Feds promoting discrimination

[Leafless]

Federal spending on promoting French and English in Canada should be increased by about 25 per cent to reach $1 billion in the next five years, a bilingualism report recommends.

If the Harper government accepts this recommendation it will be discriminating against the Charter rights of majority English speaking Canadians.

This means it will allow Quebec to continue to discriminate against the English in Quebec by allowing Quebec to continue to use the NWC to discriminate against minority English in Quebec with the feds recognizing this fact and unilaterally accepting the notion of Quebec being a separate distinct society.

This means the federal government will be invading individual provinces outside of federal jurisdiction promoting bilingual policies, wheras provinces have control over provincial language rights and not the federal government. In turn provinces (who allow this) are ignoring the rights of its citizens by leaning towards its legislative authority rather than implementing referendums.

The report recommended promoting and emphasizing the value of linguistic duality while "a discourse based on resistance and the defence of language and culture should be avoided." It called for improving integration services in minority-language communities to encourage more French-speaking immigrants to settle outside Quebec.

It said standardized norms of bilingualism should be established that could be used by private companies to assess language skills, along with offering financial support for literacy programs and software-makers to help create French-language computer programs.

This would be extremely costly and totally discriminatory.

There has never been a referendum relating to the acceptance of a bilingual Canada, but the federal government, it appears justifies a telephone poll over a referendum to linguistically discriminate against English speaking Canadians with their federal, non-provincial, policy.

He cited a 2006 CROP/Radio-Canada poll that showed roughly 80 per cent of Canadians support bilingualism, although the same survey also found 76 per cent stating there is "a certain degree of apathy about learning the other language."

And the article does not indicate what the exact question that was ask to detirmine support of bilingualism in Canada.

Even the Bloc is against these recommendations.

Bloc Québécois MP Richard Nadeau was dismissive of the report, saying it was written to maintain the status quo while ignoring the real problems.

"It's not bilingualism that is in trouble. It's French that is in danger in communities outside of Quebec. Lord was a patronage appointment and he only wrote what the Harper government wanted to hear," said Mr. Nadeau.

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/s...81-65918fc8985c

[Sean Hayward]

Can you explain how this is discriminatory against English-speaking Canadians? Your credibility to objectively assess bilingualism policies is tarnished by your obvious "English-only" vision of Canada. The fact that the Bloc is against these recommendations should show you that it is a policy that is good for Canada and national unity. What specifically do you want a referendum on?

[Leafless]

Can you explain how this is discriminatory against English-speaking Canadians?

Bilingualism is being force fed federally.

If the French language had any credibility it would be self sustaining, be an influence on English society and in turn flow freely, creating a bilingual nation, rather than being dictated by federal and provincial forces.

Your credibility to objectively assess bilingualism policies is tarnished by your obvious "English-only" vision of Canada.

Obviously you do not believe in assimilation.

The majority culture is forced to cater to no one, unless orf course like here in Canada by the forces of its own governments making it totally discriminatory.

The fact that the Bloc is against these recommendations should show you that it is a policy that is good for Canada and national unity.

It appears by what the Bloc said would be in agreement of harsher linguistic implemented laws outside of Quebec to ensure the survival of French communities.

What specifically do you want a referendum on?

Two items.

One referendum relating to the acceptance of bilingualism both inside and outside the jurisdiction of federal authorities.

And another referendum relating to the abusive powers of provincially legislated preference over the wishes of the residents, relating to the acceptance of bilingual policies within a majority English speaking province.

Edited March 22, 2008 by Leafless

[Argus]

Can you explain how this is discriminatory against English-speaking Canadians? Your credibility to objectively assess bilingualism policies is tarnished by your obvious "English-only" vision of Canada. The fact that the Bloc is against these recommendations should show you that it is a policy that is good for Canada and national unity. What specifically do you want a referendum on?

The federal government does not actually promote English anywhere. It only promotes French. It promotes French to the extent that it seeks out French speaking immigrants in order to entice them to come to Canada and live in English areas to reinforce the French numbers there. If the feds tried to bring in English speakers and put them into Quebec there'd be blood in the streets.

