Air canada loses lawsuit over stewardess failing to speak in "mother tongue"

[rumpleforeskiin]

By the way, there are more french speaking people in Toronto than the total population of Trois-Rivières. The spirit of the canadian approach on bilinguism, with some exceptions like Air Canada, is that services should be provided in both languages where the numbers justify it, not the proportion of official language speakers.

There are, as of 2006, 30,045 native French speakers in Toronoto, or 1.2% of the population. The population of Trois-Rivieres is 130,407.

In fact, French isn't even the second most common primary language spoken in Toronto, lagging well behind Chinese, Italian, Punjabi, Tagalog/Filipino, and Portuguese, at least.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trois_Rivieres
http://www.toronto.ca/invest-in-toronto/lang_first.htm
http://www.toronto.ca/toronto_facts/diversity.htm

note: I posted this prior to reading Cloud's post on languages spoken in Toronto. I'm going to leave it intact as it contains additional information and links to Toronto's official website documenting the numbers.

 

[eastender]

Getting Positive Results

Usual thread degeneration when the linguistic issue is raised, assumptions, extreme analogies and bluster that do not address the point made initially.

First I would like to state that I am multilingual. eastern European mother tongue followed by French then English.

Life is about getting positive results. If you do not get the service you are entitled to then depending on your mindset various actions are available to you - complain, protest, go elsewhere, sue if you are litigious, etc.

Dealing with public servants, receptionists, clerks etc is far from the main objective in life for most people. Do it at an efficient, minimalist level and things work well. Relying on a bus driver for directions is a waste of time. Since the internet, if you do not know how to get somewhere when leaving the house, apt, hotel, etc then expecting a bus driver to help is rather quaint. Gone are the sixties when a Montreal bus driver could give you precise directions from the deep east end to Lachine. Today with a loaded bus they hardly know the specific route and do not have time to notice obscure details while controlling a bus in traffic. Even in the language of their choice they usually do not know.

Same with clerks, most merchandise is wrapped in bilingual packaging. Do not expect a clerk to have read let alone remembered all the details about the varied items available in a store, likewise at a restaurant or elsewhere the typical part time clerk has little knowledge about the product or service.

Likewise the CLSC or the various government agencies. Appropriate cards and documents at the ready will get you to the person who can actually do what has to get done. At that point the issue is handled or you learn that you need a professional on your side.

Learn the basics of getting positive results.

 

[x.Minie]

^ The voice of reason rises above the shouts, clamours and dissonant noises. Excellent post Mister!

 

[sapman99]

Apples and apples

You can call TTC customer service and get serviced in many languages but this is not the case in Quebec.. Check this link on the TTC website and look for multilingual services-> http://www3.ttc.ca/Contact_Us/index.jsp

As a fifteen-year resident of Toronto, I was very curious about this, so I checked the Website:

The link you provide has several phone numbers, and one of them is for "Multilingual Services". It is the same number as their route info line.

I called it and here is what happens:

• An English recorded voice comes on, giving a set of options, including how to get to multilingual services. You have to press 7, then 2, then 2 if I remember correctly. Remember that so far, you have to understand English to get there.
• Once in the French menu, you have the choice of three recorded messages, none of which gives you full access to a route planner.

I am by the way, not knocking the TTC. Just correcting Cloud's claim and assumption about comparative linguistic services in both Transit Commissions.

Ok, so I checked the STM site. The link for English is clearly at the top right of every page, and the site is fully translated in English. I clicked "Contact Us" and scrolled to the phone contact, got the number and called it.

"Bienvenue à la Société de Transport de Montréal. For service in English, press 8". After doing that, you get the same full menu of information options the French get.

Sounds pretty simple :lol:.

 

[rumpleforeskiin]

I want to address the legendary hostility of the French toward the English in Montreal, but only through the lens of my own experience. As background, I've been spending considerable time in Montreal for the last 15 years and for the last three I've had a home here where I spend about half my time. I've specifically chosen, for a number of reasons, to live in an area of the near East End, the Plateau, that is quite bilingual though predominantly French. While I'm learning French, or trying, it's a slow process at my age and while I can fake it a bit, I'm not nearly functional.

