Thanks Like_It_Hot for pointing that out. I went to double check the bill. There is still a problem for these people though. Even though they may be few, it is not fair to put a kid in a situation where he/she will not be allowed to graduate because his/her parents are stationed in Quebec during the last years of their high school education.
Rejection of the proposed amendments to the Charter of the French language (Bill 14)
- Thread starter Max15411
- Start date
@Max You are right about this special situation and my personal thought is that the bill should be amended for those special cases. I would also agree to exclude kids from canadian army force to the application of this law (wich is the case now with law 101).
Hello Gentlemen,
So you are saying "the kid" can go to English schools, but has to learn to speak and write French to get a diploma? Aren't the English schools offering French in the last four years of secondary education like American schools do? Of course if the kid is already at the last couple of years before he would receive a diploma then time is a huge handicap factor. But many millions of Americans learn another language in the last four years of high school because it's usually required for a university or college. If the English-speaking Canadian student isn't already very late in his education I don't see why he would be any worse of than Americans who often start another language in the 9th grade at about age 14-15.
I agree there should be exemptions to the law requirements where time or extraordinary conditions create at significant problem, but any argument that proficiency in a second language can't be done with at least four years left is disproved by millions of Americans who do it.
BTW - if there was no PQ, no Marois, and no one had any wish to make laws requiring French why wouldn't bilingualism be required for the educational curriculum anyway. It just makes sense in a bi-cultural society like Montreal.
(tmwgpoammi)
Cheers,
Merlot
I don't know where are those millions but I met and worked with lot of americans with even phD and they just can't have a minimal conversation in french. Those who had some french has decided to melt themselves with the french culture and some went in France for 2-3 years where they have no choice but practice and use the french language. Of course, the situation here is different and it is easy to get exposed to french with good will.
I shortened the cut, due to merbs quoting rules. I would say your exemple is a bit different than my perspective. We are talking about a language here, not a discipline. I can learn Muay Thai and Jui jitsu at the same time and remember both very well, as they are very different. But when it comes to language, it aint about learning the 2 without mixing them up or whatever, its about pushing for your kid to remain french. I am sick of english to be honest, i am sick of the superiority complex of the USA... i am sick of being taunt on xbox live everytime i speak french with my friends in a lobby(such as weird nose suposing to mean jibberish or being called a french frog, or fag) and being told : SPEAK ENGLISH. Even english canadian do the same thing and call us the "lesser canada" or such. We can't talk in our language just because... what? they can't understand what we say??? Sometimes even if we are 4 french and 2 english dude in a team, they will make a scene because we speak french... hello... majority here. Anyway this is the main reason why i want to protect french and at least keep it where i live. I don't want to see a world being composed of only english just because they think they are the best, the most powerfull country, the this and the that. Xbox live really gave me a bad reputation of the english speakers mostly...even if i do have a couple usa friends...
And i switched back to english just for you rumple...
I'm not. It's been this way for years for kids who have been in Quebec since they were born. I have no problem with them not getting their diploma. It leaves many more college positions open for my kids once they graduate.
They do in Quebec and the French education a kid receives in an English public school is on par with that received in a French public school. If someone comes to Quebec, following their parents in the military, from a province where French is really not a priority and the French education they might have received is a joke compared to here, they should not be penalized for it.
I think bill 101 was before Marois' time as a politician and it did just fine with the French language. Adding these amendments with bill 14 is only hurting the economy again and they are meant to spit in every non French Quebecers face.
These new laws are not going to help anyone and they will hurt the French as much as they will piss off everyone else.
Max
Merlot mentioned a second language, he didn't say it was French. Americans have little use for French and if they were to learn a second language it would probably be Spanish. Part of the problem is that Quebecers have an overinflated opinion of the value of French in the world. While it's important here in Quebec, it isn't that important elsewhere, even in the rest of Canada and especially in the US.
@Halloween Mike, your last post really shows how little you know of the world. Like I mentioned above, French isn't that important outside of Quebec. If you play on xBox against Americans, well it's normal that the language used is going to be English. IF you want to play in French, then stick to playing with groups of like minded people. I used to play a lot of Call of Duty and Counterstrike on line with my PC and there were many French servers to play on if I chose. So maybe you should switch to PC gaming instead. I belong to a few different message boards on different subjects and the language used is always English and it is usually in the board rules as well that all posts are to be made in English. English is as close to a universal language as we have in the world right now. You may not like it and I hate to burst your bubble but Quebec isn't going to change that no matter how much they want to or how hard they try. All they will achieve is isolating themselves and limiting their possibilities. That doesn't seem to be very intelligent in the 21st century where borders are coming down.
Montreal is a cosmopolitan city, an International city. That is not going to change without extreme measures and any attempt to do so will be met with anger and resistance. Forcing it to change will be detrimental not only to Montreal but to Quebec as a whole. Limiting the education of Francophones in Quebec hurts no one other than themselves. It's time you let go of your small town mentality and expanded your horizons.