In addition, of course, bilingualism, the way it has applied, means an ever greater number of senior federal officials, mandarins and bureaucrats are francophone, far greater than their numbers in the population. Something like 75% of all new executive promotions in the federal public service are French - mostly Quebecers. And these people are making decisions which affect you every day.

[Moxie]

Spending money on Bilingualism is madness, we are in the middle a Health Care crisis and that should be the focus of our PM and our MPs. Canada is not bilingual, Quebec and New Brunswick are, this is just another example of throwing away our hard earned taxdollars to pander to a small minority in Quebec. If we stopped this nonsense think of how many people who speak English could get jobs with the Federal Government? State sponsored Bilingualism only benifits those that speak French, it's blatant discrimination against those that don't have the option of learning French.

[Borg]

It is a matter of votes.

Kebec must be there.

If we would be so lucky as to see them gone from canada this debacle can end.

french - nothing more than a distraction forced upon us by people needing votes.

Borg

[seabee]

It may have been great pride and fun to conquer it. Now comes the time to pay the price.

Conquering a people is the easy part; keeping it conquered is a never-ending time-, energy- and money-consuming task. Make sure you know what you ask for.

[Wilber]

It may have been great pride and fun to conquer it. Now comes the time to pay the price.

Conquering a people is the easy part; keeping it conquered is a never-ending time-, energy- and money-consuming task. Make sure you know what you ask for.

Bullshit. Time to stop re-fighting centuries old colonial wars between Europeans don't you think? We will soon reach a point where a majority of Canadians are no longer descendant of either French or English origin if we are not there already. I reject entirely that Quebec is a conquered people under the thumb of the ROC. The very fact Quebec has been able to hold two referendums on whether they want to remain part of Canada flies in the face of that notion.

[seabee]

Wilber:

Now you just have to convince some 7,000,000 people in Québec that you are right. In French, of course.

Best of luck.

[Sean Hayward]

No I do not believe in your version of assimilation, where we would value English above French and attempt to cleanse Canada of its French-speaking elements. Both languages should be treated equally by the federal government and certain provincial governments.

Your assertion that French linguistic communities outside Quebec receive aid while the English linguistic community inside Quebec does not (while I doubt its truthfulness) is something that I too am concerned about. We should promote these communities to ensure that, in the future, Quebec does not remain "the French-speaking province" and the other nine provinces do not remain "the English-speaking provinces". That should be our objective, promoting linguistic duality within each province. The federal government should attract English-speaking people to settle in Quebec and attract French-speaking people to settle in the rest of Canada.

I would support holding referendums on official bilingualism, as long as the questions are clear and fair. That way the Canadian public could express their support for the policy and we could get on with the task at hand, building a nation.

Those of you who are so against official bilingualism, what about the English-speaking minority in Quebec? I find that beneath the arguments used by the anti-bilingualism people, such as "it wastes our money" or "it's just pandering to an interest group", the real reason for the resentment of official bilingualism is a feeling that English is just better than French. The same people who criticize official bilingualism in the rest of Canada are those who criticize official monolingualism in Quebec, presumably because in that case it benefits French at the expense of English.

[Borg]

Those of you who are so against official bilingualism, what about the English-speaking minority in Quebec? I find that beneath the arguments used by the anti-bilingualism people, such as "it wastes our money" or "it's just pandering to an interest group", the real reason for the resentment of official bilingualism is a feeling that English is just better than French. The same people who criticize official bilingualism in the rest of Canada are those who criticize official monolingualism in Quebec, presumably because in that case it benefits French at the expense of English.

Perhaps the out right rejection of anglo language rights in kebec has something to do with the attitude of the rest of canada.

Turn about can be considered fair play - of which I am sure many will disagree.

No one goes to jail or is fined in canada for NOT displaying a sign in a certain language - unless of course you happen to live in kebec.

As for the international language of business, science, medicine and engineering - even the Chinese communicate in English.

french on the other hand is quite parochial.

