Xenophobes and Racists. If the Shoe Fits...

Luce Cloutier & Mario Beaulieu. If the shoe fits, wear it!

On Friday I promised a piece about xenophobia and racism as it pertains to the radical French language and sovereignty movement in Quebec.
This in response to Quebec language militant Mario Beaulieu taking great exception that some in the English mainstream press and within the blogosphere (sites like ours,) had the audacity to use these terms in describing the PQ, Pauline Marois and the radical language movement.

Here is the type of thing Mr. Beaulieu is complaining about;

“Xenophobia” is applicable because it literally refers to a fear of the other. It’s not a pretty word. It pains me to use it when describing those who shape the discourse in my home province. When Quebec nationalists speak incessantly about the “Anglo threat...,” 

There’s no denying the furor that would ensue if Quebec politicians spoke of the “Arab threat,” or the “Chinese threat.” When one of the province’s most popular radio hosts, Benoît Dutrizac, mocks the Anglo accents of veteran, bilingual Montreal city councillors, where is the outrage? And had Charles Adler imitated a Québécois accent; what then? The double-standard is shocking: It is perfectly acceptable in Quebec to demean Anglophones as a form of over-compensation for past abuses. Institutionalizing that debasement is equally tolerated... ”   
Read the rest of the story: Xenophobia and Quebec’s uncomprehending radicals

and here is part of what Beaulieu complained;

"For example, in The Gazette, National Post and the Globe and Mail, Quebec separatists or those who want to strengthen Bill 101 are depicted as Franco-supremacist, intolerant, anglophobes, radicals, close-minded idiots, who want to assimilate, destroy and despise minorities. And spread without restraint, downright hateful comments from readers who are not shy to draw parallels with neo-Nazi and fascist movements. Link{Fr}

"xen-o-pho-bi-a"
-unreasonable fear or hatred of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange.

French language militants and Peequists are all quick to say that the sovereignty movement is inclusive and is based solely on French as the common language and all who speak it are welcomed wholeheartedly into the fold.
Unfortunately, it just isn't true.

For the last couple of years we have been treated to incessant harangues by these so-called open and inclusive democrats, including Mr. Beaulieu and the PQ's newest minister, Jean-François Lisée, who complain bitterly that the island of Montreal is in danger of being lost because more and more of its citizens have a language other than French as their mother tongue.
In fact, alarm bells were pushed by the above two gentlemen when shock of all shocks, it was revealed that the balance of mother tongues is shifting over to the dark side and soon the majority of Montrealers will have a mother-tongue other than French.
The horrors!

Let us consider the 'problem'
Each year Quebec welcomes about 45,000 immigrants, of which, about 10,000 leave for other provinces leaving 35,000 net newcomers, of which about 30,000 settle in the Montreal area.

About 95% of these people have a language other than French as a mother tongue, so it is easy to understand that slowly but surely the statistic concerning mother tongue will shift away from French (and English).

But so what?

Let us take the example of a Spanish speaking family named Gonzalez who immigrated from El Salvador to Montreal and who speak no English at all.
The family sends their children to French school and the parents learn French quickly and get jobs, working in French. The years go by and the family is firmly rooted into the French side of the language equation, economically, scholastically, socially and culturally. The family still speaks no English and in public all their interaction is in French. That being said, at home, they speak their native Spanish.

And therein lies the rub.
Because they speak Spanish around the dinner table, they are, according to Mr. Lisée and Mr. Beaulieu, a 'problem' and are counted on as being on the wrong side of the equation in the 'mother-tongue' debate.
When militants describe a language problem in Montreal, the Gonzalezes are part of the problem!

