Language shift and propaganda

Language Shift

The process in which a minority language is gradually replace by a dominant language is called language shift. It is a process that has been observed and well documented, most notably in the historical shifts to English by Celtic language speakers of Britain and Ireland. The main factors that cause a people to abandon their language for another are well understood by linguists. Addressing these factors is exactly what Quebec's language laws are about. In terms of linguistics, this is known as "language planning" and the goal is to achieve "language maintenance".

Any country will have a dominant language. This is not a problem when the citizens of this country all naturally speak this language. If, however, this country is the product of imperialism, the dominant language will often be one that dominates minority languages. It can be a forceful domination or an insidious one but the effects are often the same.

In most cases the majority language is numerically stronger as regards numbers of speakers (e.g. English in Wales or Scotland), but in some cases the majority language, spoken by a dominant elite may in fact be the first language of a minority (e.g. the elite status of Russian in Estonia during the Soviet era). In both cases, the balance of power between the different speech communities is rarely - if ever - equal. This power differential may be either perceived or real, with regard to a language group’s access to economic, political, legislative, cultural or educational resources.

A marked mismatch in power relations between these groups may result in language shift, whereby the disfavored language loses ground. Should this process continue, the outcome may be so-called language death. This is the fate that befell two of the Celtic languages, Cornish and Manx, which died out as native languages with the death of the last native speakers in 1777 and 1974, respectively.

Language shift doesn't happen overnight. It's a gradual process. A typical model looks something like this: Using the letter A for the language of the monolingual minority speech community and the letter B for the language of the majority speech community, the process of language shift can be represented as follows:

                                           A > Ab > AB > aB > B

Thus language shift over the space of a few generations begins and ends in monolingualism passing through three stages of bilingualism: Ab, where the bilingual is most competent in the minority language; AB, where the bilingual is a equally competent in both the minority and majority language; and aB, where the bilingual is most competent in the majority language.

This is how it played out in Scotland:

Percentages of Gaelic speakers (mono and bilingual) in Scotland in successive census years, 1891–2001. Red, 75–100% Gaelic speaking; orange, 50–74.9% Gaelic speaking; yellow, 25–49.9% Gaelic speaking; white, less than 25% Gaelic speaking.

According to this model, language maintenance appears to be under threat from the moment a population becomes bilingual. This isn't necessarily the case. If a minority language can maintain itself at the Ab stage, it is still secure as long as the minority language remains necessary in everyday life (i.e. it is not an optional language). In other words, French must be as essential in Quebec as English is in Ontario. Franco-Ontarians can get services in French, if they ask for them, but they understand that English is the common language and they are all bilingual anyway. It is very difficult to function in Ontario without English. The same must be true in Quebec with regards to French if we are to avoid language shift.

The Big Mistake

Probably the single biggest mistake the English made in Canada was simply not sticking to the plan. The Act of Union of 1840 laid it all out, Upper Canada (Ontario) was to be merged with Lower Canada (Quebec) in order to form the Province of Canada. Massive immigration from the British Isles would eventually make Francophones a minority. The French language was banned in the Parliament, Courts and all other governmental bodies of the new united province. An added bonus to all this was that Upper Canada could unload half of its massive debt onto the then-solvent Lower Canada.

Even though the English were given an artificial majority in the new parliament until they actually formed a real majority, the union never really worked out for them. Francophones tended to vote as a block, whereas the English vote was split so nothing could really get done without the consent of the Francophones (The whole idea was to marginalize them). This situation eventually lead to Confederation and the creation of the province of Quebec.

What the English ended up doing was giving us a state in which we were the majority. This would prove essential in resisting language shift. Had we remained a stateless minority, it would have been much harder, if not impossible, to resist the planned assimilation. It is through the government of Quebec that we have had the necessary tools to even begin to address the problem. We must also recognize the important role played by unions who had to fight for the basic right to be able to work in French.

Of course, it must be remembered that Canada did not become officially bilingual until 1969, a year after the Parti Quebecois was formed. French language schools in Ontario were not officially recognized under the provincial Education Act until 1968. In other words, only the fear of an independent Quebec moved Canada to clean up its act. Before that, we had to fight for even minimal recognition of our language like having some French on our stamps and currency. Nothing was ever given to us, it had to be fought for.

 

Propaganda

Any discussion about language policy in Quebec should be framed within the context of our history and the fact that we are a linguistic minority that faces challenges that the dominant, majority language does not. Unfortunately, our opponents aren't engaging in any kind of discussion. They are waging a very ugly propaganda war and like in any war, the truth is the first casualty.

Pastagate:

It all started with someone visiting an Italian restaurant in Montreal called Buona Notte. This person was presented with a menu which was in Italian and English only. Had he asked for a French version, he would have got one but instead he reported the incident to the OQLF.

The OQLF sent an inspector who was presented with the French version of the menu. He should have closed the case but instead he sent a letter to the owner of the restaurant about the headings in the menu (Antipasti, Pasta, Carne, Contorne, Pesce) which he felt should have a French equivalent. As always, he asked the owner to contact him in order the find an acceptable solution (The OQLF will often offer to pay part of the costs of the changes). The owner, however, chose to go to the Anglo media and claimed Quebec wanted to ban the word "pasta", this was repeated ad nauseum and even reached foreign media. He even began selling T-shits commemorating the event.

It's true, some mistakes were made but the way this story was distorted and exploited went well beyond any sense of proportion. Enforcing these types of laws will always be a tricky business. I'm sure if we were to scrutinize the CRTC's enforcement of Canada's Canadian content laws, we would also find some strange cases.