I've never encountered even the slightest bit of hostility anywhere in Montreal. The only problem I have is that when I enter a shop or cafe and try to conduct my business in French, the salesperson or server, instantly recognizing that my French is quite broken, responds to me, quite cheerfully, in English. Each and every time.

 

[Techman]

Mods,

I simply do not accept that statement.

I feel hurt as a French Canadian and Quebecer, who communicate with you guys in English and have shown total respect for all people of any origin on this forum from my beginning in 2005, to be treated that way. That is an insult.

I pursue extremists of both sides in this debate. They are responsible for the entire fuck up on the forum and in day-to-day life. Cloud happens to be one of them. I attack him on his positions and, as an ethno paranoid (that is what extremists on both sides are), he accuses me of being xenophobic.

I have tremendous disagreement with Techman on this question. He is harsh, so am I with him. He uses the word xenophobic more than anyone else here. But at least he has the decency of not using it to attack individuals.

So, Mod, if this accusation stays on line, I request permission in all fairness, to answer his post drawing from the same lexicon.

And while you have done so, no forced you to do so. You could post in French if you wanted to and no one would stop you. You made that choice on your own. That is a huge difference and a very important one. No one is forced to post in English here. Freedom is amazing isn't it? Wouldn't it be nice if everyone in Quebec had such freedom.

I may disagree with you on much of this discussion but I agree that the extremists are the ones that cause the problems. I wouldn't consider you to be a xenophobe but you do have trouble seeing both sides of the coin.

And people really have to stop bringing other cities into this discussion. In most of the other major cities in Canada, French is not the second most spoken language or even the third. And there are no laws against French in any other part of Canada so there is no comparison to the situation here in Quebec.

 

[sapman99]

In most of the other major cities in Canada, French is not the second most spoken language or even the third.

Ottawa, Sudbury, Moncton and Fredericton immediately spring to mind.

There were quite a few more just some decades ago, but both assimilation and immigration have altered the demographic portrait.

And by the way, what you said also has a reverse effect: Montréal is the only city of over one million inhabitants in North America with a francophone majority. Guaranteed 100% without language laws here that immigrants would flock to English education and workplaces would massively go over to English for the sake of globalism.

English services are seemingly quite available here, and there is no law on the books preventing anyone from conversing in English, serving a client in English, etc. If there are inequities such as the CLSC situation brought to light by the Gazette yesterday, they must be corrected. Zealots do not represent a majority of society here, on either side of the language divide.

 

[Merlot]

La Victoire des Séparatistes et Xénophobes???

Hello all,

Anyhow the difference between the xenophobic separatists and people like me is that you can post in French if you wish. I have no problem with that. But as you noticed there are many American posters who do not speak French. But on the other hand xenophobic separatists would never want me to speak or write in English they would enforce French on me.So you tell me who is narrow minded and intolerant?

But what is your point by this statement, though it seems 100% true? All I see in this anger and resistance to "the other language" by all those who insist on speaking only one language out of resentment is that the extremists are in effect controlling how you act and getting exactly the cultural divisiveness they want and need to achieve their goals. So if so many of you object to them, then why are you giving them so much de facto assistance??? This is self-defeating. And If these extremists are in the minority on each side then why not cooperate with the majority who are respectful of both sides? Don't they matter, or is anger so important? I think you all need to reevaluate who is really winning in all of this bitterness and obstinate resistance...when you give intolerance to all because of the intolerance of the bitterest few.

I've never encountered even the slightest bit of hostility anywhere in Montreal. The only problem I have is that when I enter a shop or cafe and try to conduct my business in French, the salesperson or server, instantly recognizing that my French is quite broken, responds to me, quite cheerfully, in English. Each and every time.

Well, sometimes I notice hints of language hostility, and once in a great while there is very clear resistance. But the great majority of time I start as best as I can in French and when the people of Montreal see my difficulty they are most willing to speak English out of appreciation of my effort.