"The future of the French language is at risk because of a steady decline in the number of people on the island of Montreal who use it as their main language, Lisée said, citing statistics from the Office québécois de la langue française showing the number of people who speak French at home dropped from 61 per cent in 1971 to 54 per cent in 2006. If nothing is done, Lisée said, it could drop to 47 per cent in less than 20 years.
“The weakening of the francophone majority imperils the ability of new arrivals to integrate in French in the city, and makes the future of the French language extremely fragile,” said Lisée, a former journalist and adviser who worked with former premiers Jacques Parizeau and Lucien Bouchard."-Jean-François Lisée, Link

When militants complain about mother-tongue, they are not only complaining about immigrants who assimilate over to the English side of the language equation, but the Gonzalezes, as well.

But honestly, what more could the Gonzalezes do to satisfy Mr. Beaulieu and Mr. Lisée?

You cannot get around the fact that the 'mother-tongue' debate is ringed by xenophobia, the only 'flaw' that language militants perceive in the Gonzalezes, is where they were born.

Mr. Lisée is particularly galled that 'real' French speaking natives are leaving the island of Montreal and being replaced with the foreigners, many like the French-speaking Gonzalez family.
And so when French language militants, complain about 'mother-tongue,' it is not really a language issue, but largely a foreigner issue, or to put it more bluntly, a 'too many foreigners' issue.

Whenever you hear the militants bring up the 'mother-tongue' debate, alarm bells should go off in your head.
Those who complain are less concerned about the French language and more concerned about who it is speaking French and whether they are 'de souche' or not.
It is no different than complaining about skin colour, religion or ethnicity and no matter how hard all these 'foreigners' try to integrate into francophone Quebec society, according to the language militants, they will always be on the other side of the 'good citizen' ledger.

In the end, there is only one solution to the 'problem' of the shifting away from French as a mother-tongue in Montreal and that is to curb immigration.
So spin it however you want, complaining about mother-tongue is xenophobia, pure and simple, something Mr. Beaulieu, Mr. Lisée and all the other radicals should be called out over.

Now before I go further into this post, I'd like to preface everything I write above and below as applying to a tiny vocal minority of extremists who enjoy a disproportionate amount of media exposure.
The vast majority of francophones in this province (including sovereigntists) are as racist or xenophobic as are their Anglophone counterparts.
Unfortunately for all of us, we are over-exposed to the French language mullahs in the media, who do preach xenophobia and hate.

As an observer, I actually remain pleasantly surprised that in spite of the vast media campaign to demonize English, Quebecers remain unconvinced, much to the frustration of language militants who have no other choice but to ramp up the linguistic pressure and exaggerate problems that do not exist.

Perhaps it is the fact that collectively, francophone Quebecers, who having been led up the garden path by the Church for centuries, are loathe to put too much trust in those telling them how to conduct their lives.

Now let us turn to the racism part of this post and specifically, the most recent campaign of the Mouvement Québec français and an action by its branch in the Lanaudiere region, which recently won a great deal of media attention by compiling 1,000 language complaints for the Office québécois de la langue française.

The thousand complaint story was splashed all around the media with not many reporters bothering to dig into the specifics where they would find that many of the complaints were completely bogus, like those that cited Churches for posting signs in English.
Even the most radical of French language militants knows that religious institutions and not for profit educational institutions are exempted under Bill 101 from the obligation to use French at all.

I'll save all that for another post to concentrate on another big aspect of the complaints, that of English names or trademarks, those that the MQF demand be accompanied by French descriptors.

The very idea that a company like Canadian Tire, an institution that has operated in Quebec for about seventy years, be forced to change its name is galling, considering that the demand has zero to do with familiarizing unilingual Quebecers with what is being sold in the stores, and everything to do with humiliating and showing up those Anglophone companies who dare to trade under a non-French, corporate name or trademark.

According to the MQF, the issue is about respect and that an English name, in and of itself, is offensive and disrespectful to the majority.
Is that not utterly racist?
Imagine the public reaction if all the anglophones in your place of work were obliged to change their names to something more acceptable to the MQF?

The respect that the MQF demands, reminds me of the respect demanded by young King Joffrey in HBO's War of the Thrones, a nasty sort who demands that subjects bow down to him both physically and metaphorically, under pain of certain death.
I don't call that respect, I call it intimidation.