Other examples:

This one isn't even based on a real event. La Charte de la langue française does not regulate art. It regulates commercial signage only. The purpose here is to perpetuate the "language police" myth. The OQLF are endlessly portrayed as some kind of Gestapo that breaks down doors and arrests people.

It's not uncommon to find people in English Canada who actually seem to believe that you can be fined for speaking English in public in Quebec. All of our efforts to survive as a linguistic minority in this country are systematically vilified. It's not honest criticism, it's just slander.

The management and maintenance of the Mercier bridge is shared by the federal crown corporation The Jacques Cartier and Champlain Bridges Incorporated and the Ministère des Transports du Québec. Why not blame the federal government for the state of this bridge? Why not focus on the $332 million wasted on corruption and federalist propaganda during Canada's sponsorship scandal? No, that's not important. That was a worthy cause. The point here is simply that 1¢ spent on protecting the French language in Quebec is 1¢ too much.

Article 26(3) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: "Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children."

If you immigrate to Italy, can you demand that your child be given a publicly-funded education in English? No, of course not. Public education in Italy is in Italian. Public education in Quebec is in French with exceptions made for the traditional Anglophone community and for the Native people. However, these rules don't apply to private schools. Parents do have the right to choose. Quebec is no more in violation of this article than Italy or any other country. What these Anglophones really want is for Quebecers to subsidize the assimilation of their own society by providing English public education to any newcomer to Quebec. Refusing to do so is considered discrimination and a violation of human rights.

Conclusion

What should be apparent to anyone by now is that Canada is not, and never has been, willing to make any serious concessions in order to allow a minority language to survive. When its back is against the wall, Canada will pretend to make concessions, mostly meaningless ones like Trudeau's fantasy about a bilingual Canada. The reality boils down to being able to buy stamps in French or English anywhere in Canada but not much else. Francophones outside of Quebec are still being assimilated at an alarming rate.

Anyone interested in keeping Quebec a place where North American French can survive and thrive long into the future needs to understand that this will only happen in an independent Quebec. Keeping Quebec a province of Canada is keeping us all in a perpetual battlefield and I feel it is battle we may lose in the long run. The real choices are independence or assimilation. If I had my way, that would be the question for the next referendum: Independence or Assimilation?

Detective Murdoch and the case of the missing Canadian history

Louis Riel? Never heard of him.

Canadians have two national pastimes, hockey (at least if we are to believe Tim Horton ads) and Quebec bashing. By "bashing" I don’t mean criticism. Good criticism is fair-minded and self-consistent, whereas bashing is unfair, demagogic and sensationalistic and rests on double-standards and generalizes from a few anecdotes. In fact, the Quebec bashing article has become a kind of literary genre in itself. First we have the “incident”, supposedly illustrating the inherently intolerant nature of Quebecers. The incident can be true, partially true and exaggerated, or entirely fabricated. It doesn’t really matter. Next, we have the analysis of Quebec’s culture and everything that’s wrong with it. This is the most insidious part, as it’s just good old-fashioned bigotry masquerading as a sociological thesis. Also, by accusing something as intangible as our culture, there is no possible way we can defend ourselves which is the whole point of bashing.

Anyway, I’m proposing something similar. The “incident” is the repeated broadcast of episodes of The Murdoch mysteries. I will use this incident to analyse Canadian culture, but hopefully I will be more fair-minded. I should point out that I haven’t seen every episode, so I can’t be absolutely sure about my analysis. However, I hope that the synopsis of every episode found on Wikipedia and IMDb will be sufficient to fill in the blanks. I will start by what we see on the show, and then by what we don’t see.

Set in Toronto in the 1890s, The Murdoch Mysteries follow the investigations of detective William Murdoch of the Toronto constabulary. The main character is handsome, clean-cut and without any apparent flaws or vices. He is not an addict, like Sherlock Holmes (with whom we most readily compare Murdoch). He does not have obsessive-compulsive disorder like Adrian Monk, nor is he a slob like Columbo. He has no inner demons. In fact, he doesn’t seem to have much of an inner life at all, if you don’t count his infatuation with Dr. Julia Ogden. Murdoch is very forward-thinking, using the very latest scientific advances in his investigations. He is also a devout Roman Catholic, setting him apart from the largely Protestant (and Orange, the Order not the color) society in which he lives. In short, Murdoch is the poster boy for mental health, moral rectitude and men’s hair care products. A nineteenth century Ken doll with about as much depth and personality.

I believe it is precisely the main character’s bland goodness that provides much of the show’s appeal for Canadians. He validates the pathological need Canadians have of being the good guys of the universe, a need that stems from a deep seated insecurity. Canada is basically an empire, which means it has no inherent legitimacy. It must maintain itself through the constant suppression of its francophone minority. The good guy fantasy provides a means of dealing with that unpleasant reality. It also provides a means of feeling superior both to the French and the Americans, another source of insecurity. Indeed, after the Conquest, the American Revolution is the second event that had a profound effect in shaping the Canadian character. It was because of this that Canada became populated by Loyalists, people who believed it was better to suck up to wealth (in the form of the British monarchy) and power (the mighty British Empire) than to take a chance with those crazy revolutionaries who spoke of liberty and a republican form of government. Ever since history has shown that they backed the wrong horse, Canadians have felt a need to prove something to Americans. This need is even more acute since Canada became a cultural colony of the United States (and since Harper came to power, a political one as well).

