Quebec, the French Language, and Quebecois Identity

[dreambrother808]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

As with anything, depends on what's exactly being said. Supporting Palestinian independence is obviously not hate speech. But genocidal chants against Jewish people such as "river to the sea" or "globalize the intifada" are definitely hate speech and those lines are frequently heard at pro-Palestine rallies. In a lot of cases as well, the people organizing pro-Palestinian protests have genocidal attitudes towards Jews, supporting the destruction of the State of Israel and justifying October 7th. Now obviously - a big number - probably a sizeable majority, even - of the people participating in the rallies are just angry about the death toll in Gaza and just want peace (this is certainly naive and misdirected, but it's not hate speech). It's much like the Freedom Convoy - while most of the participants of that event had a politically reasonable position (simply opposing covid restrictions), the organizers had much darker motivations, and teasing apart which people there are hate-filled radicals and which people are simply political protestors is a difficult task.

Edit: To add, as well, the phrase of "a century of Israeli colonial oppression" is itself a bit suspect on your part. Israel has only been occupying the Palestinian territories for 57 years, much shorter than a "century". Saying a "century" suggests you consider Israel's very existence to be "oppression", which, well.. that's anti-Semitic. Jews have a right to self-determination in their indigenous homeland, and Israel has the right to exist, like all other countries on this planet. (So do Palestinians.. hence the need for a peace process).

I am not Indigenous to a place a possibly small percentage of my distant ancestors may have lived in over 2000 years ago. By that logic, Finnish people can colonize Siberia. I most certainly don’t have the right to displace those who remained indigenous to that area.

Thank you for throwing out the “anti-semitism” barb. I’m not biting.

As for the protests, yes, extreme opinions exist. Frankly, if your family had been murdered would you respond peacefully to those who murdered them? Israelis can commit genocide and that’s not a big deal for some. Palestinians will say my people have a right to live in the full extent of their homeland, “from the river to the sea,” and people like you will say that’s the real crime…

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

Not really. It's just that the pro-Palestine protestors have been extremely loud. They don't actually come close to reflecting public opinion. Most people don't care about foreign conflicts. In fact, I think the opposite has happened - the mainstream is irritated/concerned about the protests to the point where they've become modestly pro-Israel as a reaction. Case in point - that Leger poll in Canada that found that Canadians overwhelmingly disapprove of the university encampments. Notice that in the UK election, where Labour moved to a moderately pro-Israel position despite the angry screams of the hard left, this had no real electoral consequences for them outside of a few predominantly Muslim ridings. I think this is part of why the protests are becoming increasingly unhinged, they're upset that society isn't just immediately bandwagoning onto their position the way society did for every other cultural-left cause de jour these last few years (while simultaneously convincing themselves that the general public supports them - doublethink is one hell of a drug...)

They are so unhinged they think Biden and Trudeau are Genocide supporters. They will enjoy Trump and Polievre attitude to the conflict and frankly their whole BS. While the bleeding heart liberals of North America are now polling as supporting Palestinians. As soon as the conflict stops it will go back to indifference. These same people only held Hamas accountable for a few days and they killed babies and raped women in their homes.

[P'tit Renard]

Originally Posted by New Brisavoine

By the way, in the North America constituency the Macron candidate won, but it wasn't thanks to Montréal. It's mostly because of NYC, Boston, and Silicon Valley that he won.

Now you've got a taste of how bobo Plateau Mont-Royal truly is. This politics permeates the whole island, it's the leftist nirvana of Canada.

[Meuhud]

First, I come to skyscraper page.com to follow construction and urban issues. I don't understand why Quebecois culture and now the Israeli-Arab conflict have a place here.
That said, calling the war in Gaza "genocidal" is not factual and is anti-semitic. Read James Verini"s recent book about the fight over Mosul, called "They will have to die now" which is about the American-Iraqi-Kurd campaign to defeat ISIS and compare it to how the Israelis have conducted their war against the terrorist group Hamas, and their many civilian supporters in Gaza, and any objective observer will note the difference. In order to defeat a group of terrorists sworn to destroy Israel and try to free innocent hostages Israel has spared the vast majority of the Palestinian civilians behind whom Hamas hides. The Israeli military has not been carrying out a genocide but those who choose to label it such are carrying out a blood libel against the Jewish people!