Bonjour à tous,

Comme un Américain je comprends l'amertume entre les Français et les Anglais à Montréal, mais bien sûr, je ne le ressens pas. Oui, je sais que c'est une différence très importante. Pourtant, certaines choses que j'ai lu dans ces postes ne font pas sens.

Quand je parle à des inconnus en public, je parle à des personnes avec respect. À Montréal, j'essaie toujours de parler français d'abord parce que de la majorité. Pourtant, plusieurs d'entre vous qui parlent français et anglais ont dit que vous refuserez de parler à d'autres dans la langue qu'ils comprennent, et vous imposerez une seule langue pour tout le monde en dépit d'être bilingue. Je ne comprends pas comment cette décision vous est bénéfique. Est-ce votre colère le but le plus important avec d'autres personnes?? Serez-vous heureux d'être irrespectueux envers les étrangers? Ce que tout cela faire de votre vie ou votre monde meilleur? Voulez-vous une société meilleure, ou êtes-vous satisfait de conflits culturels?

Je ne parle pas beaucoup français, et je ne parle pas bien la langue, mais je suis d'apprentissage. J'ai deux amis à Montréal échanger des courriels avec moi en anglais et en français. Ils corrigent mon français, et je les aide avec leur anglais. C'est difficile pour nous, mais nous essayons parce que nous sommes désireux d'apprendre et nous voulons faire preuve de respect pour la langue de chaque personne.

Quel est votre objectif? Est-ce votre colère plus important que le respect mutuel et une société meilleure ... ou avez-vous des soins? Je pense que vous devez décider ce que votre objectif est, ce qui est mieux pour vous, et ce que vous devez faire pour y parvenir.

S'il vous plaît excuser mon erreur langue ici. J'essaie.

Bonne chance,

Merlot

Hello all,

As an American I understand the bitterness between the French and the English in Montreal, but of course, I don't feel it. Yes, I know that is a very important difference. Still, some things I have read in these posts don't make sense.

When I talk to strangers in public, I speak to individuals respectfully. In Montreal I always try to speak French first because of the majority. Yet, several of you who speak both French and English have said you will refuse to speak to others in the language they understand, and you will impose only one language to everyone despite being bilingual. I don't understand how this decision benefits you. Is your anger the most important purpose with other people? Will you be happy being disrespectful to strangers? Does any of this make your life or your world better? Do you want a better society, or are you happy with cultural conflict? What is your goal?

I do not speak much French, and I do not speak the language well, but I'm learning. I have two friends in Montreal exchanging emails with me in English and French. They correct my French, and I help them with their English. This is difficult for us, but we try because we are eager to learn and we want to show respect for the language of each person.

What is your goal? Is your anger more important than mutual respect and a better society... or do you care? I think you need to decide what your goal is, what is best for you, and what you need to do to achieve it.

Please excuse my language errors here. I am trying.

good luck,

Merlot

 

[metoo4]

Merlot, if all English-speaking peoples would make the effort you are making, the resentment would be nonexistent or very faint. I am one of those who will switch to English without an issue when meeting a guy like you. Once you are comfortable you can use English with me if you need to get out of a tight spot, I'll start moving back and forth between both language so you can keep learning. That solution was proposed to me by a unilingual English friend who wanted to learn French. When he is in Québec, he make a point to always start any conversation, in restaurants, shops, public transit, whatever, always in French, even just to say "Bonjour". Himself noticed the difference in the way he was treated when doing that rather than barging in and demanding English from the start,

What causes the resentment are those who come in and demand to be spoken in English. No hint of French, not a word, not a "Sorry", just English. (For the French readers, "demand" in English mean "exige" not "demande". That difference almost created a constitutional war before because of a faulty translation from French to English. "Demander" in French would translate to "requesting" in English, not to "demanding". Big difference.)

And those who are born and raised in Québec but still refuse to say a single word of French, like they would need to wash their mouth with disinfectant if they ever articulated a word of French. There are plenty of those. They mostly understand French perfectly and once cornered, can manage to speak it but will refuse to do so in day-to-day business, even when they deal with peoples who don't speak English. How can anybody get to 60 years old and spent his entire life in a French community can still be unable to speak French, that's beyond my understanding. The only explanation left is they feel superior and show disdain towards French.