The Murdoch Mysteries is even more interesting in what it doesn’t show, specifically its troubled relationship with history. Its Wikipedia page states that “real history is an important element in most episodes”. This is true, in a way. The show seems to take a People magazine approach to history, in that the great names of the period (Henry Ford, Harry Houdini, Nikola Tesla, Arthur Conan Doyle, H. G. Wells and so on) all make an appearance for one contrived reason or another. It’s as if they’re all strangely attracted to Toronto, which must have been a pretty unremarkable city at the time. Often, the historical celebs serve as an excuse to talk about the century that is to come, not to reflect on the one just past. It’s as if the Canada of the 1890s depicted on the show has no past, only a future.

But a past Canada most certainly has, even in the 1890s. At that time, the British Empire was at the height of its power and arrogance. The Orange Order was a powerful force in Canada, with its hatred of all things Catholic and a general hostility towards anyone who wasn’t White Anglo-Saxon and Protestant. We do see some of this on the show. Inspector Brackenreid and Constable Crabtree are Orangemen, we see instances of prejudice against the Chinese and Jewish communities, and Murdoch’s Catholicism (very) occasionally causes problems for him. But it all feels very watered down, very mild. This is the same Orange Order, after all, that was involved in the burning of the parliament building in Montreal in 1849, fought the right to French instruction wherever it could, and would later develop ties with the Ku Klux Klan¹.

It is here, I think, that we hit the nail on the head. While there is nothing specifically Canadian about prejudice against Catholics, Jews and other visible minorities, francophobia is quintessentially Canadian. It is also conspicuously absent from the show. The only episode I am aware of with anything French in it is Monsieur Murdoch, season 4, where Murdoch investigates the disappearance of a young woman from France and collaborates with a French police officer. Apart from the fact that the French policeman plays into all the stereotypes Anglos have about Frenchmen, I should point out that French people from France is not the same as francophones from Canada. At the very least, the show’s creators could insert some casual francophobia here and there, so as to create some realism. They could put in a throwaway scene where, during an Orangemen parade, two francophones unwisely speak French to each other in the street. They are then accosted by a group of hostile Orangemen and told to “speak white”. Murdoch witnesses the scene and is vaguely embarrassed by it, but walks on. This sort of thing, after all, is a natural part of life in British North America.

Alternatively, the show’s creators can use some major historical events as part of the story. Events like the Red River Rebellion (1869), the North-West Rebellion (1885) and the ongoing discrimination against francophones are all within living memory in the 1890s and are filled with conflict, injustice and resentment. Going back a little further we have the brutal repression of the Patriotes in Quebec (1837-38), also filled with violence and Anglo militias looting and burning the homes of Quebecers^2,3. This is all great material for a murder mystery writer with an affinity for history. Let’s see if we can’t help the show’s writers by proposing a story idea. When Manitoba joined the Canadian Empire... I mean, Confederation in 1870, it was officially bilingual. But by 1890 it became officially unilingual English, thanks in no small part to the efforts of a rabid francophobe called D’Alton McCarthy⁴ who died in 1898 in a carriage accident … or was it? Murdoch is on the case. And he suspects foul play. Evidence points to the possibility that the murderer may be a former guerrilla for Louis Riel. Murdoch questions Riel’s former lieutenant Gabriel Dumont, who happens to be in Toronto for some implausible reason. During the course of the interrogation we learn all the sad and sordid details about the dispossession of the Métis. History comes alive!

The lesson here is that Canadian history is not boring. Canadians make it boring by systematically ignoring those parts where they don’t look good, which also happen to be the most interesting parts. It could be argued that the creators of The Murdoch Mysteries are free to make any kind of show they want, including one where a Victorian-era detective goes around solving crimes in a Bourgeois and genteel society. After all, most detective shows aren’t at all interested in history. All this is true, but then why bother doing a period piece in the first place? Why couldn’t Murdoch solve crimes in contemporary Toronto? It just seems like a wasted opportunity to bring history to life in all its conflict, pain and tragedy. That is what the show lacks the most, a sense of the tragic. Even the murders don’t seem particularly tragic. Instead, we have an hour long heritage minute with commercial breaks, approved by the Harper government and designed to appeal to Canadian vanity. We get Canadian history as clean as the tables at Tim Horton’s after the busboy swabbed it down and as sweet as the jelly donuts with maple frosting on special that day.

Of course, there is an alternate explanation. Maybe Canadians don’t feel a need to talk about history involving Quebec and francophones outside of Quebec because they don’t consider it to be part of Canadian history. That is, in spite of all their talk of a “Canadian family”, they don’t consider us to be real Canadians. Just as the Indians were never really British and the Algerians were never really French, deep down Canadians will always consider us internal foreigners.

1 – Normand Lester, Le livre noir du Canada Anglais 2, Les Intouchables, 2002.

2 – Normand Lester, Le livre noir du Canada Anglais, Les Intouchable, 2001.

3 – John F. Conway, Des comptes à rendre, VLB éditeur, 1995.

4 – Jean-Paul Marchand, Conspiration? Les anglophones veulent-ils éliminer le français du Canada?, Stanké, 1997.

Language equality or English supremacy?

Since the election of the Parti Quebecois on September 4th 2012, Anglophones in Quebec seem to be whipping themselves into a frenzy. It may be because of the NDP sweep of Quebec in the 2011 federal elections and certain polls at the time showing that support for sovereignty in Quebec was dropping that Anglos felt that this whole “Québécois” thing was coming to an end. They must have felt that the time was right to start pushing back and getting Quebec back on the path to assimilation. Then comes this minority PQ government trying to impose their new language laws on everyone!?! It was muscle-flexing time. A bunch of Anglos came together on Facebook on a site called “Put Canadian Flag back In Quebec Assembly” (which is kind of ironic because that foreign flag was never actually removed). The owners of this site began seeing themselves as the center of a new Tahrir square movement and they began promising a huge demonstration against these modifications to the language laws on February 17th 2013 .

