Journal de Montreal and Anglos

I don't trust the sincerity. Call me paranoid. From the crap I've read from this 'paper' in the past and recent past,I have no reason to buy what they're selling. 

That was an interesting article especially the stats on the young adults.  

Careful Pondering someone will call you an Angryphone. 

Unionist wrote:

Ok, Pondering. I guess we have different experiences. My partner and I and our kids (the latter born here) have never felt anything but welcome. We made an effort early on to learn and speak French. Amazing how much warmth and respect that effort earns. Never felt welcome that way growing up as a child of Jewish immigrants in the Prairies. So we're here to stay.

Everyone I am talking about speaks French fluently including myself. I am speaking specifically of anglos with a history in Quebec. It isn't your history that got wiped out of the history books. There is no valid reason to bar Quebec anglos from taking the same French lessons offered to every other anglophone who comes to the province from outside Quebec. French people are not the ones doing this crap. I blame politicians 100%. The francophones I know would want anyone to be able to take French lessons. The francophones I know want accurate history. The francophones I know want access to English CEGEPs on principal. The town I spoke of that wanted to provide bilingual information was majority French and it was the French people pushing for it. Apparently the community had a lot of older retired anglophones and their francophone neighbours didn't want them excluded. 

Quebec politicians use language to jerk people around and to suck up political energy so we aren't agitating about other issues. The CAQ specifically stated that they introduced the Bonjour/hi motion specifically to expose Couillard's position on language. Couillard knew it was a trap so went along with it. Afterwards a spokesperson even said so though not in those words. She infered that politically he had to go along with it but that it had no force. 

So yes I am fed up with English being used as a political football. I think the anglophones who remained here have accepted Bill 101 and do educate their children in French and are bilingual and do live in French. 

Do you acknowledge that many sovereignists (non-QS) are upset that people are speaking languages other than French at home? Not just English, any other language. When Bill 101 was introduced the school rules were intended to ensure that immigrants were assimilated into the French Quebec community, not just that they would speak French. The people, as opposed to politicians, did not foresee Montreal becoming dominated by immigrants. How can immigrants be absorbed into the dominent culture when the majority are immigrants? Immigrants spread out a bit in Quebec but Montreal's population will become increasing majority immigrants. The demographic trend is solid and irreversible if Quebec wants it's economy to be able to pay for social services. Within 10 to 15 years the trend is going to be even more extreme. 

Expect the tension to increase and for La Meute or similar organizations to grow. Expect them all to say that they are not racist. They just want to protect the dominent Quebecois culture. You can bet all of La Meute is also sovereignist. I really hope I am wrong but in writing this I have come to think that it is going to get very ugly over the next decade. 

One thing I agree with Alan on is that if CAQ gets in we are looking at dark days ahead. 

Yes, I knew that would happen. Also Martineau the cyber-scab and Bock-Côté. They are just stirring the pot. Classic JdM behaviour. If the Canadiens were doing better, they wouldn't have found another "controversy" to fuel sales.

I usually read that rag only because there is often a copy at Caffè San Simeon...

A host of reasons Martineau deserves at least a punch in the face. He was also a cyber-scab, continuing to write his column during the long and bitter Journal de Montréal workers' strike. He hates cyclists, Projet Montréal and the environment in general, and I suspect the only reason he doesn't join La Meute is that he regards them as a bunch of hicks.

He also hates poor people. I'll think of other reasons to despise him; there is no shortage. Notice how he is equally as obnoxious and stereotyping in this column as Montreal Gazoo columnists are towards francophone Québec. Those are their calling cards. Oh, of course he hates unions, Québec solidaire and social movements.

Yes, I'd contend that this fellow has two assholes, an upper one and a lower one.

pietro_bcc wrote:

http://www.journaldemontreal.com/2018/02/18/1-800-save-an-anglo

See, this is real Journal de Montreal right here. Welcome back.

And this is the other face...

http://www.journaldemontreal.com/2018/02/18/qui-a-peur-des-anglos#cxrecs_s

Oui, des jeunes anglos vont partir. Mais beaucoup de jeunes francophones, parmi les meilleurs, quittent aussi le Québec parce qu’ils le trouvent étouffant de rectitude politique, de repli identitaire, de peurs de toutes sortes, dont celle de disparaître. Ils n’y croient pas.

