Yesterday on the TV, I saw, yet again, yet another walking, talking example of how the Québec fatwah of "Je me souviens de mes origines françaises!" ("I remember my French origins!") is a gaw-damned LIE, an egregious case of FALSE ADVERTISING! There is this local "French-speaking" musician going around hawking his new album.
What is this new "French-speaking/"Je me souviens de mes origines françaises" album? Why, it is none other than a tribute to JOHNNY CASH, who a) was American, and b), as far as I know, did not speak French (or, more accurately in this case, Gaspesian. French Foreign Legionnaires look at you as if you have a hole in your head if you say "OSTY DE COWLIS DE TABARNAK!")
Nothing illustrates the fundamental pathology of the fatwah, the myth, the lie of "Je me souviens de mes origines françaises!" more than eejits who say this over and over and over and over and over and over again...then proceed to recite everything there is to know about Harvey Weinstein--again, to my knowledge, an American who does not speak Gaspesian--but then proceed to give you a blank stare when you bring up the subject of something that is REALFrench, like, say, PSGor the Garde Républicaine. There are plenty of REALFrench songs and songwriters for this Gaspesian bampot to make tributes to.
But noooOOOOOOOoooooo! The "Je me souviens" bampot had to go out...and deliberatelyfind something NON-French to make a tribute to. Well, I suppose I should thank said bampot for making my point that Gaspesians are to REALFrenchmen what Tribeca street vendors hawk is to REALGucci, Prada and Dolce&Gabbana.
As if to underscore the point, yesterday, on the second day of an election campaign ending on the 1st of October, the ruling Liberal Party of Québec introduced a new candidate who will become health minister if elected. Here is an excerpt of her speech.
Now, contrast Bourdon's MANIFESTinability to deliver a speech using complete sentences--you know, subject, verb, object, PERIOD! with each sentence logically following the other, with NO "uhs", "ums" "las"-- with how a REAL Frenchman speaks.
Did I mention that Bourdon is a high-ranking administrator in a major hospital centre? Bob on Toast, no WONDERhealth care in Québec is so fucked up! The head honchos of institutions, knowing no other language than French, CANNOT EVEN FORM COMPLETE FUCKING SENTENCES IN THE LANGUAGE THEY PURPORT TO SPEAK!!!!!!!!! If they cannot even speak French like normal people, it follows that a sophisticated concept like OPSCis well beyond whatever the fuck it is they supposedly have between their ears.
This is material to the main topic of this entry, which is the contrast between Québec white nationalist Coalition avenir Québec leader François Legault on the one hand, Ontario Prime Minister Doug Ford and currently independent Federal MP Maxime Bernier. An aside is necessary first.
I was born in Québec, grew up in New York, and have been back in Québec for several decades now. I know Legault and Bernier best. I might be wrong about what I am about to say about Ford because I do not know him, or Ontario, that well. I have been to Ontario a handful of times, but nowhere near as many times as I have been to New England or New Jersey. To put things into perspective, most particularly for Britons, continental Europeans and ANZACs, Canada, among the nations, has the second largest landmass. The distance between Canada's most famous easternmost city, Saint John's in Newfoundland, and its most famous westernmost city, Vancouver in British Columbia, is three thousand kilometres. That is about the same as the distance between Belfast in Ulster and Tiflis/Tblisi in Southwest Asia, as well as about double the length of the Mediterranean. As well, unlike America and Germany, which have strong federal governments, Canada's composite provinces maintain massive barriers to the free movement of people and goods WITHIN Canada. As far as I know, the PSNI does not arrest you if you are in possession of Bucky's purchased in Govan, but New Brunswick arrests you if you are in possession of beer purchased in Québec.
All of this is to say that it is as reasonable to expect me to intimately know Ontario as it is to expect a shoemaker in Smolensk to be on a first-name basis with every whorehouse bouncer in Vladivostok. As I said, I have been to Ontario a couple of times. Near as I can tell Ontario suffers from the same basic design flaw as 99.99999% of other places on this planet, which is to say that it is not New York, it is not Portadown, it is not the Shankill and it is not Govan. That aside, it seems a decent enough place to me. One big difference I have noticed is that people in Ontario are generally far less manic, far less histrionic and far less prone to wild, violent and spontaneous hand gesticulations than are 6 million out of 8 million people in Québec. People in Ontario, whether they speak English or French--yes, many Ontario people do speak French--have this magical ability to speak in complete sentences, most unlike Bourdon above.