They were going on about it for months. They kept telling us that thousands had said “maybe”.  In the end, barely two hundred people showed up for this gathering. It was a huge failure but the organizers blamed the weather. It's nothing new, even the Nazis blamed the weather for their failures (Wow, it is easy to make gratuitous comparisons with Nazis). But what were that handful of people really doing out there? In their postmortem, they gave a few reasons like:

• Bill 14 would give the PQ language minister Diane de Courcy judicial type powers of seizure and the ability to seize personal computers, files, documents and whatever they feel admissible.

I have no idea where they came up with this one. I couldn't find it anywhere. I'm sure it was "implied" somehow...

• Bill 14 would close a loophole that allows francophone military families a right to send their children to English schools.

The official language of Quebec is French. Public education in Quebec is in French. There are a few exceptions for Anglos and Native people, but why should we make exceptions for grunts? I don't get it.

• Bill 14 would force high school and CEGEP students to have a “mastery” of the french language in order to graduate. Please note high schools and CEGEPS already have french language immersion and requirements to graduate. What the PQ considers “mastery” is unknown at this moment.

Governments impose standardized tests all the time. Why should we be shocked about this one? Maybe there are a lot of Anglo graduates who still can't function in French. I certainly know a few.

•  Bill 14 would strip municipalities and their citizens of bilingual status and publications.

Demographics change all the time. When Francophones asked for services in French in English Canada, they were often told that those services incurred costs and that they were only given "where numbers warrant". The fact that Quebec would apply the same standards makes it racist!

We were then given the following stirring words:

They WERE there to express how they love freedom, equality and liberty. They WERE there to tell them they want a Constitution that you may very well take for granted, to apply to them as Quebeckers and Canadians and not just the rest of Canada.

The next time you gauge your pride in your nation by donning a Team Canada jersey, the next time you sew on the flag to your backback before you travel, the next time you hold your head high and think, "I am proud to be a Canadian" you need to ask yourself the following questions: 

Ask yourself how would you feel if your rights were being taken away in the most offensive and apparent ways? And what if your fellow countrymen have remained silent and abandoned you for over 40 years?

These Quebecers and proud Canadians who, despite insurmountable odds, threats and acts of violence against them, and regardless of laws that already exist which classify them as second class citizens came out to stand in solidarity.

Francophones, anglophones, immigrants and people from all cultural backgrounds in finger numbing cold and despite every  justifiable reason to believe an entire country has forgotten them, today they stood arm-in-arm to say they still love their country. And regardless of the odds, they stood together to say, "We are proud to be Canadians!".

After today, I feel a very strong case could be made for them being the greatest Canadians in the nation. So the next time you take a moment to reflect on what Canada means to you, take a moment to think of them. The Quebec protestors that stood there in the cold for hours and remember that on Feb 17th 2013, they showed the rest of Canada that they DO care.

So please do not abandon them,  they have not abandoned you Canada.

I nearly lost my lunch reading that crap. As nauseating as it sounds, these are the terms in which they frame their "struggle". On their site, they have referred to themselves as freedom-fighters and Quebec's language laws are routinely described as the most vile oppression since Nazi Germany. Believe me, I'm only slightly exaggerating. The Facebook page purports to be fighting against language discrimination and is filled with stories about the OQLF's sillier antics,  people refusing to speak English in the metro and basically anything negative about Pauline Marois. Recently there were two videos that were highlighted on their page which sheds some light on what is being portrayed as "language discrimination" in Quebec.

The case of Onehundredjobs:

This video is made by someone who is known on Youtube as Onehundredjobs. Ms Jobs starts by tells us of her upbringing in Ontario, going to French immersion school and moving to Quebec, etc. Then she tells us of her dismay at seeing a reemergence of old battles she felt had been resolved in the 2000s. I have no idea what she believes was resolved during the reign of the Charest cabal. I guess to some, a corrupt government in Quebec City that doesn't give a shit about the future of Quebec equals problem solved. Ms Jobs then moves on to the changes to Quebec's language laws proposed by the PQ which she completely distorts. According to Ms Jobs, Anglophone kids will now be forced to go to French daycare. She characterizes this shocking law as FASCIST!

Meanwhile back in the real world, what the PQ are proposing is extending a watered down version of Bill 101 to publicly subsidized daycares. As usual, Anglophones are exempt. Francophones and immigrants have French subsidized daycares available to them. If that is not acceptable, private daycares are available in English or other languages. Fascism indeed!

Ms Jobs then moves on to denounce fictitious laws that demand that shop clerks address customers in French only. No such laws exist but nonetheless, the hysterical Ms Jobs boldly asserts that she will not be EXTERMINATED! Her act of defiance is to refuse to speak French. Of course, she won't be the first Anglophone in Quebec to refuse to speak French... Not by a long shot!

Ms Jobs responds to challenges to her assertions by deleting them and blocking anyone who disputes her version of reality.

