Statistics Canada Reports II

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

Everyone forgets the role Frank McKenna had in the failure of Meech. As a newly elected Liberal Premier in NB, he decided to stand up to Conservative Prime Minister Mulroney, and delayed the legislative vote in NB for Meech "for consideration and reflection." After a couple of months he had a "my God, what have I done" epiphany, and promply allowed the legislature to ratify Meech, but, it was too late. Clyde Wells then did the same thing in NL, and Elijah Harper delivered the coup de grace.

But, it all started with Frank McKenna. His intent was not to imperil Canada, but his actions took us to the brink. I'm sure he still wakes up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat thinking about it.

I think McKenna gets off relatively easy in the history books because he changed his mind and admittedly worked really hard to try and fix things. But you're right that he is the one that got the ball rolling that led to Meech's demise.

(He also came to speak at my university and I attended.)

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Finland was in fact part of Russia for 125-150 years I think.

And Russia tried to take it back during the Winter War.

While Finland won the war and handed Russia it's ass, Russia was still able to annex a large portion of eastern and northern Finland and refused to give it back.

Perhaps a point to be remembered in a potential future Canada/Quebec conflict and "Quebec du Nord".........

[Acajack]

For the record, during almost of all the Meech debacle I was still a ROCer and dead-set against the agreement and very happy to see PET work behind the scenes to kill it. That is, until the very end of the saga when I abruptly changed gears. What transpired during the last days of Meech really changed my vision of Canada forever.

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by Acajack

It's also not unheard of to hear people say "we Italians learned English to live in Canada, why can't the French in Quebec do the same?" (Most Canadians, whether native-born or naturalized citizens, aren't too knowledgeable when it comes to their country's history.)

Sounds like a quote right out of 1978.

Well sure, there are assholes that say things like that. Not very many nowadays, especially within Quebec's borders.

It is on the same level as being screamed at with "Ici, c'est Québec, et ici nous parlons français!!" (not because I was trying to be served in English, but because I was speaking to a friend in English while walking the streets of Montreal....something similar happened to me once while speaking English to my wife on the metro in Paris...a barrage of nasty (translated) "Goddamned f*cking stupid Americans and their ugly language polluting our city and hurting my eardrums"....well he was quite shocked by my response of telling him to shut up and eat shit (in french), and how the streets of Paris, while beautiful, were filled with rude locals like himself).

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Finland was in fact part of Russia for 125-150 years I think.

yep, and Michigan was part of Quebec for many years too.

[MolsonExport]

Back in 1825, the population of Lower Canada (Quebec) was less than half a million (and back then the English speaking proportion of Lower Canada was much greater than it is today).

The following estimate was made for 1822, by Bouchette, of the population of Lower Canada.



Recapitulation
Districts. North side. South side. Total
Québec 56,359 77,315 133,674
Trois-Rivières 18,882 28,974 47,856
Montréal 123,904 120,082 243,986
Clergy and Convents 449
Protestants in Parish’s 1,500
Grand Total 199,145 226,371 427,465

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/...064809-eng.htm

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Sounds like a quote right out of 1978.

Well sure, there are assholes that say things like that. Not very many nowadays, especially within Quebec's borders.

It is on the same level as being screamed at with "Ici, c'est Québec, et ici nous parlons français!!" (not because I was trying to be served in English, but because I was speaking to a friend in English while walking the streets of Montreal....something similar happened to me once while speaking English to my wife on the metro in Paris...a barrage of nasty (translated) "Goddamned f*cking stupid Americans and their ugly language polluting our city and hurting my eardrums"....well he was quite shocked by my response of telling him to shut up and eat shit (in french), and how the streets of Paris, while beautiful, were filled with rude locals like himself).

They're both reflective of attitudes that are still out there, regardless of how often they are openly expressed.

I'd never deny that there are lots of people who think everyone (or at least, most everyone, except maybe for tourists) should be speaking in French on the streets of Montreal.