From the article you pointed out which is unecessarily hostile:

Seulement le tiers des immigrants se sont inscrits aux cours de francisation entre 2010 et 2013, et tout le monde s’en fout !

Plus de 90 % des nouveaux arrivants qui complètent le cours de francisation sont incapables de fonctionner au quotidien en français.

Entre 2010 et 2016, environ 100 000 immigrants ont posé le pied au Québec sans connaître un mot de français.

In English:

Only one-third of immigrants registered for francization courses between 2010 and 2013, and not everyone cares!

More than 90% of newcomers who complete the francization course are unable to function daily in French.

Between 2010 and 2016, about 100,000 immigrants landed in Quebec without knowing a word of French.

...

All immigrants say it: in Montreal, if you speak only French, you do not find yourself a job. Whereas if you only speak english , no problem, the sky is the limit .

I think that last bit is an exageration but there is some truth to it because immigrants get jobs within their communities' businesses. 

The rate of immigration required economically dictates that more and more Montrealers will not be speaking French at home. Eventually they will dominate the province just as they will dominate Vancouver and Toronto and all of Canada. Most young immigrants and young people in general will learn English because it is continentally dominant.

https://euobserver.com/opinion/128249

In the space of one generation, English has become the continent’s undisputed lingua franca.

According to a Eurobarometer poll in 2012, it is spoken by 38% of Europeans, compared to 12% for French and 11% for German. A quarter can read a newspaper, understand TV news or communicate online in English. About 5% can do so in French. Over two-thirds of respondents said English was one of the two most useful languages, compared to 17% for German and 16% for French.

So for the first time since the Roman Empire Europe now has a language a large chunk of its people can converse with each other in. That is something to be celebrated, not scorned. It makes travel smoother, communication quicker and doing business easier. But most of all, it allows Europeans to connect with each other....

In European terms, the harsh truth is that French is the language of the past and English the language of the present and future. Four out of five Europeans believe it is important for their children to learn English, compared to 20% for French – down 13% in the last decade.

Most young French people get this, which is why the journalism students I recently taught in Lille – in English – understood the need to speak the language fluently to make it as a reporter.

This is not Anglo-Saxon triumphalism, which would be difficult for a proud Welshman. Neither is it schadenfreude – French is, after all, the mother tongue of my children. It is simply the reality of Europe in 2015.

English people aren't trying to subjegate anyone or force anyone to speak English or to not speak their own language whatever it may be. Most anglophones in Quebec fully or mostly accept the language laws and the basic premise for them. Young people of all languages realize that English is the lingua franca of the world therefore the means through which they connect with it. The reason Montreal is the economic engine of the province is because immigrants settle here and because they bring their connections to the wider world with them.  

Most Quebecers see no more reason for Quebec to separate from Canada than Ontarians see reason to separate from Canada. Why? What's the point? What is Canada doing to Quebec that requires it to separate? Canada isn't forcing Quebec to accept immigrants or English or anglophones. Hence, the existence of La Meute. 

Ken Burch wrote:

Could somebody explain why Anglo-Quebecers(if this is actually true)are NOT eligible for free French lessons?  On a point of simple logic, shouldn't they be one of the prime targets for those classes?  Why should Anglos be, if what Pondering says is true, be the one group who have to pay out of pocket to learn the majority language in Quebec?  Seems to be the situation would be far less antagonistic if that policy were changed, and I can't imagine what could possibly be lost.This issue has been raised here in the past and I've never seen any explanation posted here for it.  

Good question. I know that free intensive French courses are available to new arrivals. If you're born here,you're shit out of luck. And if you're English and went to English schools (Elementary and High School) chances are your spoken French is poor or Parisienne which when spoken to French Quebecers,will get you laughed out of the room.

What really should be taught is Joual which is the Québécois dialect spoken here. I imagine that Joual is taught in these intensive French courses unavailable to anglophones.

My English and French friends who speak both languages fluently and flawlessly,either went to French school as kids and English  Secondary school and post secondary school.Or vice versa. Others were raised with both languages spoken at home.

Funny thing about,at least Montréal,when you go to a store or speak to a francophone in French,if they catch an English accent,will immediately start talking to you in English.