All those highly schooled nice americans I met (and I do continue to have contact with some) can't speek spanish neither. The fact is without using it you will fastly loose a foreign language. For myself, I am french and use english alot to read and learn what's going around. At 14, I was already a subscriber to popular mechanic and National Geographic to open my mind to different cultures. I also speak spanish, usefull in South America, to keep it I watch spanish broadcast on internet.
As for the second part of your quote, I think it is disrespectfull to pretend french quebecers have an overinflated opinion of the value of french. I doubt, but I may be wrong, that you know the french culture. If your reference is purely business and money, you better, might as well, learn mandarin as it is probably the more powerfull economy now and in a short future. Each culture and language has by itself (in french we say "intrinsèque") a richness that shouldn't be underestimated by anyone.
Hello Like_It_Hot and Max15411,
My point was, in case it was missed, a bi-cultural society should automatically have a bi-cultural education. Since this didn't happen through logic and sense Montreal and Quebec is now paying for a bad mistake with bi-cultural anger and demagoguery. Had the right thing been done first this would not be an issue.
Some keep bringing up that English is the language of business, as if business is the only reason any language can be relevant. Anyone who doesn't see the fault in that instantly can't understand the benefits or beauty of cultural variety, and so no explanation is worth the effort. I think it's unconscionable for anyone to even suggest culture and language should fade and die under any circumstances much less that relevance depends on business...as suggested.
It's also been suggested many times les Francais have an "overinflated opinion" of themselves, and the side favoring some laws are xenophobic. It's the same tactic we see so often in American politics. Paint the other side in extremes, claim they have no sense or logic to remove credibility. Ironically the tactics usually do more to discredit the accusers.
Regarding Americans learning another language, true, you won't hear much of it as a visitor except where new immigrant populations tend to concentrate, or in ethnically tight communities tourists don't visit. Americans tend to learn as a matter of college requirements rather than job or community necessities, and it does fade without use. But it can be done in a relatively short time at an older age well past early childhood, so the idea that not having it from birth makes learning too hard is an excuse, not fact. That was the point.
Sure Spanish has the edge in the U.S. overall. But which language is learned more is regional much of the time. In the northeast there tends to be more balance between Spanish and French. Relatives and acquaintances have mentioned greater priorities for German in the midwest, Russian, Polish, Italian, etc., elsewhere. And Latin, dead and irrelevant as Techman might say is still frequent enough in schools. Often it isn't practicality that matters, it's pride in heritage or a wish to learn. Some people just want to be cultured more extensively.
Why then whee there is more need due to the prevalence of two cultures didn't people in Quebec do what was necessary, with so much more reason to do so than just broadening oneself without being pushed into it. That lack of natural will seems to indicate that purposeful social division is closer to the real reason for this fight over language than anything one might rationalize about "business" priorities or relevance, and the ugliness of the battle often characterizing each side in extremes is more proof that the fight has less to do with business than cultural snobbery and resentment that was present long before Bill 101, or Bill 14.
Merlot
My point was, in case it was missed, a bi-cultural society should automatically have a bi-cultural education. Since this didn't happen through logic and sense Montreal and Quebec is now paying for a bad mistake with bi-cultural anger and demagoguery. Had the right thing been done first this would not be an issue.
Some keep bringing up that English is the language of business, as if business is the only reason any language can be relevant. Anyone who doesn't see the fault in that instantly can't understand the benefits or beauty of cultural variety, and so no explanation is worth the effort. I think it's unconscionable for anyone to even suggest culture and language should fade and die under any circumstances much less that relevance depends on business...as suggested.
It's also been suggested many times les Francais have an "overinflated opinion" of themselves, and the side favoring some laws are xenophobic. It's the same tactic we see so often in American politics. Paint the other side in extremes, claim they have no sense or logic to remove credibility. Ironically the tactics usually do more to discredit the accusers.
Regarding Americans learning another language, true, you won't hear much of it as a visitor except where new immigrant populations tend to concentrate, or in ethnically tight communities tourists don't visit. Americans tend to learn as a matter of college requirements rather than job or community necessities, and it does fade without use. But it can be done in a relatively short time at an older age well past early childhood, so the idea that not having it from birth makes learning too hard is an excuse, not fact. That was the point.
Sure Spanish has the edge in the U.S. overall. But which language is learned more is regional much of the time. In the northeast there tends to be more balance between Spanish and French. Relatives and acquaintances have mentioned greater priorities for German in the midwest, Russian, Polish, Italian, etc., elsewhere. And Latin, dead and irrelevant as Techman might say is still frequent enough in schools. Often it isn't practicality that matters, it's pride in heritage or a wish to learn. Some people just want to be cultured more extensively.
