Gained In Translation

62 Replies to “Gained In Translation”

1. I have to say it, but most of you guys sound like exactly the lefty whining sissies that are regularly lambasted on this site.
   If you really want to work for the feds, in a high-up role, just learn French. It ain’t that hard. It ain’t frigging rocket science, for cryin’ out loud.
   But what I can’t understand, why do any of you, here of all places, want to work as a civil servant in the first place? You constantly call bureaucrats a bunch of bumbling incompetents, and you want to join them? Hello? Do I miss something here?
   Real capitalists don’t go work for the f**king government. They roll up their sleeves and start their own businesses, and run them.
   Leave the bureaucrat jobs to the losers.

2. Because French is no longer a world language, to say nothing of the lingo used in Quebec, the only way to grant it importance was to grant it status in Trudeau’s charter (not forgetting Pearson’s part prior) that it no longer has on the world scene. French is my first language, so I know very well the mentality behind it. Even in France you have an elite that cannot accept that France, and the French language, are no longer serious players on the international scene. Imposing and enforcing “official bilingualism” is pure totalitarianism as ET has pointed out. Switzerland has four official languages, but one does not need to speak or know more than one in order to live, work and function unless one wants to work in their foreign service. If you live in a French-speaking canton (province), you can succeed just fine in French only. The same applies to the other cantons. So it seems that only Canada was determined to buck the natural order of things with its official bilingualism.
   To make matters worse just consider the significance, or lack of, of French in North America and then consider the numbers. It would make much more sense for people learning a second language to learn Spanish or Chinese than French.
   Still thanks to Trudeau we are now stuck with it along with the tons of money wasted on a totally useless and ineffective program.

3. ET, agree with you 100% on this topic.
   Bilingualism is the greatest ripoff that has occurred in Canada and probably created far more anti-french feeling than any other government policy. I grew up in Alberta and spoke Ukrainian and Croatian before I learned English. French was something I only ran into when living in Ottawa and I took a first year mickey-mouse French course that rendered me “officially bilingual”; most of the French I learned was by partying with students from Quebec but unfortunately this was state-dependent learning and I have to drink 4-6 beers to comprehend written French.
   What struck me about those U of zero days was the utter assurance of many of the French speaking students that they were going to be working in some government job because they spoke French; it made no difference what they were majoring in and at that time Uof0 was almost 100% English in the science faculties and almost all French in the arts faculties.
   Fluency in several languages is useful to have but the time to learn languages is before kids even go to school. Learning 3 languages at once for me was interesting and probably resulted in my brain being wired quite differently for a while. I used to get a hard time from my parents about only speaking 4 languages when they seemed to effortlessly be able to speak in Ukrainian/Croatian, switch to German for a while then practice Italian or French. The only way that one can get this sort of fluency is to be in an environment where multiple linguistic groups live in close proximity to one another like Europe.
   My decision was to learn one language well and I chose English. All technical terms in Ukrainian and Russian are just slightly modified English words and only the French have seen the need to create their own technologic lexicon just to be difficult. If one looks at what would be the most practical language to be learning now, I’d have to say Chinese because China is going to be a big economic power over the next few decades especially now that they pwn the US.
   One of the stupidest things parents can do is to put their kids in French immersion classes. If parents think that the ultimate job is as a civil servant then perhaps their kids should be going into French immersion, but time spent learning a language which they will never use is time that they can’t spend learning math or science.
   The one thing that learning 3 languages at once did for me was the discovery that language is merely an arbitrary means of expressing fundamental mental states and that certain languages are better at expressing these fundamental mental states than others. Aside from having a very frustrating non-phonetic spelling, English is the easiest language I’ve found to translate my thoughts into.

4. Really does anyone need to be bilingual these days when all one needs is a set of translator ear pieces? Given the technology available today, I do not think being bilingual for any position should be a requirement. I can go to any web page in any language and translate it with the click of a mouse. Hand held translators have become very popular with travellers and are relatively inexpensive and as with all technology, the price is dropping significantly every few months.