The lack of French eduacation in English schools is a failure of Bill 101. Not a failure of anglo education. After all,it's hard to learn a language when it is only taught 1 hour per day. And Parisienne dialect at that. You need intensive language education and you need to speak that language as often as possible. If not,you're in danger of being unilingual.

If anyone needs intensive French courses importantly in Joual,it's anglophone Quebecers. But it also could be a generational thing. Most younger anglos are more fluent in Joual than older stock anglos.

If Québec is to be a truly French nation,it needs to provide the tools and education for all to communicate properly in Québécois French. The real losers of Bill 101 are anglos that were educated exclusively in English schools.

http://www.immigration-quebec.gouv.qc.ca/en/informations/FrenchSpellsSuc...

They placed further restrictions since I last looked. 

Full-time

To speed up your integration

• For immigrants who have lived in Canada for five years or less
• Course of 25 or 30 hours per week
• Beginner and intermidiate stages
• Allowances possible for participation, transportation and child care expenses

Part-time

To combine French and integration  

• Available to all immigrants and asylum seekers
• Courses of 12, 9, 6 or 4 hours per week
• Beginner and intermediate stages
• Allowances possible for child care expenses

Even the online course is restricted. 

Learning French online

A FREE service!

The online francization service (FEL) allows you to learn French at your own pace according to various learning formats, whether you’re abroad or already in Québec to work or study.

Who can access this service? 

• People who have held a Certificat de sélection du Québec (CSQ) for at least two months and are still abroad (required age of 16 or older)
• People who hold a Certificat d’acceptation du Québec (CAQ) and are already residing in Québec to work or study (required age of 18 years or older)
• People who reside in Québec with the required immigration status

People who have attained a maximum of 1800 hours of French classes offered by the Ministère de l’Immigration, de la Diversité et de l’Inclusion are not admissible.

If my goal were to promote integration and language knowledge I would have a minimum of 6 half hour programs on TV. some on radio too. One half hour would cover current events in Quebec, serious news and entertainment news or commentary. The other half hour would be pure entertainment. Quebecers would be invited to submit half hour programs of all sorts comedy, historic, activities and travel in Quebec. It would be six half hours because they would be created for beginners, intermediates and advanced but not yet fluent. 

I would expand to the point there could be an entire channel dedicated to introducing French language and Quebec culture to anyone interested in learning about it. There could be exercise programs, cooking shows, all created in French that stretches listeners comprehension without overwhelming it. 

That would do far more than any number of laws preventing people from communicating in English. I'm not a genius. I can't be the first person, or even the hundreth person to think of that. 

Instead they design a narrow course focused on business language and limit it to recent immigrants so they can test everyone. Even the online course!  The intelligensia of Quebec is no more dedicated to the welfare of Quebecers than anywhere else. 

alan smithee wrote:

Ken Burch wrote:

Could somebody explain why Anglo-Quebecers(if this is actually true)are NOT eligible for free French lessons?  On a point of simple logic, shouldn't they be one of the prime targets for those classes?  Why should Anglos be, if what Pondering says is true, be the one group who have to pay out of pocket to learn the majority language in Quebec?  Seems to be the situation would be far less antagonistic if that policy were changed, and I can't imagine what could possibly be lost.This issue has been raised here in the past and I've never seen any explanation posted here for it.  

Good question. I know that free intensive French courses are available to new arrivals. If you're born here,you're shit out of luck. And if you're English and went to English schools (Elementary and High School) chances are your spoken French is poor or Parisienne which when spoken to French Quebecers,will get you laughed out of the room.

What really should be taught is Joual which is the Québécois dialect spoken here. I imagine that Joual is taught in these intensive French courses unavailable to anglophones.

My English and French friends who speak both languages fluently and flawlessly,either went to French school as kids and English  Secondary school and post secondary school.Or vice versa. Others were raised with both languages spoken at home.

Funny thing about,at least Montréal,when you go to a store or speak to a francophone in French,if they catch an English accent,will immediately start talking to you in English.

The lack of French eduacation in English schools is a failure of Bill 101. Not a failure of anglo education. After all,it's hard to learn a language when it is only taught 1 hour per day. And Parisienne dialect at that. You need intensive language education and you need to speak that language as often as possible. If not,you're in danger of being unilingual.