Why then whee there is more need due to the prevalence of two cultures didn't people in Quebec do what was necessary, with so much more reason to do so than just broadening oneself without being pushed into it. That lack of natural will seems to indicate that purposeful social division is closer to the real reason for this fight over language than anything one might rationalize about "business" priorities or relevance, and the ugliness of the battle often characterizing each side in extremes is more proof that the fight has less to do with business than cultural snobbery and resentment that was present long before Bill 101, or Bill 14.
Merlot
@ Alyssia
How is it ironic? We are a majority of french in quebec too... And if you imply canada, to me thats pretty much just a foreign country such as USA... i am always surprise to see there aint no borders between Ontario and Quebec, cause would it be my decision, there would be... And yeah english can be usefull, never said otherwise, but do i need to speak it perfectly? No. Look at GSP, he speak with one of the worst accent i ever saw, yet he still is champ and do fine in an american compagny.
Thats common sense, even tough i don't agree with the doctor exemple, would you like your kid to be something all opposed to you? If i have a kid someday you can be sure the first CD i will give to him is gonna be Metallica, and i will make all efforts nessary so that he loves metal and not the crap like Lady Caca and Justin Beaver that those kids love today. If i fail so be it, but i will try.
Of course... its so simple to write english, even without trying im not doing too bad....
@Techman
I don't play on PC, never will, i can't play with a keyboard and mouse... its not in my gene i guess, i have been raise with a controller, i will always use a controller and i love to just buy my games, put them in the xbox and tada ! it work. Everytime i tried to play a PC game either my PC couldn't run it because it was too recent, or it didn't work because of weird reason, or it work but there some glitch... thats just too much trouble...
Now that being said, me and my friends usually make a party chat when in the same team on a game, but that feature didn't exist in 2006 when i started playing Gears of War. When a person was dead, he couldn't speak with his teamates anymore, he was put on a deathroom chat if i can say where all dead people could speak to each other. It was an elimination kind of game, like search and destroy on COD only the goal was just to kill each other. So when we died, we didn't stoped speaking to each other, if one of us was still alive and the 3 others dead, of course we would chat among each other, and the english would always make a scene. More often than not(actually 9 games out of 10) we would kick there ass , so they would get mad and pick on us for stupid reasons like the language. Even if they where winning, they would mock us and all because we speak french(how many times i heard "i surrender" because they tough we where from france... ignorants)
In any case i won't restrain myself from speaking my language with my team of friends just to accomodate dumb ass americans who are just mad because they can't understand what we say. I made the effort of learning your language, make the effort of learning mine if you want to understand. We played team of spanish, team of germans and such and never mocked them because they where speaking there language. Xbox live is universal, i have the right to play in my language, there is nothing saying english only.
How is it ironic? We are a majority of french in quebec too... And if you imply canada, to me thats pretty much just a foreign country such as USA... i am always surprise to see there aint no borders between Ontario and Quebec, cause would it be my decision, there would be... And yeah english can be usefull, never said otherwise, but do i need to speak it perfectly? No. Look at GSP, he speak with one of the worst accent i ever saw, yet he still is champ and do fine in an american compagny.
Thats common sense, even tough i don't agree with the doctor exemple, would you like your kid to be something all opposed to you? If i have a kid someday you can be sure the first CD i will give to him is gonna be Metallica, and i will make all efforts nessary so that he loves metal and not the crap like Lady Caca and Justin Beaver that those kids love today. If i fail so be it, but i will try.
Of course... its so simple to write english, even without trying im not doing too bad....
@Techman
I don't play on PC, never will, i can't play with a keyboard and mouse... its not in my gene i guess, i have been raise with a controller, i will always use a controller and i love to just buy my games, put them in the xbox and tada ! it work. Everytime i tried to play a PC game either my PC couldn't run it because it was too recent, or it didn't work because of weird reason, or it work but there some glitch... thats just too much trouble...
Now that being said, me and my friends usually make a party chat when in the same team on a game, but that feature didn't exist in 2006 when i started playing Gears of War. When a person was dead, he couldn't speak with his teamates anymore, he was put on a deathroom chat if i can say where all dead people could speak to each other. It was an elimination kind of game, like search and destroy on COD only the goal was just to kill each other. So when we died, we didn't stoped speaking to each other, if one of us was still alive and the 3 others dead, of course we would chat among each other, and the english would always make a scene. More often than not(actually 9 games out of 10) we would kick there ass , so they would get mad and pick on us for stupid reasons like the language. Even if they where winning, they would mock us and all because we speak french(how many times i heard "i surrender" because they tough we where from france... ignorants)
In any case i won't restrain myself from speaking my language with my team of friends just to accomodate dumb ass americans who are just mad because they can't understand what we say. I made the effort of learning your language, make the effort of learning mine if you want to understand. We played team of spanish, team of germans and such and never mocked them because they where speaking there language. Xbox live is universal, i have the right to play in my language, there is nothing saying english only.