I am fully bilingual and would love to learn many more languages. The more the better. But French is my main language and, besides the language itself, it includes a culture! I am not ready to trade that off for any other arrangement and, a big part of the language laws in Québec are aimed at protecting that culture as a whole, the language being a part of it.

 

[jeff jones]

I've never encountered even the slightest bit of hostility anywhere in Montreal. The only problem I have is that when I enter a shop or cafe and try to conduct my business in French, the salesperson or server, instantly recognizing that my French is quite broken, responds to me, quite cheerfully, in English. Each and every time.

I to can only speak of my own experience, i have been coming to montreal since the mid 70's and i have never experienced any hostility because i couldn't speak french. A lot of this has to do with your own attitude. If you are friendly and make the best of it when someone struggles with english things always work out okay. Years ago from the mid 70's to the mid 90's i used to drive to montreal and at times i would get off the beaten paths and end up in small towns looking for gas and so on and it was a lot different, here i sensed a lot of hostility and run into a lot of people who were just plain unfriendly. I could not imagine having these same people come to my area and treating them the same way because they could not speak english. For the last 15 years i have been flying to montreal so i no longer end up in these small towns so i can't say what it is like now and i will add that not everybody was this way but enough that you sure noticed.

 

[CLOUD 500]

And those who are born and raised in Québec but still refuse to say a single word of French, like they would need to wash their mouth with disinfectant if they ever articulated a word of French. There are plenty of those. They mostly understand French perfectly and once cornered, can manage to speak it but will refuse to do so in day-to-day business, even when they deal with peoples who don't speak English. How can anybody get to 60 years old and spent his entire life in a French community can still be unable to speak French, that's beyond my understanding. The only explanation left is they feel superior and show disdain towards French.

Unfortunately not everyone is like you and are willing to speak English. The same can be said of many French people living here. They hate it when they hear English and refuse to speak it. There are many tourists coming into this city and many people refuse to speak English even though they speak it. For every action you get an equal and opposite reaction. When one is given the choice many times it gets you an opposite effect. But when it is enforced on you many people resent it and refuse to speak it. But in Quebec the choice is not given it is enforced on you. Can you blame those English speaking people to resent it? Many xenophobes hate English.

I am fully bilingual and would love to learn many more languages. The more the better. But French is my main language and, besides the language itself, it includes a culture! I am not ready to trade that off for any other arrangement and, a big part of the language laws in Québec are aimed at protecting that culture as a whole, the language being a part of it.

I agree with the first part of the statement. But there is a major difference. You choose to learn a different language it was not enforced on you like it is done here in Quebec. If Quebec has to enforce their language to protect the culture then it is the fault of the people. There are so many immigrants in this city and you do not see them loosing their culture. They preserve it and speak their own language. Many Quebecors are not having enough children and the government is giving so many incentives to increase the birthrate.

 

[CLOUD 500]

But what is your point by this statement, though it seems 100% true? All I see in this anger and resistance to "the other language" by all those who insist on speaking only one language out of resentment is that the extremists are in effect controlling how you act and getting exactly the cultural divisiveness they want and need to achieve their goals. So if so many of you object to them, then why are you giving them so much de facto assistance??? This is self-defeating. And If these extremists are in the minority on each side then why not cooperate with the majority who are respectful of both sides? Don't they matter, or is anger so important? I think you all need to reevaluate who is really winning in all of this bitterness and obstinate resistance...when you give intolerance to all because of the intolerance of the bitterest few.

You are right about this but my point in this was to respond to Gugu's post. I disagree with Gugu's point of view.

 

[StefanoUS]

Among my American friends, speaking and writing French proficiently or fluently is seen as very highly intelligent, sophisticated and cultured.

Frank,
That is so very true. I started learning French as a mandatory course beginning in the 3rd grade! However, over the years the schools adopted Spanish, and to a lesser extent Italian as the predominent language requirement. I admire anyone that is fluent in French and English. English is a tough language to master, especially in written form.

