Hacker News Reader

Comment by School-Cotton | Hacker News Reader

I think it's perfectly normal for people in a small enclave nestled in the heart of the giant Anglo-saxon hegemon to feel insecure about the long-term survival of their unique language and culture and want to take extra steps to preserve it. I'm completely sympathetic with them refusing to provide services in a foreign language when that language is a serious threat to their existence as a cultural group.

Look what happened to French in Louisiana, or Irish in Ireland, or Native American languages across the continent. Quebecers don't want that to happen to them, and I can't blame them.

By the way, always remember that Quebecers never chose to become part of Canada or any English-speaking society; they were conquered by military force.

View on HN

Most places were conquered by military force, multiple times for that matter, that's not what makes Quebec unique or a terribly interesting piece of history.

In fact, as places that explicitly chose to be part of a country, Quebec ranks pretty highly, since they've had multiple referendum's about leaving Canada.

What was the referendum result though? 49.4% for statu quo vs. 50.6% for independence? That's not really what I'd call a plebiscite for being part of Canada.

Something like that... and since the referendums happened when Quebec was most inclined to separate (in recent memory) that's really a good sign that > 50% of Quebec would prefer not to.

Are you really thinking that half the province against each other is a good sign?

Please.

It's much less than half now, that was at the ultimate peak - was the point he was making.

Like I said, support for that movement is way less than half now, the first result I found from a quick search [0] suggests 18% as of 2015.

[0] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/quebec-angus-reid-ca...

I think a majority vote choosing to stay is a hell of a lot better than "forced to stay by the military"... which is what you'd get from the post I originally replied to. And it's not "against eachother" so much as "politely thinking that we'd be better of splitting the country in two" for most of them.

I misread the contextual OP, he wasn't supporting the francophones.

And proceeded to get told by the english landowners to "Speak White" when we'd speak our native french tongue.

We're just about as white as they come. "Speak White" means "Speak the english of your captors."

There is an actual poem from about the time of the Quiet Revolution named "Speak White" which would explain this really well, here's (ironically) an English translation of it :

https://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=738881

In Quebec City they are loudly proud of how many Anglos they have driven away. They pretty much purged the city of anything non-French in the two last decades and are displaying it as a success story.

For me, displacing large communities based on their mother tongue is nothing to be proud of. Be it either way.

Citation needed? I'll concede that I haven't lived there so I could be wrong, but I've been to Quebec city twice, including once with people who spoke no French at all, and never felt any hostility. Again, I'm not disputing that it could be different for the local Anglo minority, but I'd need to see some sources before I believe that you're not exaggerating.

There’s a difference between a tourist and a local. As a tourist you bring dollars. But try getting any government service in English and you’ll get eye rolls and rude behaviour. Even cops in Montreal will not speak English generally.

How many governments around the world provide services in a foreign language?

That's just a plain lie.

Sure, as for literally any other subject, you may find people with extreme views on the topic, but that's what they are: extreme. That doesn't make it the general consensus.

Please stop spreading lies like this.

It's not a lie at all.

Yes it is. The point is _not_ about driving Anglos (or whatever culture) away, but about being proud of being able to communicate in French. As a matter of fact, exactly the same thing English speakers ask to literally the rest of the world.

Edit: and, of course, this does not apply to tourists or visitors. This point is about people who want to live in Quebec.

It was an exhibition on the top floor of the tallest building in the city. It was comparing Montreal to Quebec City trying to draw more people and business to Quebec City. One of the "selling" points was a statistic saying that:

1. Montreal has about 50/50 French/English split whereas in Quebec City it's something like 98/2 French/English. Yes, that was presented as an advantage.

2. There was a graph showing how the city is becoming more and more French-speaking over time. Again, proudly presenting that fact as a selling point.

I never said they are openly hostile but by hindering any English business and opressive language laws they drove whole communities of English speakers away. That's a fact.

> They were conquered by military force.

This will no doubt come across poorly, but it's important to keep in mind when it happened. Quebec was allowed to keep their language, despite being conquered.

The current government is downright hostile towards Anglophones and immigrants.

Quebecers never chose to become part of Canada or any English-speaking society; they were conquered by military force.

You could say the same thing for the indigenous people of Quebec. Why is there no protection for their languages? For example, the Malecite–Passamaquoddy language may have as few as 600 native speakers remaining [1]. This is a much more urgent situation than French, which has 76.8 million native speakers worldwide.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malecite-Passamaquoddy_languag...

Yes you could say the same thing about them, and I would be completely sympathetic to indigenous people in Quebec promoting the use of their own languages in their own territories, and discouraging the use of French. Unfortunately some of the groups have so few members (like the 600 you point out) that it would be difficult for them to be viable as a modern civilization using only their native language, but if they are somehow able to do so, that's great and I hope they succeed.

I explicitly mentioned in my comment that the destruction of indigenous cultures throughout the Americas was a regrettable thing, which is why Quebecers would like to avoid it happening to themselves.

I'm not blindly arguing here that French is the greatest language ever and nationalist Quebecers are correct on all political matters. I think French people were colonialists and their treatment of Native Americans in Quebec was terrible. But that doesn't change that now, however unsavory the circumstances of its birth, the Quebec culture doesn't deserve to be wiped out.

I don’t think we even need to entertain discussion of the idea that any culture should be wiped out. That’s a non-starter. The distinction here is one of political power.

Francophone Quebecers have enough political power to enforce and expand their language and culture laws in order to “defend” their culture. But never lose sight of the fact that this comes at the expense of more than just anglophone residents. This affects all other cultures within Quebec. And that’s why you see it take the form of more than just language, it includes attacks on minority religious symbols and clothing as well.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com