Barbara Kay has an excellent commentary on the Office quebecoise de la langue francaise, otherwise infamous as the language police or tongue troopers.
She sums up her blasting of Quebec’s linguistic intolerance as follows:
The only beneficiaries of this fiasco will be Sainte Agathe’s ducks. Henceforth the signs forbidding people to feed them, up to now in English as well as French, must be in French only. I daresay that will mean a lot of extra breadcrusts thrown to them by law-abiding unilingual tourists who haven’t got a clue what “Défendu de nourrir les canards” means.
The ominous rigidity and totalitarian attention to detail of the Office reminds one of the soulless Inspector Javert in Les Misérables. Javert is so consumed by his obsession with the law that he has forgotten what it is to be a human being. And we all know what happened to the Inspector. Unable to reconcile the fact that there are times in life when compassion, human fellowship and morality conflict with the Law, he committed suicide.
Read Barbara Kay’s Full Comment.
lsatenstein
Jan 18, 2013 @ 11:40:55
How dense are we. We are bacteria for the PQ. We need to be eradicated. If you know psychology, they are attacking the English using a technique of Successive Approximation. You first generate hints, then you whittle away at the resistance,where the hints are now laws, and do so making the community feel secure, and then you remove all the English rights.
To the French.
In a North American Context, you will disappear after 150 years. With current linguistic policies, it will accelerate that action. Your best and brightest do leave and will continue to leave for better opportunities.
When you are surrounded on 4 sides by English (500 million), and on three sides where the second language will be Spanish (350 million citizens), you will be assimilated through marriage, commerce, technology, Internet, job migration, low birthrate, and desire by citizens to be part of the English world. This action cannot be stopped no matter how hard you try.
In a comparison with Israel, a religious state, which is perhaps your envy and model, you must realize that Israel is motivated by religion, the old testament, and the only place on earth where a Jew could call home. While the official language is Hebrew, Israel does not block two other languages from public view or use (Arab and English) and does not diminish their use in public. French Quebecers cannot say that without Quebec, they will not have a possibility to live and speak in French culture elsewhere. French unit-linguals fear change and diversity, and that is racism.
Quebec is not a province with the main industry being agriculture. Quebec is industrial. Industry deals with the world. Industry deals in English.
French will endure and grow in use in France, Morocco, Algeria and North Africa. It cannot sustain growth in Quebec, even with Sovereignty.
In 1980 my employer left Quebec and took 500 head office jobs with him. It will happen again. Head offices are already relocating to Lancaster, Alexandria, Hawkesbury. Live in Alexandria, work in St. Lazare is the new trend.
Water flows downhill. So does the exodus of people to where there is a comfort feeling.