The case of Mohamed H. Amin:

This video is made by Mohamed H. Amin. He is not insane, he is a limited edition. I have no idea what that is supposed to mean but Mr Amin seems to think it is quite clever. This is about his visit to the SAAQ. If what he says is true, someone at the SAAQ refused to speak to his wife and him in English. She told them that they are in Quebec and we speak French here. He reminded her that she is NOT in Quebec but in Canada and Canada has two official languages, English and French. It is his choice and since he pays her salary through his taxes, he can choose to speak to her in English if he wants. But she kept on speaking in French.

Then, she hit the "next" button. This humiliated Mohamed in front of his wife and child (the dramatic music stops when he says this... to make it more dramatic). Moe wanted to complain to the manager but his wife said it was useless because the government encourages this behavior.  Moe then feared that one day his daughter will be brainwashed by the government and tell him that he has to speak French because we are in Quebec! Discrimination has become a culture in Quebec according to Mr Amin.

Mr Amin clearly does not understand how the Canadian system works. The different tiers of government are a mystery to him. He simply can't get his head around how the federal government can have two official languages but a provincial government can have just one. Yet this is the case for 9 out of 10 provinces. The official language of Alberta is English and their version of the SAAQ is under no obligation to offer services in French. If Quebec and the SAAQ are guilty of language discrimination then so are all the other provinces with the exception of New Brunswick. But the accusation of discrimination only seems to apply to Quebec.

It was suggested to Moe that if he were truly concerned about discrimination, perhaps he should make a video about the plight of the Copts (Christians) of Egypt who face a rather violent form of discrimination. Mr Amin answered that there is no discrimination against the Copts in Egypt. He said it was all just Western lies designed to undermine the Muslim Brotherhood. He then added that the Copts were also guilty of violence against Muslims. So basically, it's all lies and, anyways, they do it, too.

Clearly logic and honesty are not among Mr Amin's virtues. And clearly his video has nothing to do with denouncing any discrimination in Quebec. It is about a personal vendetta Mr Amin has against an employee of the SAAQ. Moe has simply expanded this vendetta to include all Francophones in Quebec.

Quebec's language laws

Quebec's language laws are not about exterminating Anglophones in Quebec as some hysterical headless chickens would have you think. They are not about discrimination and they are not about racism. They are about ensuring that French is the common language in Quebec just like English is the common language everywhere else in Canada. More importantly, they are about integrating immigrants.

Canada has been a demographics battle ground for a long time. After the rebellion of 1837, it was decided that Francophones in Canada should be assimilated through massive immigration from the British isles. At that time Francophones were still the majority in Canada. By the 1850s they had become a minority. By 1900, Francophones made up roughly 30% of the population of Canada. Today, Francophones represent only 23% of the population. There is a certain trend here that is kind of hard to miss.

When the supply of British immigrants ran out, Canada began luring people from other parts of Europe offering incentives to populate Western Canada.  This is the same era that saw the banning of French schools throughout English Canada and a surplus of people in Quebec who saw no alternative but to immigrate to the USA. It's not just a trend but a deliberate pattern with a very obvious aim.

Immigration has been used as a weapon against the French-speaking population of Canada for a long time. The counter-attack came in the form of a prodigious birth rate but that is now gone. If the Francophones of North America are to survive they need to integrate immigrants. This is an up-hill battle when you are a minority in someone else's country. Immigrants naturally tend to join the dominant group. Before Bill 101, 90% of immigrants to Quebec ended up as Anglophones.

Quebec's language laws have had some success in integrating immigrants. Now roughly 50% become Francophones. It's still not enough but it is an improvement. However, the language laws are a double edged sword. They seem to have lulled a significant portion of Francophones into a false sense of security. The decline has become slower and more incremental. It becomes easier to pretend that maybe Quebec can exist in Canada. The reality is that Quebec's position in Canada is untenable. Only by becoming a majority in an independent Quebec will there be a real future for the French-speaking people of North America.

Anglophones like those behind the Flag site pretend that there is some kind of equality between English and French in Canada and so protection of one language and not the other is inequality and discrimination. In reality, French and English are not on equal footing in North America. Anglophones are in no way a minority on this continent. Francophones are the 2% minority. Let's get that straight. Calling for institutionalized bilingualism in the province of Quebec is calling for the slow extermination of a culture and I'm sure that these Flagheads know it. Even an idiot can see it:

What’s wrong with the Canadian empire?

What’s wrong with the Canadian empire? Exactly that, it’s an empire. The only reason Quebec is in Canada today is because of a military invasion that occurred over 250 years ago. That is the fundamental fact about Canada: it is the product of war, of conquest, not consensus. And that war is still going on. The war of the Conquest (or the French and Indian war or the Seven Year war, as it is known to some) has never really ended. It continues in the ongoing low-intensity conflict the Canadian empire wages to preserve itself. As the great Clausewitz once wrote, war is about imposing your will on the enemy. This is exactly what the Canadian empire has been doing by (mostly) psychological means (with a few notable exceptions). Psychological war, after all, is still war.

The two main weapons in this war are intimidation for most Quebecers and bribery for a small clique willing to sell out their country for personal gain. The traitors are well-known. Trudeau, Chrétien, Dion, Desmarais, Charest, Couillard and others do their utmost to preserve the empire because it’s profitable for them to do so. The intimidation was most clearly visible in the form of the War Measures Act during the October crisis which had nothing to do with fighting the FLQ and everything to do with terrifying people with the wrong political opinions. The intimidation may not always be overt, but it is always there. Not only did the WMA serve as an example as to what might happen, but more significantly, the de facto impunity of the RCMP officers involved in various crimes and dirty tricks sent an even more insidious message. This impunity for those who commit crimes in the name of imperial unity sends the message that no mere laws will stand in the way. It undermines the very meaning of any “charter of rights”. Indeed, the WMA and the abuses surrounding it weren’t counter-terrorism but rather counter-terror.