Borg

[Pliny]

Quebecers are not French. They are Canadian. The French make jokes of them. Bilingualism is a concept born out of lib-left socialistic political correctness to engineer all things equal. We are all equal, is the mantra and those that aren't will be given grants and privilege to achieve equality.

In case anyone is unsure of the meaning of equal it means "the same as". So Black is White is French is English is Christian is Muslim is Irish is Anglo is rich is poor and any discrimination between race, religion, ethnic or cultural background is illegal. But we do, of course, celebrate diversity! Confused yet?

Does anyone have a different definition of "equal"? Or maybe equality should be clarified and stated as "having equal rights" not just being equal because that is impossible. Women are after all not men and considering them equal is quite irrational. What is common is that they are persons which has been established by law. Seems odd that it needed to be established by law I guess society did not accept that as axiomatic. I don't think having a law making women persons was necessary. I think we were all headed that way anyway, the law just forced the issue and created a bit of animosity between the genders, and many people who took "equal" literally became gender confused. The "equal" concept was a little too literal for them. Those who understood "equal" to mean having equal rights as persons under the law, as it was government and laws that primarily discriminated against them, thought it a correct concept. The laws now have swung to creating all persons as equal in the literal sense.

So prejudice is ensconced in law with preferential treatment given to minorities.

It is the job of government to treat all equally under the law; as law is the only thing in society that can be legally applied as force against a citizen of the nation.

I don't care what anyone thinks of other races, religions, ethnicities, cultures or heritage but when anyone picks up a rock and throws it at me he has overstepped his legal rights unless I initiated force against him.

French, with privilege and largesse granted by all levels of government in Canada, is fast rising to being equal, meaning of course, the same as English. The logic is that once it is the same all the bickering will cease. Think the plan will work?

[Leafless]

French, with privilege and largesse granted by all levels of government in Canada, is fast rising to being equal, meaning of course, the same as English. The logic is that once it is the same all the bickering will cease. Think the plan will work?

Now I know you have NO CONCEPT relating to the word DISCRIMINATION by a government via a "PLAN", by abusing its legislative powers.

[Pliny]

No I do not believe in your version of assimilation, where we would value English above French and attempt to cleanse Canada of its French-speaking elements. Both languages should be treated equally by the federal government and certain provincial governments.

Your assertion that French linguistic communities outside Quebec receive aid while the English linguistic community inside Quebec does not (while I doubt its truthfulness) is something that I too am concerned about. We should promote these communities to ensure that, in the future, Quebec does not remain "the French-speaking province" and the other nine provinces do not remain "the English-speaking provinces". That should be our objective, promoting linguistic duality within each province. The federal government should attract English-speaking people to settle in Quebec and attract French-speaking people to settle in the rest of Canada.

I would support holding referendums on official bilingualism, as long as the questions are clear and fair. That way the Canadian public could express their support for the policy and we could get on with the task at hand, building a nation.

Those of you who are so against official bilingualism, what about the English-speaking minority in Quebec? I find that beneath the arguments used by the anti-bilingualism people, such as "it wastes our money" or "it's just pandering to an interest group", the real reason for the resentment of official bilingualism is a feeling that English is just better than French. The same people who criticize official bilingualism in the rest of Canada are those who criticize official monolingualism in Quebec, presumably because in that case it benefits French at the expense of English.

Unfortunately, Sean, as rational and erudite as your plan may sound, it is one of engineering society. Is that the task of government? Or should we, the citizens, get on with the task of building a nation?

[Pliny]

Now I know you have NO CONCEPT relating to the word DISCRIMINATION by a government via a "PLAN", by abusing its legislative powers.

What's that mean?

[Leafless]

Those of you who are so against official bilingualism, what about the English-speaking minority in Quebec? I find that beneath the arguments used by the anti-bilingualism people, such as "it wastes our money" or "it's just pandering to an interest group", the real reason for the resentment of official bilingualism is a feeling that English is just better than French.

There is no English speaking minority in Quebec.

It is an illusion and only appears the English language is a minority language in Quebec because of Quebec's racist language laws.

Quebec is not a country, it is a province in the country of Canada making Quebec's French language a minority language in comparison to Canada's majority English language.

The same people who criticize official bilingualism in the rest of Canada are those who criticize official monolingualism in Quebec, presumably because in that case it benefits French at the expense of English.

Again, you are promoting Quebec's racist language laws to favour a linguistic superiority over the English language in Quebec.

And besides, Quebec's 'official monolingualism' was implemented by Quebec's own provincial government and is NOT recognized as being 'official' by Canada's federal governmet, the government that rules the land.

This of course raises embarrissing questions relating to federal discrimination against the English speaking population in Canada.

Edited March 23, 2008 by Leafless

[Wilber]

Wilber:

Now you just have to convince some 7,000,000 people in Québec that you are right. In French, of course.

Best of luck.

No I don't, they can figure it out for themselves.

[Sean Hayward]

Is it the task of government to engineer society, to build a nation? In general, yes. Nation-building projects must be undertaken by governments simply because the individuals cannot undertake these projects alone, and the federal government is the manifestation of the collective will of the nation. Nation-building requires a degree of co-operation and co-ordination that individual citizens are not capable of without government. If we want to establish anarchy and never have any kind of government in our lives, well then that's a different question. But if you agree that we should have a government to hold us together as a society, then you must agree that there needs to be some degree of social engineering. If Canada is to become a nation in the full and true sense of the word, we must abandon this isolation of French in Quebec and English outside Quebec, and accept that Canada is bilingual from coast to coast.

Leafless appears to be so confused I don't know where to start. There IS an English-speaking minority in Quebec. If you have any knowledge whatsoever of Canada, then one of the first things you would learn is that Quebec has a French-speaking majority and an English-speaking minority. The English-speaking minority of Quebec is part of the English-speaking majority of Canada. Maybe that is where I lost you. I can assure you I would never support any racist law of any kind. Quebec's language laws are in no way racist. They discriminate against languages other than French, but they do not discriminate against any race. I was not taking a position on those laws by mentioning them, I was simply pointing out the hypocrisy of criticizing French-only laws in Quebec while promoting English-only laws in the other provinces. Do you understand the concept of an official language? You say "Quebec's monolingualism was implemented by the government of Quebec". Of course it was implemented by the government of Quebec! Who else would Quebec's language policies be implemented by? What role has the federal government to recognize or not recognize provincial language policies? I must have failed to understand your point because I can't think of any embarassing questions this brings up. Would you like to ask them to me directly?

[normanchateau]

If the Harper government accepts this recommendation it will be discriminating against the Charter rights of majority English speaking Canadians.

This means it will allow Quebec to continue to discriminate against the English in Quebec by allowing Quebec to continue to use the NWC to discriminate against minority English in Quebec with the feds recognizing this fact and unilaterally accepting the notion of Quebec being a separate distinct society.

Of course Harper will accept these recommendations. Quebec anglophones aren't likely to vote for Harper anyway and Harper will spend as much as he needs from the rest of Canada to lure the francophones to vote for him. One only needs to look at the 2007 federal budget when Harper took an unprecedented budgetary surplus and totally squandered it by shovelling billions into Quebec from the rest of Canada. No wonder Duceppe warmly endorsed the 2007 budget.

[capricorn]

Of course Harper will accept these recommendations.

And so will the Liberals.

Just wait until the Liberals get this report in Committee. They'll probably bring in even more measures to increase the spread of bilingualism and embellish it for Quebec's benefit. They must increase their numbers in Quebec before an election is called. This is the perfect opportunity.

[Pliny]

Is it the task of government to engineer society, to build a nation? In general, yes. Nation-building projects must be undertaken by governments simply because the individuals cannot undertake these projects alone, and the federal government is the manifestation of the collective will of the nation. Nation-building requires a degree of co-operation and co-ordination that individual citizens are not capable of without government. If we want to establish anarchy and never have any kind of government in our lives, well then that's a different question. But if you agree that we should have a government to hold us together as a society, then you must agree that there needs to be some degree of social engineering. If Canada is to become a nation in the full and true sense of the word, we must abandon this isolation of French in Quebec and English outside Quebec, and accept that Canada is bilingual from coast to coast.

Leafless appears to be so confused I don't know where to start. There IS an English-speaking minority in Quebec. If you have any knowledge whatsoever of Canada, then one of the first things you would learn is that Quebec has a French-speaking majority and an English-speaking minority. The English-speaking minority of Quebec is part of the English-speaking majority of Canada. Maybe that is where I lost you. I can assure you I would never support any racist law of any kind. Quebec's language laws are in no way racist. They discriminate against languages other than French, but they do not discriminate against any race. I was not taking a position on those laws by mentioning them, I was simply pointing out the hypocrisy of criticizing French-only laws in Quebec while promoting English-only laws in the other provinces. Do you understand the concept of an official language? You say "Quebec's monolingualism was implemented by the government of Quebec". Of course it was implemented by the government of Quebec! Who else would Quebec's language policies be implemented by? What role has the federal government to recognize or not recognize provincial language policies? I must have failed to understand your point because I can't think of any embarassing questions this brings up. Would you like to ask them to me directly?

If the federal government is mandated to perform the collective will of the nation then there would be no bilingualism. It is Quebec that has lobbied for bilingualism in Canada and unilingualism in Quebec.

My point is that the collective will of the nation is often not represented by government. When you are talking about government engineering society you are talking about individuals in positions of power having the authority to engineer society.

The will of the people is what will occur with or without government not because of it.

You have to remember what the will of the people is. Surprisingly you will find it is often not your will, and as I previously stated often not the willof government, and if immigration policies continue to be multi-cultural the will of the people will increasingly depart from your concepts of Canadian society.

I believe that in light of your favour toward social engineering you believe your views to represent the will of the people and you feel justified in having government enforce your views in society as opposed to someone else's views. If you wish to remain in the majority you will have to, over time, change your views. Mine will remain the same as they are not the views of the collective.

[Sean Hayward]

If the federal government is mandated to perform the collective will of the nation then there would be no bilingualism. It is Quebec that has lobbied for bilingualism in Canada and unilingualism in Quebec.

My point is that the collective will of the nation is often not represented by government. When you are talking about government engineering society you are talking about individuals in positions of power having the authority to engineer society.

The will of the people is what will occur with or without government not because of it.

You have to remember what the will of the people is. Surprisingly you will find it is often not your will, and as I previously stated often not the willof government, and if immigration policies continue to be multi-cultural the will of the people will increasingly depart from your concepts of Canadian society.

I believe that in light of your favour toward social engineering you believe your views to represent the will of the people and you feel justified in having government enforce your views in society as opposed to someone else's views. If you wish to remain in the majority you will have to, over time, change your views. Mine will remain the same as they are not the views of the collective.

You are mistaken fundamentally on the issue of official languages. The federal government is officially bilingual, in Quebec as in the rest of Canada. Almost all (except New Brunswick) of the provincial governments are officially unilingual. Therefore your statement that official bilingualism is arranged asymetrically to benefit Quebec is completely false. On the point that the collective will is often not well represented by government, that is a problem to be addressed by democratic reform, not a fundamental, un-fixable problem. What I mean by social engineering is society engineering their government, which then engineers society. In other words, society is able to engineer itself according to its collective will, through government. There is a difference between individual will and collective will. The individual will is, as you said, "what will occur with or without government not because of it". The collective will is the combined will of the community, as a community.

Can you clarify your allusion to multiculturalism? I don't think you understand that all government policies are, in some way and to some degree, social engineering. If you want to be completely free of social engineering, you must give up all government.

[Borg]

You are mistaken fundamentally on the issue of official languages. The federal government is officially bilingual, in Quebec as in the rest of Canada. Almost all (except New Brunswick) of the provincial governments are officially unilingual. Therefore your statement that official bilingualism is arranged asymetrically to benefit Quebec is completely false. On the point that the collective will is often not well represented by government, that is a problem to be addressed by democratic reform, not a fundamental, un-fixable problem. What I mean by social engineering is society engineering their government, which then engineers society. In other words, society is able to engineer itself according to its collective will, through government. There is a difference between individual will and collective will. The individual will is, as you said, "what will occur with or without government not because of it". The collective will is the combined will of the community, as a community.

Can you clarify your allusion to multiculturalism? I don't think you understand that all government policies are, in some way and to some degree, social engineering. If you want to be completely free of social engineering, you must give up all government.

You said a mouthful and yet nothing.

Borg

[Pliny]

You are mistaken fundamentally on the issue of official languages. The federal government is officially bilingual, in Quebec as in the rest of Canada. Almost all (except New Brunswick) of the provincial governments are officially unilingual. Therefore your statement that official bilingualism is arranged asymetrically to benefit Quebec is completely false. On the point that the collective will is often not well represented by government, that is a problem to be addressed by democratic reform, not a fundamental, un-fixable problem. What I mean by social engineering is society engineering their government, which then engineers society. In other words, society is able to engineer itself according to its collective will, through government. There is a difference between individual will and collective will. The individual will is, as you said, "what will occur with or without government not because of it". The collective will is the combined will of the community, as a community.

Can you clarify your allusion to multiculturalism? I don't think you understand that all government policies are, in some way and to some degree, social engineering. If you want to be completely free of social engineering, you must give up all government.

As all provinces are officially unilingual with the exception of New Brunswick, Federal bilingualism benefits the minorities in their respective areas over the majority. Only bilingual individuals are benefitted.

Society does not have the benefit of the use of force as government does.

I do understand that all government policies are in some way and to some degree, social engineering, which is why it should be very limited in its mandate.

You cannot tell me that people will not co-operate or do any social planning in the absence of government. That is a ludicrous concept but I admit one that most people hold today because of the omnipresence of government. They believe that chaos will run amok. And no one will make any plans.

Governments sole purpose, in my view, is to provide force in the application of justice and the law so that force cannot be used in society outside of government authority except in the defense of one's person or property. Now I make that as a statement of a free society. It is obviously not the purpose of a Dictatorship or Socialist State - of the right or left persuasion, or even of a social democracy.

Your statement that "if I want to be completely free of social engineering, you must give up all government" is untrue. Society will engineer itself so I will never be free of social engineering, if I indeed care to be a part of a society. What government does is provide some individuals with the power to engineer society according to their desires over and above the desires of others. As long as your desires remain in congruity with the individuals in government you will not complain. I complain about government because it will eventually override your desires but you think it will always be rational and fair like you always are.

What allusion did I make to multiculturalism? It has no place in government, in my view.

Edited March 24, 2008 by Pliny

[Argus]

Is it the task of government to engineer society, to build a nation? In general, yes. Nation-building projects must be undertaken by governments simply because the individuals cannot undertake these projects alone, and the federal government is the manifestation of the collective will of the nation. Nation-building requires a degree of co-operation and co-ordination that individual citizens are not capable of without government. If we want to establish anarchy and never have any kind of government in our lives, well then that's a different question. But if you agree that we should have a government to hold us together as a society, then you must agree that there needs to be some degree of social engineering. If Canada is to become a nation in the full and true sense of the word, we must abandon this isolation of French in Quebec and English outside Quebec, and accept that Canada is bilingual from coast to coast.

There is no chance Canada will ever be bilingual from coast to coast - none. The French minorities are too small outside Quebec, and there is simply no reason for Anglophones in those areas to learn French. If they do learn it, in high school, most will quickly lose it soon afterwards through lack of use. So what really is the point of this? So far, the only accomplishment of official bilingualism are to ensure that an ever growing percentage of federal government jobs to to Quebecers. I put it to you that while this might please Quebecers it isn't in the interest of the rest of us.