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by dreambrother808

I am not Indigenous to a place a possibly small percentage of my distant ancestors may have lived in over 2000 years ago.

This is massively downplaying the extent of the Jewish connection to Israel, to the point of being disinformation. It's not some tentative hypothetical connection that only a handful of Jews have. The Jewish people literally originated in ancient Israel and the vast majority of Jews alive today have predominantly Israelite ancestry. This isn't some hypothesis; this is scientific fact. Literally the opening sentence of Wikipedia's article on the Jewish people (one of the most protected WK pages there are, so everything claimed on that page has solid scientific basis):

The Jews or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites of the ancient Near East.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jews

And I don't like reducing culture to DNA (it's too racialist for my liking), but if we're going down that route...

Studies on the genetic composition of Ashkenazi, Sephardi, and Mizrahi Jewish populations of the Jewish diaspora show significant amounts of shared Middle Eastern ancestry.

In a study of Israeli Jews from some different groups (Ashkenazi Jews, Kurdish Jews, North African Sephardi Jews, and Iraqi Jews) and Palestinian Muslim Arabs, more than 70% of the Jewish men and 82% of the Arab men whose DNA was studied had inherited their Y chromosomes from the same paternal ancestors, who lived in the region within the last few thousand years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_studies_of_Jews

Jewish culture & spirituality is literally centered on the memory of this ancient origin. It's what Jewishishness is. Judaism is often described as a "suitcase" analogy: Judaism is the suitcase that the Jews packed with them when they were forced to leave their homeland. This has been the case for millennia, it's not some fake new thing a Zionist intellectual invented.

You make good points about how the creation of Israel did come at the expense of the Palestinian Arab population: it didn't have to be this way, but it did. But what you're missing is that by simultaneously downplaying with fake information the origins and central narratives of the Jewish nation, and attempting to rewrite Jewish history to suit your political arguments, you're being anti-Semitic. You can defend Palestinian indigenous rights without denying those same rights held by Jews. It's not the former, but the latter, that makes it anti-Semitism.

Originally Posted by dreambrother808

As for the protests, yes, extreme opinions exist. Frankly, if your family had been murdered would you respond peacefully to those who murdered them? Israelis can commit genocide and that’s not a big deal for some. Palestinians will say my people have a right to live in the full extent of their homeland, “from the river to the sea,” and people like you will say that’s the real crime…

You can say the exact same thing about Israelis regarding the response to October 7th.

Every extreme opinion that has ever existed, on any topic, has a reason behind it. If simply having a reason justified shoving an extreme opinion into the public square, we'd have to accommodate every extreme opinion that ever existed. That isn't workable.

[dreambrother808]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

This is massively downplaying the extent of the Jewish connection to Israel, to the point of being disinformation. It's not some tentative hypothetical connection that only a handful of Jews have. The Jewish people literally originated in ancient Israel and the vast majority of Jews alive today have predominantly Israelite ancestry. This isn't some hypothesis; this is scientific fact. Literally the opening sentence of Wikipedia's article on the Jewish people (one of the most protected WK pages there are, so everything claimed on that page has solid scientific basis):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jews

And I don't like reducing culture to DNA (it's too racialist for my liking), but if we're going down that route...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_studies_of_Jews

Jewish culture & spirituality is literally centered on the memory of this ancient origin. It's what Jewishishness is. Judaism is often described as a "suitcase" analogy: Judaism is the suitcase that the Jews packed with them when they were forced to leave their homeland. This has been the case for millennia, it's not some fake new thing a Zionist intellectual invented.

You make good points about how the creation of Israel did come at the expense of the Palestinian Arab population: it didn't have to be this way, but it did. But what you're missing is that by simultaneously downplaying with fake information the origins and central narratives of the Jewish nation, and attempting to rewrite Jewish history to suit your political arguments, you're being anti-Semitic. You can defend Palestinian indigenous rights without denying those same rights held by Jews. It's not the former, but the latter, that makes it anti-Semitism.

You can say the exact same thing about Israelis regarding the response to October 7th.

Every extreme opinion that has ever existed, on any topic, has a reason behind it. If simply having a reason justified shoving an extreme opinion into the public square, we'd have to accommodate every extreme opinion that ever existed. That isn't workable.