However, not all intimidation comes from the state. The Canadian people themselves play an important part by approving, tacitly or otherwise, the repressive measures taken by Ottawa. Indeed, Trudeau never would have invoked the WMA if he didn't think he could get away with it politically. Likewise, the Canadian people strongly support the infamous anti-democracy law, euphemistically called the “clarity bill”. But sometimes, the relationship is inversed. Such as when enraged Anglos burned down the United-Canada parliament building in Montreal in 1849 because it was about to enact legislation compensating inhabitants of Lower-Canada who suffered losses during the revolts of 1837-38, this was not commanded by the government, but since it was carried out by “United Empire Loyalists” no one was punished. One can easily imagine that if Quebecers carried out actions one tenth as bad, the punitive results would have been very different. All this brings us back to the issue of impunity undermining the rule of law.

The dual combination of intimidation and bribery means that the Canadian empire rests on fear and greed. This is hardly surprising as all empires are about the management of fear. By definition, an empire is the domination of one nation by another nation through the use of force. Having no inherent legitimacy, empires maintain themselves by the chronic use of force or by threatening to use force, either explicitly or implicitly. For political reasons, it is profitable for empires to get members of the conquered nation to perform the repression. This is where bribery and greed come in. It’s in the empire’s interest to keep the subject nation divided, and this is precisely the role of the PLQ in Quebec. Naturally, all this bribery leads to corruption. While there is a lot of corruption in Quebec, it’s no accident that all those involved are federalists. The root cause of this corruption is that the PLQ and federalists in general, are more concerned with pleasing Ottawa and its unofficial viceroy (Paul Desmarais Sr.) than serving the interests of Quebec. And of course, they and their dependents expect to be generously rewarded for their services.

In closing, we return to where this article began: Canada is war. The war of the Conquest morphed into a system of domination of the Quebec people and an ongoing campaign of cultural genocide, both outside Quebec and within it. Talk of equality and freedom of choice by Anglos today is pure hypocrisy because they know perfectly well that in the present context it favors them and hastens our assimilation. But this hypocrisy, and the racism that accompanies it, is also a product of Canadian imperialism. Truman once said something to the effect that you can’t keep a people in the gutter without getting into the gutter yourself. He was referring to the plight of African-Americans in the 1950’s, but it also applies to how Canada dominates Quebec. Such domination not only makes Quebecers cynical and resigned, but makes Canadians hypocritical, racist and pretty creepy. The independence of Quebec would not only liberate Quebec, but it would also free Canadians of the mental straitjacket necessary to keep their empire together. On that day, Canadians will wake from their imperial illusions and see Quebec and themselves with clarity and lucidity.

Dependence vs independence: Newfoundland and Iceland

Over sixty years ago, Iceland and Newfoundland were both colonies, dependent on the motherland.  In 1944, Iceland, a desperately poor place, took its independence from Denmark. Five years later, Newfoundlanders went in the opposite direction and voted to join Canada. 

Iceland and Newfoundland share more than their rugged appearance. They are isolated. They are similar in size. They depend on the fishery as their mainstay and have done so for centuries. The people are as rugged as the land. They drink excessively. They live intensely. They are fiercely independent. Their cultural roots run deep. Iceland has its sagas, Newfoundland its folksongs.

But that's where the similarities end. Although Iceland was much worse off than Newfoundland, since winning their independence Iceland has prospered while Newfoundland hasn't fared as well. Unlike Newfoundland, Iceland has very few resources, save the codfish. Yet, it is one of the most prosperous countries in the world. Unlike Newfoundland, Iceland is not losing its young people for lack of work. And Iceland still has a thriving cod fishery, and a bright future.

From The Passionate Eye's blurb for the June 2005 showing of "Hard Rock and Water".

Cod fish and sovereignty

So, why did Iceland prosper and Newfoundland stagnate? History has rarely given us such a perfect test case. Both countries were heavily dependent on the cod industry in the 1940s. Independent Iceland took complete control of its vital industry, managed it well and it is still going strong today. Newfoundland, however, handed over an industry that represented 80% of its GDP to the Canadian government in 1949, since fisheries is federal jurisdiction.

The result has been called “managed annihilation,” “Confederation’s greatest failure,” “a national embarrassment, a national shame.” The demise of the cod fishery off Newfoundland is now legendary as an environmental and economic disaster. Over 19,000 fishers and plant workers laid off indefinitely, another 20,000 jobs directly impacted – the biggest layoff in Canadian history. And yet, for most Canadians the loss of the Northern cod is at most a distant misfortune – something that was probably inevitable and had nothing to do with them.

When Newfoundland and Labrador became a province, Canada was more than happy to take over the fisheries jurisdiction and subject it to federal priorities. The end result was the replacement of the traditional salt-fish trade with deep-sea factory-freezer trawler, and corporations taking over from the merchants of St. John’s and the outports.

Soon both Canadian and foreign vessels were dragging the ocean floor for the largest catches in history. In 1968, a record 810,000 tonnes of northern cod were harvested – more than three times the estimated maximum sustainable catch at the time. These vessels vacuumed up the fish and took over the markets. The smaller, more sustainable community-based fisheries of Newfoundland were increasingly marginalized. It was only a matter of time before the whole thing would collapse.