 

[Techman]

Ottawa, Sudbury, Moncton and Fredericton immediately spring to mind.

There were quite a few more just some decades ago, but both assimilation and immigration have altered the demographic portrait.

And by the way, what you said also has a reverse effect: Montréal is the only city of over one million inhabitants in North America with a francophone majority. Guaranteed 100% without language laws here that immigrants would flock to English education and workplaces would massively go over to English for the sake of globalism.

English services are seemingly quite available here, and there is no law on the books preventing anyone from conversing in English, serving a client in English, etc. If there are inequities such as the CLSC situation brought to light by the Gazette yesterday, they must be corrected. Zealots do not represent a majority of society here, on either side of the language divide.

You cannot include immigrants who have been forced to learn and work in French as francophones when it comes to the demographics. They may speak French, but they are not francophone. And as for globalization, it isn't going away any time soon and it sure as hell isn't going to be stopped by Quebec laws and this province better get on board or be left behind. The world is coming together, just look at the European Union, only here do certain factions of the population want to do the opposite and move apart.

The language of business in the world is English. You may not like it, but you have to deal with it. It's not like the rest of the world is going to change for Quebec.

 

[Techman]

Merlot, if all English-speaking peoples would make the effort you are making, the resentment would be nonexistent or very faint. I am one of those who will switch to English without an issue when meeting a guy like you. Once you are comfortable you can use English with me if you need to get out of a tight spot, I'll start moving back and forth between both language so you can keep learning. That solution was proposed to me by a unilingual English friend who wanted to learn French. When he is in Québec, he make a point to always start any conversation, in restaurants, shops, public transit, whatever, always in French, even just to say "Bonjour". Himself noticed the difference in the way he was treated when doing that rather than barging in and demanding English from the start,

What causes the resentment are those who come in and demand to be spoken in English. No hint of French, not a word, not a "Sorry", just English. (For the French readers, "demand" in English mean "exige" not "demande". That difference almost created a constitutional war before because of a faulty translation from French to English. "Demander" in French would translate to "requesting" in English, not to "demanding". Big difference.)

And those who are born and raised in Québec but still refuse to say a single word of French, like they would need to wash their mouth with disinfectant if they ever articulated a word of French. There are plenty of those. They mostly understand French perfectly and once cornered, can manage to speak it but will refuse to do so in day-to-day business, even when they deal with peoples who don't speak English. How can anybody get to 60 years old and spent his entire life in a French community can still be unable to speak French, that's beyond my understanding. The only explanation left is they feel superior and show disdain towards French.

I am fully bilingual and would love to learn many more languages. The more the better. But French is my main language and, besides the language itself, it includes a culture! I am not ready to trade that off for any other arrangement and, a big part of the language laws in Québec are aimed at protecting that culture as a whole, the language being a part of it.

I could turn that around and say the exact same thing about francophones. 99% of my clients are French speaking and the majority of them understand English quite well but will not speak it. For some of them, I am pretty sure their reasons are either political or they just hate the language, for most of the others, they are simply shy to do so around anyone who is much more bilingual than they are. I know many English speaking people who gave up speaking French after being literally laughed at by those they were speaking to. Often it was not in a malicious way but it still put them off of trying to speak French in the future. French is a much more difficult language to get a handle of than English is. Hell...most anglos don't speak their own language properly and when it comes to written grammar, well just look around the net. Imagine the average American trying to deal with past and present tense and the fact that everything in French has a gender, whether it's human, animal, vegetable or inanimate object. And even the genders in French don't always make sense...we say "bonne fin de semaine" which is feminin but "bon week-end" which is masculine, and they both refer to the same thing...have a nice weekend.

Anyways, French as a language and culture is not in danger in Quebec. The only thing in question is whether it will remain the dominant language in Quebec. To me, laws are justified if they are there to protect the language from extinction but not to ensure it's dominance over all others. If it deserves to survive, it will survive. If the people who speak it are not strong enough for it to survive, or they don't teach it to their children or, most importantly, don't give birth to these children in the first place, then it will not survive. All the laws in the world can't prevent that, they can only delay the innevitable. And no matter how many immigrants are forced to speak French, they will never be Quebecois as they do not share our history and will never adopt our culture over their own. You can argue all you want, you can try to deny it, you can refuse to accept it and be happy living in denial, but unless Quebecers start to increase their numbers by having children, you will never be able to prevent it.