Just as there are lots of people who think French is an anachronism in Canada, that we're an English-speaking country and that francophones should just "get with the program".

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by lio45

The rest of your post seems to contradict this: if you admit Quebec will continue to get diluted if it doesn’t achieve sovereignty, then how can you see it doing well? Continuous dilution will doom it.

“I forecast that in 200 years the Finnish language will be alive and well, especially if Finland has become part of Russia by then”

Why assume that sovereignty would make a difference? It's far from obvious.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

Why assume that sovereignty would make a difference? It's far from obvious.

It's as good a bet as any, I'd say.

With the exception of Ireland, almost every single country that has become independent from their "cultural overlords" (for lack of a better term) has seen their culture and language do better than it did when they were a minority in the larger entity. This is especially true when independence happens for cultural and linguistic reasons. In the case of Ireland, the reasons for independence certainly were not linguistic, and the Irish language was too far gone by 1921 for it to be revived as an everyday language.

Quebec independence has at its heart the question of language. So it's basically impossible that any Quebec independence scenario in the lifetime of any of us on here would not lead to a strengthening of French by the new country. I suppose that in the much longer term, one might see a broader upheaval of North American geopolitics that could lead to Quebec becoming independent (almost by accident) in spite of it using mostly English at that point, similar to Ukraine with Russian today, but that won't happen in any of our lifetimes.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Back in 1825, the population of Lower Canada (Quebec) was less than half a million (and back then the English speaking proportion of Lower Canada was much greater than it is today).

The following estimate was made for 1822, by Bouchette, of the population of Lower Canada.



Recapitulation
Districts. North side. South side. Total
Québec 56,359 77,315 133,674
Trois-Rivières 18,882 28,974 47,856
Montréal 123,904 120,082 243,986
Clergy and Convents 449
Protestants in Parish’s 1,500
Grand Total 199,145 226,371 427,465

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/...064809-eng.htm

Those tables in the link are very interesting.

[BlackDog204]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I think McKenna gets off relatively easy in the history books because he changed his mind and admittedly worked really hard to try and fix things. But you're right that he is the one that got the ball rolling that led to Meech's demise.

(He also came to speak at my university and I attended.)

I am glad Meech Lake failed, and I was a proud Manitoban when we helped kill the bill.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by BlackDog204

I am glad Meech Lake failed, and I was a proud Manitoban when we helped kill the bill.

You are perfectly entitled to feel that way but I think the overwhelming historical consensus is that in retrospect Meech would have been a relatively small price to pay to avoid all of the drama and turmoil of the 5-10 years that followed its demise. Even most of the Meech opponents of yore will say that today.

[P'tit Renard]

Originally Posted by Acajack

And note that in Seine-St-Denis the linguistic integration is seamless. 100% of the banlieue kids speak perfect French and in most cases their parents also spoke French before they moved to France from Africa or the Middle East.

If anything, the recent arrivals from Punjab are in a significant worst position than France's guest workers, given how much debt most of them are saddled with to pay the exorbitant International student tuition fees, and the pressure/stress piled on them because their parents literally sold the farm and all their family heirlooms to pay for this misadventure.

The Smart Prosperity Institute's interview with Mike Moffatt and Alex Usher is very revealing. Canadian diplomats are flagging these hundreds of thousands of discontented students who are ultimately denied PR as national security threats. How does Sean Fraser sleep at night I wonder?

https://youtu.be/fm-ih2VOH3Y?si=2NoYbxgLGVpjsXfT&t=1400

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by P'tit Renard

If anything, the recent arrivals from Punjab are in a significant worst position than France's guest workers, given how much debt most of them are saddled with to pay the exorbitant International student tuition fees, and the pressure/stress piled on them because their parents literally sold the farm and all their family heirlooms to pay for this misadventure.