5. Official Bilingualism is at the stalemate level and the time has come for us to face some facts. Quebec must learn English if they wish to remain in Canada; conversely, Quebec can call their province Canada and the rest of us can clear out and call ourselves something other than Canada. This is not radical or rash: it has happened in many other countries and usually the outcome is positive for both sides – think of Ireland, Former Czechoslovakia, Cypress, Normandy…I never understood why people recoiled in horror at the mention of Quebec and/or Western Canada separating from the rest of the country. This is a very big country (not like Switzerland!) and we have floated along with a batch of Quebec separatistas in the NATION’S House of Commons for too many years…it is beyond ridiculous, IMO. Let us think rationally and make two good nations out of one fractured, malfunctioning entity.

6. It is remarkable that mainly Trudeau et al are the ones being condemned for where we are now in terms of Francophone rule of government, the civil service and most all agencies/boards/commissions of the federal government. It has also been quietly moving into provincial governments as well. Yes, Trudeau et al were the start of it, but it was also promoted during the Mulroney era as well and now is being financed/promoted by the Harper government – big time. Observe how much of the expansion of French has happened since 2006. It is going to continue and probably get worse.
   The most devastating blow in all of this, the effects of which your children and grandchildren will have to bear, happened when an amendment to the Official Languages Act was allowed to quietly flow through the Senate (the origination) and all three readings of House of Commons in 2005. The amendment was given royal assent into law in Dec 2005 (going into the run-up to the 2006 federal election.
   This amendment pretty much ensures that a challenge if provisions of services when not provided on demand in French will be guaranteed by a Supreme Court decision, if taken that far, because this amendment pretty much provides that there will be French “on demand” now rather than as before – when French would be provided “where numbers are warranted” in the Rest of Canada (outside QC).
   The amendment is now law and because of demographics, it will be virtually impossible to secure enough votes in the House of Commons to repeal it – even if it was put forward. This will be a most significant plank (your opinion as to whether this is positive or negative) in the legacy of all MPs, their leaders, and the senators who were sitting in the 2004-2005 time period. A plank that is going to cost Canada $billions more in support of Official Bilingualism to create the illusion that Canada is a fluently bilingual country when in fact, it is not nor is it likely to be so.
   In the final reading, the amendment apparently was given ALL Party approval to make it happen quickly. It is a no-brainer in terms of who the opposition was at this time. Had the opposition opposed it, this amendment would never have seen royal assent. It was probably the best kept secret during the run up to the 2006 federal election. There was no public debate – MPs in all parties did not breathe a word of the fact that this was going on. The MSM opted to remain silent on the issue. The voting public knew little about what was quietly happening. The farm has been sold.

7. It is remarkable that mainly Trudeau et al are the ones being condemned for where we are now in terms of Francophone rule of government, the civil service and most all agencies/boards/commissions of the federal government. It has also been quietly moving into provincial governments as well. Yes, Trudeau et al were the start of it, but it was also promoted during the Mulroney era as well and now is being financed/promoted by the Harper government – big time. Observe how much of the expansion of French has happened since 2006. It is going to continue and probably get worse.
   The most devastating blow in all of this, the effects of which your children and grandchildren will have to bear, happened when an amendment to the Official Languages Act was allowed to quietly flow through the Senate (the origination) and all three readings of House of Commons in 2005. The amendment was given royal assent into law in Dec 2005 (going into the run-up to the 2006 federal election.
   This amendment pretty much ensures that a challenge if provisions of services when not provided on demand in French will be guaranteed by a Supreme Court decision, if taken that far, because this amendment pretty much provides that there will be French “on demand” now rather than as before – when French would be provided “where numbers are warranted” in the Rest of Canada (outside QC).
   The amendment is now law and because of demographics, it will be virtually impossible to secure enough votes in the House of Commons to repeal it – even if it was put forward. This will be a most significant plank (your opinion as to whether this is positive or negative) in the legacy of all MPs, their leaders, and the senators who were sitting in the 2004-2005 time period. A plank that is going to cost Canada $billions more in support of Official Bilingualism to create the illusion that Canada is a fluently bilingual country when in fact, it is not nor is it likely to be so.
   In the final reading, the amendment apparently was given ALL Party approval to make it happen quickly. It is a no-brainer in terms of who the opposition was at this time. Had the opposition opposed it, this amendment would never have seen royal assent. It was probably the best kept secret during the run up to the 2006 federal election. There was no public debate – MPs in all parties did not breathe a word of the fact that this was going on. The MSM opted to remain silent on the issue. The voting public knew little about what was quietly happening. The farm has been sold.

8. oooops – sorry for the double post – didn’t realize the first one had gone through.