In 1992, the Canadian government imposed a moratorium on Newfoundland's cod fishery. This closure ended almost 500 years of fishing activity in Newfoundland, and it put over 35,000 people out of work. Fish plants closed, boats remained docked, and hundreds of coastal communities that had depended on the fishery for generations watched their economic and cultural mainstay disappear overnight.

Iceland, on the other hand, was far more protective of its cod industry. In the 1970s Iceland nearly went to war when British boats began fishing in its waters. When cod stocks starting depleting on both sides of the Atlantic, Iceland took pre-emptive measures, slashing quotas and protecting its waters from other European boats. That approach has payed off today. Iceland still has a cod fish industry. But despite a nearly 25 year moratorium, Newfoundland's cod industry has yet to recover.

Vital industry vs plunder

The real power brokers in Canada don't live in Newfoundland. Most of them live in Ontario's Golden Horseshoe. To them the economic engine of Canada has always been Southern Ontario and now, to some degree, Alberta. Other regions are mainly for extracting resources and fishing has never made up more than 1% of Canada's GDP. Should we really be surprised that Newfoundland's cod industry was mismanaged? No one will look after your interests better than you will. It's a basic lesson you learn once you're out of childhood.

It's far easier to simply send welfare checks to Newfoundland than it is to spend the time and energy necessary to properly build up and manage its economy for the benefit of the people living there. You know, like what the Icelanders did with their own economy. I think the answer to the question of why Iceland prospered while Newfoundland stagnated is obvious. Newfoundlanders made the colossal mistake of handing over their sovereignty to the Canadian government and in return they got mismanagement and neglect. Then came the welfare checks and the derision in the Canadian media for being beggars and welfare bums; a derision that is usually reserved for Quebecers.

Quebecers should learn the lesson of Newfoundland and Iceland. Independence for Quebec is not just for cultural reasons; it is also for economic reasons. No one will look after our economic interests better than we will. It's that simple. Iceland, a country with very few natural resources, doesn't need handouts from anyone. They are masters of their own destiny and we should be, too.

Quebec nationalism and the decline of Montreal

"A free nation writes its own history. A subjugated nation sees its history imposed by others whose primary purpose is to perpetuate the subjugation."

Here's how the story goes: Once upon a time, there was a prosperous city called Montreal that was the economic capital of Canada. But one day, dark forces called "Quebec Nationalism" began causing "instability" and in 1977 they imposed French on everyone through La charte de la langue française AKA Bill 101. The good people of Montreal (Anglo capitalists) fled in horror to the safety of Toronto taking all their money with them. And that is why Toronto is now the economic capital of Canada, not Montreal.

Well, that's how it was told to me a number of times. It always struck me as a strange story. As long as there is money to be made, there will be capitalists there to do business. Even the rise of the overtly racist and genocidal Hitler in Germany did not scare away western capitalists. But somehow the PQ and their Bill 101 managed to terrify all these big corporations. Is French really that scary?

There's no denying that the decline of Montreal and the rise of Toronto do seem to be linked and there were some well publicized "capital flight" stories in the media at the time. One only has to think of the story of those Brink's trucks full of cash leaving for Toronto right before the 1970 Quebec elections. OK, that one was a staged media propaganda stunt but Sun Life's headquarters did pack up and leave for Toronto in 1978, listing Bill 101 as one of the reasons. Did Quebec nationalism really cause this economic shift from Montreal to Toronto? If not, then what is the real cause?

The St. Lawrence Seaway

There is, of course, another event that coincides with this economic shift which is the completion of the St. Lawrence Seaway in 1959. Prior to this, all ocean-going vessels had to stop in Montreal to unload goods which were then shipped to the Great Lakes on smaller vessels or by rail. Most Canadian exports passed through Montreal as well. The St. Lawrence river has always been an important trade route and Montreal is situated at the most strategic spot on this route. Any city in a position like that will prosper.

However, this all changed in 1959. Thanks to the St. Lawrence Seaway, ocean-going vessels could simply bypass Montreal and continue to the Great Lakes and Toronto. So, it's not surprising that much of the economic activity related to this international trade also bypassed Montreal and went to Toronto in the following decades. Politics did play a role in this economic shift but it wasn't Quebec nationalism. It was political decisions made by the English Canadian establishment which favoured Toronto over Montreal.

The real question we need to ask ourselves is what independent country would have gone along with such a project without any real compensation? I'm not saying that the St. Lawrence Seaway is necessarily a bad thing for Quebec. The Panama and Suez canals are both money makers for their respective countries but the revenues Quebec gets from the Seaway are nothing compared to what it lost. The reality is that no sovereign country would have agreed to that. The province of Quebec, however, had no choice but to go along with a plan that was detrimental to its economy. Not only did Quebecers have to go along with the plan but they had to partly finance it through their taxes.

Being dominated by another nation has its price. We're never told of this story and of how many billions were sucked out of Quebec and sent to Toronto. No, we're not told about that but we are endlessly told about transfer payments and how Quebec is like Greece or a third-world country and how Quebec needs Canada to support its extravagant socialist life-style!?!

I think it's time for Quebec to start writing its own history and stop letting others invent it for us.

Discrimination in Quebec... and Canada!

It's not hard to find anglophones in Quebec who feel that they are the victims of discrimination. The more hysterical ones will even make comparisons with Nazi Germany or Apartheid South-Africa. The source of this discrimination, they say, is the Charter of the French Language, also known as Bill 101. Quebec, of course, does have language laws but do they really constitute discrimination? Why do francophones in Quebec feel that they need these laws? In order to achieve a rational understanding of something, we need to understand the context, the bigger picture. Let's take a look.