 

[sapman99]

I could turn that around and say the exact same thing about francophones. 99% of my clients are French speaking and the majority of them understand English quite well but will not speak it.

This sounds exaggerated and malicious. Or do you have a contract with the Parti Québécois :lol:?

The language of business in the world is English./99% of my clients are French speaking

A slight dichotomy here...

You cannot include immigrants who have been forced to learn and work in French as francophones when it comes to the demographics.

Man, you are on a mission here...! That quip about including forced immigrants is way over the top. Ok, now onto the real statistics:

"In terms of mother language (first language learned), the 2006 census reported that in the Greater Montreal Area, 66.5% spoke French as a first language, followed by English at 13.2%, while 0.8% spoke both as a first language.[77] The remaining 22.5% of Montreal-area residents are allophones, speaking languages including Italian (3.5%), Arabic (3.1%), Spanish (2.6%), Creole (1.3%), Chinese (1.2%), Greek (1.2%), Portuguese (0.8%), Romanian (0.7%), Vietnamese (0.7%), and Russian (0.5%).[77] In terms of additional languages spoken, a unique feature of Montreal among Canadian cities, noted by Statistics Canada, is the working knowledge of both French and English possessed by most of its residents."


So, take 65.5% of 1,620,693 and you get over a million, and that is only including the City of Montreal, not the entire island.

Anyways, French as a language and culture is not in danger in Quebec. The only thing in question is whether it will remain the dominant language in Quebec.

I just love how, as a Frenchman, you seem ready to go to any lengths to diminish the importance of French in our city, and just about admitted that without legislation it would dwindle to second language status. If you are willing to live with this, I am not.

Give your head a shake!

The language of business in the world is English. You may not like it, but you have to deal with it. It's not like the rest of the world is going to change for Quebec.

I will grant you this, and Quebec is not asking the rest of the world to change.

In fact, I do not agree with the signage law the makes every language except French smaller. It is stupid. However, the provisions about work and education make sense.

In education, nowhere is it outlawed to have private English schooling for those who don't qualify for public English education, and you know the criteria are large.

As far as workplace regulations go, yes the right to work in French is legislated, but English can be a requirement.

Please stop making the language legislation sounding like the Gestapo, your tune is getting stale.

 

[Kansas Frank]

I admire anyone that is fluent in French and English. English is a tough language to master, especially in written form.

Steve,

Did you mean to say "French is a tough language to master. . . ."

 

[Techman]

This sounds exaggerated and malicious. Or do you have a contract with the Parti Québécois :lol:?A slight dichotomy here...Man, you are on a mission here...! That quip about including forced immigrants is way over the top. Ok, now onto the real statistics:

"In terms of mother language (first language learned), the 2006 census reported that in the Greater Montreal Area, 66.5% spoke French as a first language, followed by English at 13.2%, while 0.8% spoke both as a first language.[77] The remaining 22.5% of Montreal-area residents are allophones, speaking languages including Italian (3.5%), Arabic (3.1%), Spanish (2.6%), Creole (1.3%), Chinese (1.2%), Greek (1.2%), Portuguese (0.8%), Romanian (0.7%), Vietnamese (0.7%), and Russian (0.5%).[77] In terms of additional languages spoken, a unique feature of Montreal among Canadian cities, noted by Statistics Canada, is the working knowledge of both French and English possessed by most of its residents."


So, take 65.5% of 1,620,693 and you get over a million, and that is only including the City of Montreal, not the entire island.

I just love how, as a Frenchman, you seem ready to go to any lengths to diminish the importance of French in our city, and just about admitted that without legislation it would dwindle to second language status. If you are willing to live with this, I am not.

Give your head a shake!

I will grant you this, and Quebec is not asking the rest of the world to change.