If anyone needs intensive French courses importantly in Joual,it's anglophone Quebecers. But it also could be a generational thing. Most younger anglos are more fluent in Joual than older stock anglos.

If Québec is to be a truly French nation,it needs to provide the tools and education for all to communicate properly in Québécois French. The real losers of Bill 101 are anglos that were educated exclusively in English schools.

That taught me a lot.

Awww, I've really enjoyed the lack of personal attacks from Lagatta. It's so much more peaceful, but I do have compassion for her frustration and stress is bad for anyone's health.

Maybe someone could tell her that she can respond to the meat of my arguments without quoting me or referencing me directly simply by expressing her own ideas on the topic being covered. She could also answer Ken's question without engaging me directly. 

As if that person never made personal attacks on me... What baskets of bullshit. Another one just there!

That person and I must not speak to one another. There is a deep animosity between us. This is CLASSIC "concern trolling":

but I do have compassion for her frustration and stress is bad for anyone's health.

My health is just fine. I loathe your anti-activist stance, but never think about it except when I come across it. Now, please do NOT address me again.

Pietro, I don't understand your comment about the JDM scandal-sheet attacking in your words, "my community". Nowadays they are down on street gangs, not the Italian-origin "crime families". Think everyone knows that nowadays there are francophones, anglophones and many others in those organisations, not just italophones. Just wish there would be more about the honest people of the same origin the mobsters abuse. Oh well, back to the Italian workers' movement in 1949, and baroque prose...

I am under no obligation to respond to anyone on an internet board. I'm very busy with work these days.

In Christina McCall's Trudeau biography,  she mentioned that, during his college years, he studied to Paris, at least in part, to "regularize" his French.  Why would he have done that if speaking Parisienne would make him sound ridiculous in his own home town?  Was that a common thing in wealthy Montreal francophone families of that era?

Also, when he was in politics, which form of French did PET usually use?  As a non-francophone there'd be no way for me to tell.  

Have they had classes in joual for people arriving in Quebec from France or from somewhere else in "le francophonie"?

Unionist wrote:

Do anglo youth really think this way??

None of the ones I know do, but then, I'm not really plugged into the element of the community that's lived with a steamer trunk packed since 1976 for the day the FLQ goes house to house machine-gunning anyone who speaks English.

Mr. Magoo wrote:

I guess if I lived where you live I could follow your example and pay attention to the French my friends and acquaintances were speaking.  But given that they weren't speaking French then I guess if I lived where you live, and "had a clue" I'd probably be a so-called "Angryphone" if you and everyone else was going to laugh at me for even trying.

As an immigrant, I didn't attend grade school here, so perhaps I'm missing out on some universal anglo experience of being humiliated for having non-perfect French. The overwhelming majority of francos I've ever interacted with have been accepting of my accent and occasional slips of the tongue. The near-hallucinatory paranoia among the particular anglo subgroup in question reminds me of men who were laughed at by a woman once and promptly decamped to join the MRAs.

That said, I'll throw in one huge caveat: I'm white, and my wife can pass for white. I can't fully speak to the intersection of linguistic bigotry with the racial variety. Once I was a passenger in a car being driven by a dark-skinned Southeast Asian friend of mine as he got pulled over for speeding in an exceedingly white rural area. The SQ officer let him off with a warning, and he told me "That usually happens once I speak French to them. Being a brown person who can speak joual ups my respectability, or something."

Mr. Magoo wrote:

Quote:

And if you're English and went to English schools (Elementary and High School) chances are your spoken French is poor or Parisienne which when spoken to French Quebecers,will get you laughed out of the room.

Remind me not to bother trying, then.  And thanks for the heads-up.

I agree with every word Alan said but as long as you are from somewhere other than Quebec you won't get laughed at or disrespected for trying to speak French. Most French people appreciate the effort and many are also kind to Anglo Quebecers. Often they switch to English just because they know their English is better than your French so it's easier to communicate. Other times they switch to English because they want the practice. 

Don't hesitate to speak French in Quebec. Most Quebecers appreciate the attempt no matter how imperfect. 