You make some exaggerated genetic claims and then use Wikipedia as proof. The genetic studies wiki you link to doesn’t even support your claim that the “vast majority of Jews alive today have predominantly Israeli ancestry.” Modern Jewish people are admixtures of various ancestries and in varying degrees. The Middle East plays only one role in that.

It’s insane to think that centuries and millennia old ancestries give one right to lay claim to anything anyways. I can’t even claim citizenship to living in Europe, while being 100% descended from there within a few generations. But European Ashkenazi Jewish people like Netanyahu can slaughter indigenous Palestinians and the rest of the world should just shut up about it? Get real.

What has occurred is an atrocity and that atrocity started long before October 7th. Look up how Jewish people took over Palestinian land. There are videos of old Israeli men laughing about their crimes. Look at how they still do it today. It is brutal, ugly, and criminal. It has nothing to do with being Jewish but everything to do with the potential ugliness of humanity in general. Calling that out is a moral responsibility of every human being, no matter who is committing the injustice.

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by dreambrother808

Israel is a genocidal state

Oh boy...

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by P'tit Renard

Now you've got a taste of how bobo Plateau Mont-Royal truly is. This politics permeates the whole island, it's the leftist nirvana of Canada.

French citizens in Montréal are far more to the left than Canadian citizens. As far as I know, QS never won the municipal elections in Montréal or polled #1 on the island.

[Zeej]

Originally Posted by New Brisavoine

As far as I know, QS never won the municipal elections in Montréal or polled #1 on the island.

Correct, because QS is not a municipal party.

[Acajack]

Judging from what I saw on the streets of Paris and other French cities last night, thank goodness this is seen as a win for peace, harmony, tolerance, rule of law, "le vivre-ensemble", and the values of the Republic and the Constitution!

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Zeej

Correct, because QS is not a municipal party.

Montreal is a huge mix of ideologies, with woke leftism, diversitism and globalism very present in the city, mixed in with more classic leftism, centrism, and Québécois nationalism and separatism.

Most forms of conservatism as understood by other North Americans are not very present there however.

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by Zeej

Correct, because QS is not a municipal party.

Why is that?

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by dreambrother808

You make some exaggerated genetic claims and then use Wikipedia as proof. The genetic studies wiki you link to doesn’t even support your claim that the “vast majority of Jews alive today have predominantly Israeli ancestry.” Modern Jewish people are admixtures of various ancestries and in varying degrees. The Middle East plays only one role in that.

It’s insane to think that centuries and millennia old ancestries give one right to lay claim to anything anyways. I can’t even claim citizenship to living in Europe, while being 100% descended from there within a few generations. But European Ashkenazi Jewish people like Netanyahu can slaughter indigenous Palestinians and the rest of the world should just shut up about it? Get real.

What has occurred is an atrocity and that atrocity started long before October 7th. Look up how Jewish people took over Palestinian land. There are videos of old Israeli men laughing about their crimes. Look at how they still do it today. It is brutal, ugly, and criminal. It has nothing to do with being Jewish but everything to do with the potential ugliness of humanity in general. Calling that out is a moral responsibility of every human being, no matter who is committing the injustice.

I am sorry but this rebuttal is borderline anti-semitism. While not perfect (such things rarely are) Israelis have more of a historical claim to the lands they occupy than a huge number of people in the world do to where they currently live.

And even so, international law and custom generally dictates that people have a right to live where they and their forebears have lived for a while. Regardless of whether their control of the territory was achieved by noble means or not. If it wasn't the case, then the presence of 99% of the population of North America would be illegitimate. And of course much of the world would be ungovernable.

None of this takes away from the injustices that Palestinians have suffered and that they should also have their own country. But saying even subtly that Israelis have no right to remain where they are is a pretty gross way to approach this, in addition to dooming to failure any attempt at a solution.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by New Brisavoine

Why is that?

Municipal parties generally aren't branches of federal or provincial parties, though for sure there can be some (assumed) affinities.

Valérie Plante is assumed to be QS-friendly, for example.

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Valérie Plante is assumed to be QS-friendly, for example.

Did she remove 2 lanes from the freeways crossing Montréal?