The Smart Prosperity Institute's interview with Mike Moffatt and Alex Usher is very revealing. Canadian diplomats are flagging these hundreds of thousands of discontented students who are ultimately denied PR as national security threats. How does Sean Fraser sleep at night I wonder?

https://youtu.be/fm-ih2VOH3Y?si=2NoYbxgLGVpjsXfT&t=1400

I can understand many are frustrated but not sure about a significant security risk if they are required to leave the country once PR is denied and their study period expires, no?

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by P'tit Renard

If anything, the recent arrivals from Punjab are in a significant worst position than France's guest workers, given how much debt most of them are saddled with to pay the exorbitant International student tuition fees, and the pressure/stress piled on them because their parents literally sold the farm and all their family heirlooms to pay for this misadventure.

The Smart Prosperity Institute's interview with Mike Moffatt and Alex Usher is very revealing. Canadian diplomats are flagging these hundreds of thousands of discontented students who are ultimately denied PR as national security threats. How does Sean Fraser sleep at night I wonder?

https://youtu.be/fm-ih2VOH3Y?si=2NoYbxgLGVpjsXfT&t=1400

Are the two situations comparable?

I thought the social issues in the banlieues came from disaffected first generation French kids (citizens of Metropolitan France). They have nowhere else to go. They can't just move back to Algeria or Senegal.

We're exploiting naive kids from Punjab, which is wrong, but I don't know if we'll receive any fallout. Many will return back home broke and with nothing to show for it, and their families might be in debt, but given what class of international students migrate to Canada:

(a) If their parents borrowed money, it was probably more from a bank or some credible lender than from some criminal boss that can threaten your family with violence;

(b) being cheated out of your family's money is sadly not an uncommon experience in India, so they may not register it as traumatically as, say, a Canadian who befell the same circumstances. I'm not saying this is a good thing, but people who grow up in countries where the government can't guarantee basic services are a bit more resilient. Looking at how people internalize outcomes from a middle class Canadian pov is kind of like comparing how a professional figure skater vs. your average Joe takes a high speed fall on the ice.

[P'tit Renard]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I can understand many are frustrated but not sure about a significant security risk if they are required to leave the country once PR is denied and their study period expires, no?

It's an open question whether the Canadian government has the infrastructure or political will to search for and deport all foreign aliens who decide not to leave and overstay their visas.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by P'tit Renard

It's an open question whether the Canadian government has the infrastructure or political will to search for and deport all foreign aliens who decide not to leave and overstay their visas.

Good point. It emerged over the last year that even France of all countries doesn't really do that. So imagine Canada.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by P'tit Renard

It's an open question whether the Canadian government has the infrastructure or political will to search for and deport all foreign aliens who decide not to leave and overstay their visas.

To search for, definitely not. To deport would be expensive but would take years and years and years.

[P'tit Renard]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Good point. It emerged over the last year that even France of all countries doesn't really do that. So imagine Canada.

We also don't have border exit controls and no National ID system, so for the most part the Canadian government has no clue who has really left Canada or has decided to stay. CRA's dealing with that quagmire right now, as many who leave don't even self-declare.

[P'tit Renard]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

Are the two situations comparable?

I thought the social issues in the banlieues came from disaffected first generation French kids (citizens of Metropolitan France). They have nowhere else to go. They can't just move back to Algeria or Senegal.

We're exploiting naive kids from Punjab, which is wrong, but I don't know if we'll receive any fallout. Many will return back home broke and with nothing to show for it, and their families might be in debt, but given what class of international students migrate to Canada:

Your assumption is that they'll willingly go home, but I think what the Canadian Diplomats are worried about are the ones who decide to overstay their visa and don't leave. Given their circumstances, it's understandable why many of them would take this risk, especially since they don't have much waiting for them back in India.

There's no Canadian enforcement mechanism that will realistically deport them. Like US illegal migrants, they can very well overstay in Canada and gamble for amnesty down the road.