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Comment by alfor | Hacker News Reader

(also french Canadian) I think at this point we should accept that the french language will die out. We are a tiny minority in a sea of english speaking, it doesn’t make sense anymore in the age of internet. It has a huge cost for business and thus people and make us disadvantaged vs english speaking. I just wish we would finally move on, but as french is fading, the government is tightening its grip, reducing the freedom of people to force french. As an example I cannot send my kids to english school (because I went to french school) but my neighbor that is as french as me can.

I like a bit of our culture from time to time (and also of France) but forcing it on people make no sense. Kids will keep on watching Youtube, TikTok all in english, that ship has sailed.

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> it doesn’t make sense anymore in the age of internet. It has a huge cost for business and thus people and make us disadvantaged vs english speaking.

A French Canadian expat here in the bay told me once "if our language is to die out, at least I'll make sure my kids are free".

I think had '95 turned out differently, some VCs here would be a little bit poorer, but the Republic of Quebec would have kept a stellar engineer.

> As an example I cannot send my kids to english school (because I went to french school) but my neighbor that is as french as me can.

Sounds these laws needs tightening. No reasons to operate two parallel school districts.

> As an example I cannot send my kids to english school (because I went to french school) but my neighbor that is as french as me can.

What is this rule?

If I understand the law correctly, you can only send your kid to English-speaking public school if you yourself went to an English-speaking school in Canada.

Yes. There is also some complicated points system so that if one parent did goes for just a few years it’s not enough to get that right.

That's crazy

The English Montreal School Board's web site has some information about this:

https://www.emsb.qc.ca/emsb/admissions/eligibility/standard-...

It's remarkably convoluted.

My US based sense of "freedoms" gets really itchy when I read that ... like let me decide that, not sure I get why my kids have to be involved in someone's cultural type initiatives.

Granted if it was just say a class about ... something, whatever, but picking the full time language for the school is a lot for someone else to decide for me.

I suppose the argument is that if the parents picked they'd just pick one and there's no choice but I'm kinda ok with that.

The problem is that french canadians see themselves as oppressed by the english part of Canada. They try with laws to force french in Québec as much as possible. Now with more and more immigration (rapidly aging population) and more english around with the internet they try harder and harder to stop the inevitable decline in french.

We often think of moving out of Québec/Canada to escape government encroachment in our lives.

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