I know It may come as a shock to people raised on a Heritage Minute, sanitized pablum version of Canadian history but Canada's history is not a Disney movie. In fact, to some, it is more of a Stephen King novel. When I come across one of these hysterical Quebec Anglos with their shrill accusations of "racism" and "oppression", I like to remind them of the following laws that were passed by English Canadians and the British before them:

1916 - Province of Manitoba: The Thornton Act, by abolishing bilingual schools, completely ends the teaching of French in the province

1912 - Province of Ontario: Circular of Instructions Regulation No. 17 and No. 18. Forbids the teaching of French above the first two grades of elementary school.

1890 - Province of Manitoba: Official Language Act banning French, formerly an official language in the province. Premier Greenway diminishes the rights to French school, abolishes its use in the Parliament and in the Courts of the province. The act was declared unconstitutional 90 years later!

1877 - Province of Prince-Edward-Island: The Public School Act puts an end to the teaching of French in schools.

1871 - Province of New Brunswick: The Common School Act imposes double taxation measures against French Catholic schools.

1864 - Province of Nova Scotia: The act on public schools suppresses all subsidies to Catholic and French language schools.

1840 - Great Britain: The Parliament of Great Britain adopts An Act to reunite the Provinces of Upper and Lower Canada, and form the Government of Canada which places the former Franco-Catholic majority of Lower Canada in an artificially-created position of minority in a new Parliament inside which they were purposely under-represented. The French language is banned in the Parliament, Courts and all other governmental bodies of the new united province. French is explicitly banned in a constitutional text of law.

Confronted with these facts, the hysterical Anglo will generally shrug and say that that was the past. It's not like that now. This is true but the Anglo will rarely reflect on the meaning or consequences of these laws. He will see them as some aberration in Canada's otherwise glorious history of wonderfulness. I think a more honest reading of Canadian history shows that these laws were not an anomaly but were a central part of English Canada's policy of containment and assimilation with regards to French. 

Most people have heard of Lord Durham's report, you know the one where he recommends the assimilation of francophones through massive immigration, but don't seem to make the link with subsequent events, like the laws mentioned earlier. The objective of all this was clearly to stop French from spreading. No second French-speaking province was to be allowed to take root... and it worked. Millions of Quebecer are today Americans because of these polices. A truly bi-national, bilingual Canada could have existed but it was intentionally prevented for coming into being.

The situation in Quebec was not much better for francophones. Prior to the 1960s, we find a typical colonial setup. If you were Francophone you were generally relegated to the lowest rungs of the economic ladder. In some companies, even the position of foreman was exclusively held by Anglophones. Many parts of Montreal were as English as Toronto and your chances of being served in French were about the same as in Toronto. Before Bill 101, Montreal was basically an English city where the majority spoke French. Also, about 90% of immigrants to Quebec ended up as Anglophones. francophones had basically accepted their subordinate position to Anglophones for decades until the 1960s.

Many things changed in Quebec in the 1960s. One of which was the economic prospects of francophones. This was largely due to people like Jacques Parizeau who created organizations like la Société générale de financement and la Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec which made capital generally available to francophones for the first time. This completely changed the economic landscape in Quebec. Quebec was no longer the fiefdom of a small group of wealthy Anglo oligarchs.

Many anglophones like to attribute the impoverished state of francophones before the 1960s to the influence of the Catholic Church. While it is true that the Church was certainly guilty of leading Quebecers up the garden path for a long time, I believe their importance in Quebec society was directly proportional to their usefulness to the Anglo oligarchs of Quebec. In any case, once Quebecers had a way of improving their lot, they completely abandon the Church so it's not likely that it was the Church that was really holding them back.

So, as we can see, politics have always dictated language policy in Canada, usually against francophones. For a long time, Anglophones had a lot of power over francophones in Quebec and the result was English mansions in Westmount and French slums in St-Henri. Then, francophones in Quebec used democratic institutions to regain control of their destiny which lead to a lot of positive changes for francophones AND the dreaded language laws.

Are Quebec's language laws justice or revenge?

First, let's consider a few facts:

1. The sign legislation does not violate the freedom of expression which is destined to protect the pluralism of political, ideological and artistic expression and is only remotely related to commercial signs.
2. Anglophones in Quebec continue to do business in English. The sign legislation does not prevent anglophone merchants from advertising in English on radio and television and in newspapers, weeklies, neighbourhood publications and mailings.
3. Bill 101 does not threaten the continued existence of the historical institutions of the anglophone community, the schools, universities, hospitals, social welfare centres and community organizations.
4. If at least one of your parents went to English school, you can go from day-care to University entirely in English in publicly funded institutions. If neither of your parents went to English schools, you can still do the all-English education but your primary and secondary school education will be done in private schools.

Conclusion: The integrity of the Quebec anglophone community is not endangered.

Quebec's language laws may be a nuisance to Anglos in Quebec but they are not discrimination. Like Affirmative Action in The US, they are designed to correct an historical injustice. The problem here, of course, is that most white Americans do acknowledge the injustice done to Black people in the US, whereas most English Canadians refuse to accept that they are responsible for any injustices done to anyone, francophone, native or anyone.

Quebec is the only place left in North America where it is still possible to live and work in French. We have laws to make sure that this will continue into the future. Personally, I think independence is a better option than laws. The demands of Anglo-Quebecers seems to be that Quebec should stay a province of an English-speaking country and abandon all protection of its language. I fail to see how anyone can see that as anything other than a demand for cultural genocide for the last viable community of French-speaking people in North America. A people who have inhabited this continent for over 400 years.