for the same reasons.
So let us examine why the English community of Montreal and the French community of the province of Quebec survive, while small English communities in rural Quebec fail as do the small pockets of French across Canada.
It has to do with 'Critical Mass'
Simply put, it means that societies become self-sustaining when they attain critical mass, which in the case of Montreal's English community, means that it has the necessary social institutions to sustain itself, including English schooling from daycare to university, English health services, English media and entertainment, English job opportunities, English religious and recreational institutions and of course a population sufficiently large enough to provide for marriage within the community itself."Critical mass is a sociodynamic term to describe the existence of a sufficient amount of adopters of an innovation in a social system such that the rate of adoption becomes self-sustaining and creates further growth. It is an aspect of the theory of Diffusion of Innovations, written extensively on by Everett Rogers in his book, "Diffusion of Innovations". Social factors influencing critical mass may involve the size, interrelatedness and level of communication in a society or one of its subcultures. Wikipedia
The Montreal English community maintains the above-mentioned elements and so survives in a 'hostile' environment' where outside its Montreal area borders it is surrounded by a sea of Francophones.
Even if Quebec's Francophone element grew ten times larger than it is now, the English community of Montreal would continue to survive.
Like a walled city which has all the critical elements for its survival within, whatever hordes remain outside are largely irrelevant.
Out in the Gaspe, the Pontiac and the Townships, the English communities that survive remain threatened because they have lost or are facing deteriorating elements of critical mass and so, are ultimately doomed to fail.
As schools close for lack of enrollment, as jobs disappear where English is spoken and where churches, theaters are no longer able to survive, so goes the community.
Slowly but surely the forces of assimilation bear down and like similar Francophone communities across Canada, the writing is clearly on the wall.
To compare Montreal's English community or Quebec's Francophone community to those small disappearing towns described above is fundamentally dishonest, and French language alarmists who make the connection with disappearing Francophone towns across Canada are playing a deceitful game.
As for Quebec's Francophone society, it is almost ten times larger than the successful English community I described above and if Montreal's English community has attained critical mass, the Francophone society has attained, for want of a better word, 'super-critical mass.'
Quebec Francophones may only represent 2% of the North American population, but they represent 87% of the population of Quebec and control a huge swath of North American territory, an area bigger than 90% of countries in the world.
The seven million people that make up the Quebec Francophone society represents a population that is greater than 40% of the independent nations of the world, certainly more than enough to be self-sustaining.
And so, assertions by French language militants/separtists that francophone society is in danger would be laughable would it not be so sad.
Like flimflam artists, they talk fast, spouting nonsense, making false and misleading statements and using the tried and true method of repeating the assimilation lie over and over again, with complicit media sympathisers affording them a tribune to brainwash Quebecers.
Readers, if Quebec hasn't assimilated over the last hundreds of years, it isn't going to assimilate now. Period.
Having personally borne witness to Quebec Francophone society during the1960s, where assimilation forces were infinitely more pressing, I view with utter astonishment the separatists effrontery to alarm Quebecers into sovereignty, no different than cowboys making loud noises to steer the herd in a desired direction.
Its like the British, having just defeated the Germans in the Battle of Britain, decisively ending the threat of invasion, being told by their leaders to watch it....because they might be in deep trouble now. Absurd!
The sad reality that militants don't want to admit is that Quebec's Francophone culture and language remains triumphant within the Canadian framework.
To admit that, is to remove a cornerstone argument in the independence narrative.
In fact, I would argue that by remaining in Canada, Quebec's Francophone culture has been afforded an extraordinary protection, akin to having a big brother watching out for you in the schoolyard.
For those doing business in Canada, French is a requirement coast to coast, from corn flake boxes to documentation for products as complicated as cars.
All this is subsidized by English Canadians who pay for 75% of bilingualism, a benefit that serves francophone Canadians only.
An independent Quebec would have to pay for all this itself and who knows how many companies, relieved of French in the rest of Canada would just forgo Quebec?
One last point about language bilingualisn and critical mass.
Mario Beaulieu and other militants boast that Quebecers are the most bilingual of Canadians and so don't really need more intensive instruction in English. He and his cohorts are victims of believing their own
But are Quebecers all that bilingual in the first place?
Because of the strength of French in Quebec, the hostility shown toward English, Quebecers remain, contrary to popular belief, sadly disfunctional in English.
Less than half of Quebecers are bilingiual and removing anglos and ethnics from the calculation (they are much more bilingual than Francophones) we find that only 36% of Francophone Quebecers consider themselves bilingual.
64% of Quebecers are completely insulated from the English world, they couldn't tell you who Rick Mercer or Lloyd Robertson is.
The idea that these people are in danger on anglicizing is laughable.
And of the 34% who claim to be bilingual, how many can truly say they are fluent?
For most these people, bilingualism is the ability to order breakfast in English....after a couple of tries.
I don't think that there are more than 10% of Quebec Francophones who are fluent in English.
If one is to consider society's most socializing element, television, it is easy to conclude that French in Quebec is as secure as English the ROC.
Quebecers spend 1,500 hours a year in front of the boob tube, which is about 500 hours more than they spend in school. (Yup, do the math....180 annual school days x 5.5 hours)
The socializing element of television cannot be overemphasized, Quebec society like all others, is formed by it's influence.
If Quebecers were to be attracted to English television, I might concede a problem. But they are not.
For whatever reason (and lack of proficiency in English is the number one reason,) Francophones watch French TV almost exclusively, and they watch locally produced content, not as in the old days, where American shows, dubbed into French were the staple fare.
So strong is the connection of Francophones with locally produced TV shows, that the numbers of viewers is simply astounding, with many top shows being watched by over two million people, something that no English entertainment show produced in Canada can match and this with almost four times the population. Link{Fr}
And so an honest examination of the facts can only conclude that the Francophone society in Quebec is secure, safe and successful, with its future assured.
All this within the confines of a protective, indulgent and doting Canada.
Quebecers have the inalienable right to self-determination and if they wish to become an independant state, so be it.
But for boosters of independence to tell Quebec that they need to separate to assure its linguistic and cultural survival is utter tripe.
Unfortunately, too many Quebecers are eating it up with a spoon....