Parisenne French spoken well but without a Parisenne accent can be interpreted as pretentious or stuck-up. When it was taught in English schools joual was looked down on and not considered good French. Even after that they switched to teaching International French not Quebec French. This was obviously a huge insult to Quebecers. Even then it was only 2 or 3 hours a week. The people most likely to speak that way are older anglo Quebecers but only because that is what they were taught not because they look down on joual. 

My parents were both fluently bilingual, French mother tongue, but they stopped speaking French at home by the time I was around 4 years old because they wanted us to be English. They also left the Catholic Church. At the time French schools were Catholic and English schools were Protestant but in practice mostly non-denominational aside from the morning hymn. 

I never had a French teacher from Quebec. At school I quickly learned my French was wrong, that I didn't use the correct words for "car" or "mirror".  I stopped speaking French outside of class and didn't speak it again until I was working where I learned most of my French. My parents didn't speak it at home. 

There is absolutely hostility against anglo-Quebecers rooted in the older generation's experiences in being disrespected and higher level jobs going to anglophones because big companies were mostly national or international so operated in English in Montreal. Hence, the narrative that the English subjegated the French ever since they were conquered by the British on the Plains of Abraham.

The friend who was enrolled was involved in a programme to improve employability. He was in the same programme as many actual immigrants, from a variety of countries.

Trudeau père spoke upper-class French. People here would call that "international French". It isn't a language typical of anywhere, and most Parisians I know do not speak such a posh French. As interpreters, we have to be understandable to all reasonably educated people of our language pairs, so I speak sort of mid-Atlantic in En and in Fr.

wikipedia has a discussion about the "joual" entry that raises many of the points I did.

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discussion:Joual

Quote; Il ne faudrait pas confondre joual et français québécois. Le joual est une variété du français québécois qui est marquée socialement et régionalement.

OK, in for this one.

Anglo-Quebecers [b]can[/b] get free French language education if they enroll, as children, in French-language schools -- a right available to all. And an increasingly popular choice. 

French is of course also taught in English schools - and in the regions, it is taught by Quebecois.e.s fluent in Quebec French, in my experience. I've never heard a Paris accent here in the Estrie region, except from migrants from France and perhaps parts of Africa. In this region, there seems to be an attitude that the anglo community is a colourful bit of lcoal folklore, worth preserving. English schools are probably staffed more by francophones from Quebec, even in English-langauge subjects, than by anglophones. (As with many things, of course, Montreal and the regions have very different experiences. Montreal is awesome, but not representative of all of Quebec. Like Toronto, it assumes its experience is general - which isn't always accurate.) 

Migrants from other provinces of Canada to Quebec do not get the free Fench classes for newcomers from other countries. A bad policy, but it permits the Quebec government to save money and continue to ration the free French classes, which can have long wait lists.

But then, newcomers from other provinces are not required, as newcomers from all otehr counties inclusing the US and UK are, to send their children to French schools. Instead, they can get the certificate of eligibility for schooling in English in Quebec (which, by the way, seems to be a unilingual French document.) So there's a trade-off. Newcomers from Canada are also in less desperate need of passing French-language tests in order to keep their jobs. Algerians or Americans or other immigrants to Quebec sometimes need to meet a French-language standard to keep some jobs, or they can lose the job. Canadian citizens do not need to pass any such test. Some might argue that means they need the free classes less. 

It is not unusual for Canadians moving to Quebec from other provinces fo work reasons to receive free or subsidized French classes through their employer. 

There are absurdities in all this, and it does not aid integration of newcomers from the rest of Canada to Quebec, but there are absurditiies in everything governments do. Fixing the gap and giving free classes in the langauge of Quebec to Canadian newcomers would be a good thing for Quebec and for integration and for linguistic harmony. But it's not likely with neo-liberal parties in government and folks like M Martineau and his colleagues who get rich and famous by whipping up hatred of others. 

Byu the way I have a fun phrase book for French-from-France travellers in Quebec, telling them how to interpret what the locals are saying: ben, asteur, etc. But I've never seen anyone in Quebec act any way other than kind towards people who are struggling in the langauge but making a sincere effort. 

Do young anglos talk about leaving? Of course. Young people always talk about leaving home and going somewhere with better job prospects. