English-Canada and French-Canada

[cybercoma]

i like reading your posts, but something hit me today. you're always referring to English-Canada and French-Canada as though they were two seperate things. I wonder if this type of thinking amongst other French Canadians only serves to perpetuate the idea that you're not a part of our country? We all pay our taxes to the same government, sing the same national anthem and sew the same flag to our backpacks. Canada is Canada, english or french we're a bilingual nation. Outlining them as entirely seperate entities seems to create some tension and competition between the two groups. I think everyone in this country needs to start looking at things differently.

[Leafless]

cybercoma

You wrote-" Canada is Canada, english or French Canada is a bilingual nation."

Firstly nations can't speak so we are NOT a bilingual nation.

What we are is a country with two official languages English and French with the province of New Brunswick being the ONLY province classed as having an 'officially bilingual' language policy.

The federal government also incorporates an 'official bilingual' language policy in which many Canadians feel this discriminates against the majority English speaking population of Canada especially considering the fact Quebec itself does not incorporate an 'official bilingual policy' and that bilingualism (French) is grossly over represented in our federal public service as in comparison to what Quebec represents as a percent of our total Canadian population.

Your whole post is senseless as everyone knows it is Quebec that wants to be culturally different and it votes for regional federal political Parties not national and incoporates discriminatory and destructive language policies not the ROC.

We also all know in Quebec it is mainly the 'fleur de lis' that is flown in that province with hardly no sign anywehere of the Canadian maple leaf with Quebec residents loyal to provincial interest.

If there is anyone in this country that should start looking at things differently it's Quebec.

[Bakunin]

i like reading your posts, but something hit me today.  you're always referring to English-Canada and French-Canada as though they were two seperate things.  I wonder if this type of thinking amongst other French Canadians only serves to perpetuate the idea that you're not a part of our country?  We all pay our taxes to the same government, sing the same national anthem and sew the same flag to our backpacks.  Canada is Canada, english or french we're a bilingual nation.  Outlining them as entirely seperate entities seems to create some tension and competition between the two groups.  I think everyone in this country needs to start looking at things differently.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The truth is when both have diferent media, different way of thinking, different culture, different way of living, it become hard to talk about 1 entities. By the nature of things, it become 2 entities, it forge completly differents citizens. The only way to get rid of that would be to have a strong central government wich could only lead to a broken country.

At best it could be a cooperation, a mutual agreement, some kind of confederation and canada would become a powerfull sample in the world of peace and cooperation of cultures.

In other word, you can't ask to quebeckers to renounce to their ambition, to their beleives and embrace the canadian way of living and culture as a minority. But it is still possible to mutually share a government if it can be in a mutual respect and friendship to share common goals. This is something the federal liberals are incapable to do and will be unable to stop.

[cybercoma]

i like reading your posts, but something hit me today.  you're always referring to English-Canada and French-Canada as though they were two seperate things.  I wonder if this type of thinking amongst other French Canadians only serves to perpetuate the idea that you're not a part of our country?  We all pay our taxes to the same government, sing the same national anthem and sew the same flag to our backpacks.  Canada is Canada, english or french we're a bilingual nation.  Outlining them as entirely seperate entities seems to create some tension and competition between the two groups.  I think everyone in this country needs to start looking at things differently.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The truth is when both have diferent media, different way of thinking, different culture, different way of living, it become hard to talk about 1 entities. By the nature of things, it become 2 entities, it forge completly differents citizens. The only way to get rid of that would be to have a strong central government wich could only lead to a broken country.

At best it could be a cooperation, a mutual agreement, some kind of confederation and canada would become a powerfull sample in the world of peace and cooperation of cultures.

In other word, you can't ask to quebeckers to renounce to their ambition, to their beleives and embrace the canadian way of living and culture as a minority. But it is still possible to mutually share a government if it can be in a mutual respect and friendship to share common goals. This is something the federal liberals are incapable to do and will be unable to stop.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

At the end of the day we all want the same things in life. We're just people who happen to speak different languages. If we can't get past something as insignificant as a language barrier and start living together as one nation, then I may find myself truly disgusted with humanity.

[Bakunin]

At the end of the day we all want the same things in life. We're just people who happen to speak different languages. If we can't get past something as insignificant as a language barrier and start living together as one nation, then I may find myself truly disgusted with humanity.

:/ i understand how you can feel.

But the language barrier bring the media barrier wich bring the cultural barrier wich bring the way of living barrier and etc... I think that it would be hard to fusion both cultures and stop the hemoragy there but if i was a die hard federalist the first thing id try to do would be to try to instore a strong and interesting national media center wich would then diffuse the same culture and way of living and thinking and etc... If it can't start there then i guess 1 nation is an impossible mission.

[Guest eureka]

The rederences to English and French Canada by August are an indication of how August now sees Canada - not too different than Bakunin. There was an English Canada and a French Canada: neither had provincial boundaries.

August reflects the complacent acceptance of the expulsion of the English from Quebec which not too long ago was the second larhest English speaking province. This also is the acceptance of the removal of French outside Quebec from the class of French in Canada.

It is acceptance of a race based state in Quebec where the French state is a modern creation where "I remember" is the memory only of a myhtical creation and the wilfull obliteration of Canadian -and Quebec - history.

The last thing that Quebec nationalists want is a bilingual nation. It would destroy their racist dream. Quebec is historically a dual language province, not a bilingual one since most Francophones in the past would not trouble themselves to function even slightly in English.

[cybercoma]

Shouldn't we work towards a more understanding and unified nation on both sides of this? I understand it seems as though Quebec is expelling English from the province, but so to have the other provinces shoved french aside.

I like Bakunin's idea of a unified media that presents the same information to everyone, regardless of what language they speak.

I just think we have a great opportunity here to set an example to other nations. If we can't even get it right ourselves, how are we ever going to defend these ideals anywhere else?

[Leafless]

cybercoma

You wrote- " I understand it seems as though Quebec is expelling English from the province, but so to have the other provinces shoved French aside."

Quebec purged English from the province legally using Bill-101 now known as 'French Charter' and no other Canadian province to date has resorted using a 'legal avenue to reduce or eliminate the francophone population.

It seems you have a problem understanding the difference between a 'majority' language and a 'minority' language as the latter is commercially unfeasable when put up against a combined Canada-U.S. English population of 332-million speakers minus Quebec's 7-million which of course are not all francophone.

Canada -U.S. is not Europe where a cluster of smaller countries speaking different languages makes more sense to be bilingual for one's personal benefit if he or she personally chooses that route.

I agree with eureka's statement "Quebec is historically a dual language province not a bilingual one" advice the federal government could use to stay out of the language issue period rather than force force French on the ROC.

[tml12]

i like reading your posts, but something hit me today.  you're always referring to English-Canada and French-Canada as though they were two seperate things.  I wonder if this type of thinking amongst other French Canadians only serves to perpetuate the idea that you're not a part of our country?  We all pay our taxes to the same government, sing the same national anthem and sew the same flag to our backpacks.  Canada is Canada, english or french we're a bilingual nation.  Outlining them as entirely seperate entities seems to create some tension and competition between the two groups.  I think everyone in this country needs to start looking at things differently.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I cannot comment for August but for Montrealers (and Quebecers in general) this has been a perennial debate, along the lines of whether to put the accent in "Montreal" when speaking or writing in English (August puts it in, I don't unless I am writing in French.)

I think that English Canada and French Canada is fine, as long as we are still writing "Canada." I think a more polarizing debate would be "French Canadians" vs. "Quebecois"

[Bakunin]

A bridge between the 2 culture has to be built and it won't be easy. The heart and soul of a democratic country is a constitution. I think that one of the important step will be to build a constitution that will fit for evryone, not just the quebecker or just ontario or the west, a constitution that evryone can agree on and that is not easy to do for a country like canada.

[Guest eureka]

It is not just language, Cyber, that is being eradicated in Quebec: it is people that have been expelled.

When I went to Quebec in 1974, there were 1,250,000 Anglophones there: about 900,000 in Montreal alone. More than 600,000 left the province to escape the language laws in less than 20 years: most in the first ten or so after the laws. A couple of hundred thousand Francophones also left in disgust at what was happening in their home province.

Now, more than 50% of the Anglophone population has been forced out. The greatest displacement of people in modern history in ratio except for the flight of East Germans to the West after WWII.

Most of Canada outside of Quebec thinks it is just a matter of signs but it is not. The language laws intrude on every aspect of life on Quebec.

[Riverwind]

I think that one of the important step will be to build a constitution that will fit for evryone, not just the quebecker or just ontario or the west, a constitution that evryone can agree on and that is not easy to do for a country like canada.

Strong words, but do you think Quebequers are willing to accept that the Canada is not a federation of two nations but a federation of many provinces with their own distinct identities?

[shoop]

Strong words, but do you think Quebequers are willing to accept that the Canada is not a federation of two nations but a federation of many provinces with their own distinct identities?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It is really quite insulting to portray all English-Canadians as 'the same' just because of language.

[Bakunin]

I think that one of the important step will be to build a constitution that will fit for evryone, not just the quebecker or just ontario or the west, a constitution that evryone can agree on and that is not easy to do for a country like canada.

Strong words, but do you think Quebequers are willing to accept that the Canada is not a federation of two nations but a federation of many provinces with their own distinct identities?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

As long as there is enough air to breath as a province. The Meech accord would have been a good start.

[theloniusfleabag]

Dear cybercoma,

A quote from my Canadian Global Almanac (1992) pg 104.

"No one can deny that Quebec is, culturally and sociologically, a distinct society. So is Newfoundland." Eugene Forsey, constitutional authority, A Life on the Fringe: The Memoirs of Eugene Forsey (1990)

[Riverwind]

As long as there is enough air to breath as a province. The Meech accord would have been a good start.

I have noticed a lot of federalists that I know are increasing becoming convinced that the federal gov't should get completely out of funding programs in provincial juristition and lower taxes accordingly. I assume this would be a good basis to start a discussions.

[tml12]

As long as there is enough air to breath as a province. The Meech accord would have been a good start.

I have noticed a lot of federalists that I know are increasing becoming convinced that the federal gov't should get completely out of funding programs in provincial juristition and lower taxes accordingly. I assume this would be a good basis to start a discussions.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The only political party that is proposing anything close to that is the Conservatives.

[Bakunin]

As long as there is enough air to breath as a province. The Meech accord would have been a good start.

I have noticed a lot of federalists that I know are increasing becoming convinced that the federal gov't should get completely out of funding programs in provincial juristition and lower taxes accordingly. I assume this would be a good basis to start a discussions.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The only political party that is proposing anything close to that is the Conservatives.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

And its not a surprise that the bloc get along very well with the conservative.

[tml12]

As long as there is enough air to breath as a province. The Meech accord would have been a good start.

I have noticed a lot of federalists that I know are increasing becoming convinced that the federal gov't should get completely out of funding programs in provincial juristition and lower taxes accordingly. I assume this would be a good basis to start a discussions.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The only political party that is proposing anything close to that is the Conservatives.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

And its not a surprise that the bloc get along very well with the conservative.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The Bloc supports the Tories on this issue because they want to limit Ottawa's interference in Quebec...they couldn't care less about the implications in the ROC.

[Bakunin]

As long as there is enough air to breath as a province. The Meech accord would have been a good start.

I have noticed a lot of federalists that I know are increasing becoming convinced that the federal gov't should get completely out of funding programs in provincial juristition and lower taxes accordingly. I assume this would be a good basis to start a discussions.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The only political party that is proposing anything close to that is the Conservatives.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

And its not a surprise that the bloc get along very well with the conservative.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The Bloc supports the Tories on this issue because they want to limit Ottawa's interference in Quebec...they couldn't care less about the implications in the ROC.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I think that if it wasn't of quebec, the provinces wouldn't existe anymore... because the liberal federal couldn't care less about respecting the provincial "juridictions".

[tml12]

I think that if it wasn't of quebec, the provinces wouldn't existe anymore... because the liberal federal couldn't care less about respecting the provincial "juridictions".

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

How so?

[Bakunin]

They wouldn't exist as we know them for sure because it seems its the only province to fight with vigor and determination for a decentralized canada where the federal would have to respect his juridictions.

There is a political cost in quebec evry time the federal put's his nose in that province business.

[cybercoma]

As long as there is enough air to breath as a province. The Meech accord would have been a good start.

I have noticed a lot of federalists that I know are increasing becoming convinced that the federal gov't should get completely out of funding programs in provincial juristition and lower taxes accordingly. I assume this would be a good basis to start a discussions.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I believe strongly in a distinct seperation between federal and provincial jurisdictions. I think the sooner we accomplish this, the closer this country wil become. The programs that people need most will be spearheaded, not by some remote entity like Ottawa, but by their provincial governments close to home that have a clearer understanding of the communities they affect.

It just troubles me to see that we cannot live peacefully together as Canadians, but instead we're labelled Québecois and Canadians. There has even become a clear distinction in the way we talk about one another, this "English-Canada and French-Canada" thing really bothers me.

[August1991]

This thread popped up on a search and I realized that I had never responded. But the thread seems timely too since Canada is wondering what it is.

i like reading your posts, but something hit me today. you're always referring to English-Canada and French-Canada as though they were two seperate things. I wonder if this type of thinking amongst other French Canadians only serves to perpetuate the idea that you're not a part of our country?

Reading through the thread, I largely agree with Bakunin's various posts.

To respond to the post's title, I use the terms "English Canada" and "French Canada" (or "French Quebec") because this is the Canada I know. Like it or not, northern North America exists in two distinct ways, according to language. In my own life, there are two ways. Harper is right to say that Canada has two official languages but that does not mean Canada is bilingual.

If English Canadians are confused about this, they should think about Newfoundland. It too is a distinct place with a history longer than any Canadian province. Canada has a federal regime because this is fundamentally the nature of Canada. Such is our history.

The Internet is wonderful because I can say what I believe. I happen to think that Quebec should have distinct or sovereign status within some kind of Canadian federation. IMV, Quebec francophones can better manage affairs without the interference of outsiders. In turn, English Canada really must decide what it is. This would not be the end of Canada. Rather, it would be a different arrangement of our affairs.

Trudeau was right to make Ottawa bilingual, and right to introduce the word "francophone" into Canadian English. But Trudeau was wrong to say that Quebec is a province as any other. It isn't.

Cybercoma, to return to your question, after a key federal election, I view Harper's win of 10 seats in Quebec as part of a remarkable dialogue between English Canada and French Canada - a dialogue I have seen many, many times in my personal life. French Quebec is expressing an ouverture. May English Canada respond.

[Rue]

" What we are is a country with two official languages English and French with the province of New Brunswick being the ONLY province classed as having an 'officially bilingual' language policy. "

Your above comment is a bit misleading. In the Province of Ontario, French is considered an official language in all provincial court proceedings and government services and in fact the provincial civil service and provincial courts must provide services in French if requested. So while most Ontarians are not bilingual, it does have a public policy that in effect guarantees equal services to Francophones.