Did she decrease the speed limit on Montréal freeways down to 50 km/h?

Did she close the expressway bordering the St Lawrence River and turn it into a pedestrian alley?

Did she subsidize and install an anti-capitalist, Green extremist association supposedly about "climate change" but in fact organizing parties and far-left events (such as "how to violate the law and resist authorities?") in the most historical town hall of Montréal?

Did she enforce 30 km/h speed limit on most side streets in Montréal?

Did she quadruple parking fees in Montréal, end free parking in August, and buy a fleet of municipal cars equipped with cameras to distribute a record number of fines to car drivers who exceed their parking time?

If the answer is NO to most of these questions, then she wouldn't quality as NFP in France (the far-left alliance that won the elections yesterday).

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by New Brisavoine

Did she remove 2 lanes from the freeways crossing Montréal?

Did she decrease the speed limit on Montréal freeways down to 50 km/h?

Did she close the expressway bordering the St Lawrence River and turn it into a pedestrian alley?

Did she subsidize and install an anti-capitalist, Green extremist association supposedly about "climate change" but in faIct organizing parties and far-left events (such as "how to violate the law and resist authorities?") in the most historical town hall of Montréal?

Did she enforce 30 km/h speed limit on most side streets in Montréal?

Did she quadruple parking fees in Montréal, end free parking in August, and buy a fleet of municipal cars equipped with cameras to distribute a record number of fines to car drivers who exceed their parking time?

If the answer is NO to most of these questions, then she wouldn't quality as NFP in France (the far-left alliance that won the elections yesterday).

No she did none of this. Though she is seen as similar-minded to Anne Hidalgo, whom I gather you are not a fan of.

One of the main criticisms for sure is that she is anti-car. But she doesn't go as far as NFP-LFI types.

Under our system, she also doesn't have authority over autoroutes even on the territory of her city. While as mayor she might be consulted on certain projects or changes, the final authority rests with the government of Quebec.

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by Acajack

No she did none of this. Though she is seen as similar-minded to Anne Hidalgo, whom I gather you are not a fan of.

How can she be "similar-minded" to Anne Hidalgo when all the things I've listed in my post are things Anne Hidalgo has either already done or intends to do by the autumn of this year?

(and now that France essentially doesn't have a central government for the next 12 months, no one can stop her from closing 2 lanes of the Périphérique beltway or reducing its speed limit to 50 km/h after the Olympic Games)

I think you guys have only a very faint notion of how extreme the French Left are. Anne Hidalgo doesn't even rule with the LFI (she opposes them in Paris in fact), and yet her policies are far more extreme than anything that could be conceived by even the most left-wing politician in Canada.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by New Brisavoine

How can she be "similar-minded" to Anne Hidalgo when all the things I've listed in my post are things Anne Hidalgo has either already done or intends to do by the autumn of this year?

(and now that France essentially doesn't have a central government for the next 12 months, no one can stop her from closing 2 lanes of the Périphérique beltway or reducing its speed limit to 50 km/h after the Olympic Games)

I think you guys have only a very faint notion of how extreme the French Left are. Anne Hidalgo doesn't even rule with the LFI (she opposes them in Paris in fact), and yet her policies are far more extreme than anything that could be conceived by even the most left-wing politician in Canada.

I said she is "seen" as similar-minded.

Also, both women seem to appreciate each other a lot, and they may also if I recall have even said themselves that they have a lot in common in terms of vision.

Just reporting what I've heard and read.

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Also, both women seem to appreciate each other a lot, and they may also if I recall have even said themselves that they have a lot in common in terms of vision.

It's just some blabla for the cameras. In the real world, your Ms Plante would probably be sitting in the Macronist opposition in the Paris city council, and be decried as a "pro-car dinosaur" by our Cruella De Vil of a mayor Anne Hidalgo.

My point is, Montréal is not as left-wing as those French people living in Montréal, and there's nothing as left-wing as the NFP that wins elections in Montréal or rules the city. Thanks God for you guys.

[lio45]

Even Valérie Plante is likely too far left for the Montreal of today, she'd unlikely to get reelected. Does the clear anti-incumbent trend we see nowadays in Quebec, Canada, Britain, the USA and France apply to Paris municipal politics too? I'd guess it does...?