9. This is partly off-thread, but, following the comments of SAFELY FORCED, I was pleased to learn that a few of the Cape Breton Scots, against tremendous odds, are still promoting and speaking the Gaelic language. A few Highlanders have even moved from Scotland to work with the language in Nova Scotia.
   These are not wealthy or well-connected people, to say the least. At most they get a pat on the head from government.
   ATLANTIC GAELIC ACADEMY, http://www.gaelicacademy.ca

10. I’ll use my school experience as an example.
    In grade school up to Grade 9, we were forced to use French. I loathed the language by Grade 8, but I maintained I would stick through it until the end to get the damn certificate and have better opportunities. In Grade 9, several people took applied French, so they could get the credit and be done with it. I took Academic and I continued to dread the class. By grade 11, I had had enough. I wasn’t learning a thing, I couldn’t speak or write worth a damn and I could only read at a Grade 4 level. One of my friends stuck it out until the end. She had 10 people in her Grade 12 French class. To this day, she only remembers basic grammar.

11. I’ll use my school experience as an example.
    In grade school up to Grade 9, we were forced to use French. I loathed the language by Grade 8, but I maintained I would stick through it until the end to get the damn certificate and have better opportunities. In Grade 9, several people took applied French, so they could get the credit and be done with it. I took Academic and I continued to dread the class. By grade 11, I had had enough. I wasn’t learning a thing, I couldn’t speak or write worth a damn and I could only read at a Grade 4 level. One of my friends stuck it out until the end. She had 10 people in her Grade 12 French class. To this day, she only remembers basic grammar.

12. Why not make the argument again for why Québec (ie: Canada) should have been a country since 1837?
    If you didn’t ban French language in most of Canada, we wouldn’t be where we are at today, would we? There would be vast French populations through out the country and surely, we would have found a proper way to share the same patch of land in British-Columbia or Manitoba.
    Instead, it will be more practical for the ROC to learn Chinese than French. That was all very practical in the end, but it didn’t turn out as well as planned.
    It is also well tolerated within both communities that the French spoken by Stephen Harper is broken, same as the English spoken by Stéphane Dion was. We can make fun of their errors, but it is always appreciated by francophones to be spoken to in french, even if that french is broken.
    If you want to make this country work, that is one sacrifice to make… and it enrich us all to be bilingual anyway, to learn from the wider Canadian culture, which Quebec most certainly is part of.
    Have a broken French, we’ll have a broken English, so long as we can understand each others down the middle. I’m so tired of arrogant old school WASP who still view Quebecois with irksome tireless hostility and belittling. Face it, it’s an imperfect marriage but you got to live with it.
    The idea that it is not necessary is one of the most foolish thing one can claim. You know why? Let’s just compare ourselves with our common motherlands. France speak English at a lower level than the average Quebecois. England speak French at a higher level than the average Canadian. That’s the problem right there. No one is asking for the guy in Calgary or Vancouver to be fluent in French. Same as no one expect a guy in Saguenay to be fluent in English. But a basic understanding of the “other” language shouldn’t be too much to ask. Schools do a pretty crappy job teaching the second language, there is just not enough requirement.
    Not everyone can be Trudeau or Charest (real name John James, not Jean), whom were both born to French and Irish/Scottish parents. Surely, it ease the process when you learn it from birth. Then, your bilinguism is natural. It’s impossible for most anyone to be that fluent in both languages.
    So relax people and start thinking about this for a second. There isn’t many other languages out there you can learn that have as rich a cultural heritage as the French language. It does open many “doors” intellectually. The English language was partly built upon the French language through the Norman Conquest. Understanding both the Latin and Germanic heritages broaden your horizon as to what the Western World really is about. Yes, it always was a difficult relationship between the two Empires, but that is beside the point today.
    Why insist to remain pragmatically unilingual anyway? Does everything have to be pragmatic? Let say I read books about astronomy, while it is completely irrelevant to my professional competence, does that make this knowledge any less useful? Or actually, it is useless, which is the most important knowledge men tend to acquire, things that have no relevant usage for most, like philosophy, history, art or science. I wouldn’t say learning French (or English if you are French) will make you a smarter person, but it certainly won’t make you a dumber one. Just like knowing what is the Capital of Malaysia or who is the King of Norway would. Not things you need to know in anyway, but that help shape your mental capacity to perceive the wider world more accurately.