In fact, I do not agree with the signage law the makes every language except French smaller. It is stupid. However, the provisions about work and education make sense.

In education, nowhere is it outlawed to have private English schooling for those who don't qualify for public English education, and you know the criteria are large.

As far as workplace regulations go, yes the right to work in French is legislated, but English can be a requirement.

Please stop making the language legislation sounding like the Gestapo, your tune is getting stale.

When did I ever say that the majority of my customers were International concerns? In fact, i deal with the small and medium business market, the majority of which deal exclusively with the Quebec market. Also, I do not work in the city of Montreal and have few clients there.

Where is it written that the French language has some kind of right to be the dominant language or culture? Is it some sort of god given right? No language or culture has the RIGHT to exist above any other. That is racism at it's worst because if you actually believe that, then by extension you must believe that French is inherently superiour to any other language or culture so it must retain the dominant position. Come to think of it, I've read about such beliefs in the past and what they did to the world. It wasn't pretty. Can you give me one reason, any reason why French has the right to remain dominant?

Regarding the sign law, I am in favour of French being predominant on commercial signage. Not necessarily double the size, but definitely larger. This helps preserve the French face of Montreal more than any other law does and it tends to be attractive to tourists.

As far as education goes, as long as anyone pays taxes to the government of Quebec, which they have no choice but to do, they should have the choice to educate their children in whatever language in the PUBLIC school system that they desire. If not, they should be exempt from paying school taxes on their property. No one should be obligated to pay extra to educate their children in a private system. And the fact of the matter is that this law does not hurt the English population who have one parent who was educated in Quebec in English. The group it hurts the most are French Quebecers who do not have the choice to educate their children at least partly in English so that they can become fluently bilingual and have much more opportunities in business in the future. It allows this province to continue to have a captive work force that is unable to move outside of Quebec to find work and must remain here.

And no, language legislation is not like the Gestapo. Not even the Nazis prevented other languages on signs. But we do have the OLF, or as i like to call them- the Apostrophe SS. Can you find me any other district or province in any other country in the world that prohibits one of that country's official languages in the workplace, on signs or in education?

 

[sapman99]

Here we go again

As far as education goes, as long as anyone pays taxes to the government of Quebec, which they have no choice but to do, they should have the choice to educate their children in whatever language in the PUBLIC school system that they desire.

For your information, children of one parent "[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]whose father or mother did most of his or her elementary studies in English in Canada"[/FONT], are eligible for English public education. In the clear, this means immigrants are sent to French public school in Quebec. Please note that they are taught English in those French schools.

The group it hurts the most are French Quebecers who do not have the choice to educate their children at least partly in English so that they can become fluently bilingual and have much more opportunities in business in the future.

I learned my English at French school.

Furthermore, an anglo friend of mine in Dorval was up in arms recently because the Ministry of Education wanted to either increase the number of hours of French teaching in English schools, or lower the age where French starts being taught. Perish the thought. Her teenage daughter (born here) cannot sustain a basic conversation in French.

 

[Techman]

Quebecers who are obligated to send their children to French only schools.

For your information, children of one parent "[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]whose father or [/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mother did most of his or her elementary studies in [/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]English in Canada[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]"[/FONT], are eligible for English public education. In the clear, this means immigrants are sent to French public school in Quebec. Please note that they are taught English in those French schools.

Ummm...isn't that exactly what I said above your post? The law does not affect Anglo Quebecers who have at least one parent educated in English in Quebec. It does remove the freedom of choice from French Quebecers who are not permitted to send their children to the school of their choice. In this case, the ruling class makes second class citizens of their own people. Why? Do they fear that their culture and language is not strong enough to stand on it's own merits? Do they fear that it will be abandoned by the people? If this was to happen then does it deserve to exist in the first place?

Immigrants pay the same taxes as everyone else and should have freedom of choice as should French Quebecers.

Still waiting for an answer as to why French has a divine right to be dominant in Quebec. What will happen when there are more "les autres" in Quebec than pur laine? Will they still have the divine right to rule? Sooner or later "Les Quebecois" will no longer be the majority here. What happens then?