The language issue is a nice segue into my main point. Both François Legault and Doug Ford oppose immigration. Near as I can tell, that is where the similarities end. Legault specifically wants those handful of immigrants he allows in to be white and to pass "French" and Québec "values" tests. By contrast, near as I can tell, Ford's only objection to immigration is that it is costing Ontario money. I have looked around a bit, but I could not find anything saying that Ford wants to ban non-"French"-speakers, or non-English speakers, from Ontario, and I could not find anything about Ford forcing an "Ontario values test" on immigrants. About the only thing solid I could find on Ford and immigration is that he abolished the Ontario immigration ministry.
Again, I am not from Ontario, and I do not follow Ontario as closely as I do New York. But the above indicates to me that Ford's objection to immigration is mostly fiscal in nature. The only thing I have seen that indicates that Ford's objections to immigration are anything other than fiscal are two isolated reports, one which says so directly, one which only hints at it, that Ontario has a labour shortage. This is a far cry from Gérald Fillion's multi-year, ongoing reportingof Québec's labour shortage. Whether or not addressing the manpower shortage reported in the two articles in the penultimate sentence is worth the cost of immigration Doug Ford raises is entirely a matter for Ontarians to decide. The point I am trying to make is that, unlike François Legault, Richard Spencer, Mark Collette and Mike Enoch, Doug Ford's objections to immigration do not appear to be based on racist ideology.
With Maxime Bernie, who, last week, quit the Conservative Party, the picture is somewhat less clear than it is with Doug Ford. Enter the term "Maxime Bernier" into this blog's search function, and you will see that I admire the man for his Shane-like opposition to Canada's massive interprovincial trade barriers and provincial cartels (alluded to four paragraphs above.) Bernier's views on immigration are something about which I have mixed feelings.
For one thing, he says
This has me giggling about exactly what kind of bubble Bernier lives in. Canadian "cultural character" is basically trash like Trailer Park Bhoys, Corner Gas and Letterkenney. If an immigrant wanted to come in and forcibly change Canada from Trailer Park Bhoys, Corner Gas and Letterkenney to, say Downton Abbey, or, to just plain Portadown, the Shankill and Govan, I would MOST HEARTILY welcome that immigrant. Then, Bernier goes on to say the following.
The vast majority of Canadians rightly expect immigrants to learn about our history and culture, master ONE of our official languages (emphases mine.)
Unlike Legault, Lisée La Meute, Impératif français, Storm Alliance and Atalante, Maxime Bernier does not give a damn if you speak English. Unlike Legault and La Meute, he does not think speaking English is a Class A Felony.
The point in all of this is that there are many aspects to the arguments of those opposing immigration. Not all people who oppose immigration do so on racist grounds à la François Legault, Richard Spencer, Jean-François Lisée, Jean-François Gariépy, Mark Collette, Impératif Français, La Meute, Storm Alliance, Atalante and Andy Warski.
And, now, I want to end with a couple of plugs.
I first heard of this group on TSN 690. They are called Hockey Helps The Homeless, and they raise money for homeless people by hosting hockey tournaments featuring National Hockey League players and ordinary civilians.
McLaren alumni Sergio "Checo" Perez is collecting money for the victims of the recent earthquakes in Mexico through his foundation.
Puerto Rico has been devastated by Hurricane Maria. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has set up The Empire State Relief And Recovery Effort For Puerto Rico.
On the subject of Puerto Rico, Los Angeles Chef José Andrés has set up an organisation, called World Central Kitchen, to help feed the hungry, not only in Puerto Rico, but in other bad-off places in the world. Please donate or help if you can.
I also want to plug the Patreons of a couple of superb folks. First, there is Jordan Owen, superb musician and content creator. Then, there is Sunny Megatron, Sex Educator and Podcaster. And there is also director extraordinaire and podcaster Holly Randall. They are, all three, highly entertaining to watch. They have the charm and magnetic charisma of The Kylie Ireland Show podcast of a decade ago, starring the legendary, one and only Kylie Ireland and Eli Cross.