Racism?
Not convinced, let us explore the story just a little further.
Forget about FUTURE SHOP or CANADIAN TIRE for the moment, the MQF and the local windbag, Luce Cloutier, took the debate over English to a whole new level of ugliness, when she included in the 1,000 complaints, stores and businesses that sported English proper names.

"As for complaints about company names, the photos showed not only the usual Canadian Tire and other Pizza Hut, but also several IGA, Bentley and Reitmans, which are not English words but proper names or initials without meaning.

Mr. Beaulieu believes, however, that all these companies should accompany their names with a generic name, according to the law, as did the Second Cup chain, which appears to Quebec under the name 'Les Cafes Second Cup' " . Link{Fr}

"It has become normal in our environment to see store names like Reitmans, Smart Set, Bentley said Ms. Cloutier. Link{Fr}

So let us get this straight, if a store is named after an English founder (Reitmans) it needs a descriptor, but if a store is name after a French founder (Tanguay) it does not.

I'm curious if the cookie store called Monsieur Felix & Mr. Norton, needs half a descriptor?
Such is the utter pettiness and stupidity of these racists.

Madame Luce Cloutier, went on to say that certain English Italian Spanish 'foreign' proper names like 'Quiznos' are also 'unaccetpable'
And so, following the MQF criteria, here is a list of store names that need and don't need descriptors.

Harveys / Lafleurs
HMV / Archambault
Reitmans / Marie Claire
Aldo / Jean-Paul Fortin
Birks / Sebag
Bentley / Fournier
Greiche & Scaff / Antoine Laoun
Rogers / Videotron
Laura Secord / Laura
Ernest / Vincent D'Amérique
Parasuco / Tristan

Many of you readers are looking at the list above and asking yourselves if this is joke, but I assure you, it is not.
This is what the MQF is about....
I've heard some racist crap in my life and this fits right in with the worst.
Demanding that proper names pay 'tribute' to the French language is discrimination pure and simple.

According to the MQF, this sign is offensive

Perhaps Mr. Beaulieu and Madame Cloutier could implore the PQ to host a Wannsee-like conference to figure out rules and regulations pertaining to proper names and what will be permitted with or without descriptors.
After all, there are some thorny issues.
Stores like Ernest can be considered English or French, but considering that Ernest the owner, (who I know personally) is an Anglophone...well...

What about a store like 'Simons?'
Although the family has Scottish roots, the word Simon can actually be considered French.
But then one has to consider pronunciation and alas, the English version prevails (Sigh-mon, and not Cee-mo), so I guess a descriptor is in order.

Ah well, the subject boggles the imagination of any bone fide racist.

Ditto for Reitmans

By the way, I'd like to point out to that miserable piece of hate, Luce Cloutier, that the Reitmans clan (who I also have the honour to know personally) are a fine old Montreal family who run their retail empire from a head office right here in Montreal.
I don't know what her problem is with this Quebecois family.
Is it because they are Jewish, or is it because they are a Anglo?
Like the English, the Scots, the Irish, the Italians and a multitude of of other ethnicities who dominated business and industry in Quebec, are we all disdained for our success?

Back to Reitmans, a company which started with one store on St. Lawrence boulevard in 1928 and now operates close to 1,000 stores with 10,000 employees, across Canada.
For almost eighty-five years the company has provided employment for Quebecers and has paid millions upon millions in corporate taxes here.

Perhaps Madame Cloutier wishes to chase the head office of Reitmans out of Quebec, perhaps to Toronto, where they will be welcomed instead of humiliated.
Such is the depravity of the MQF racists.
For shame.

Incidentally, just in case the MQF doesn't know, there isn't a Quebecer in a gazillion who does not know that you don't go to Canadian Tire to buy a dress and you don't go to Reitmans to buy a hammer.

All the rest is racism, pure and simple.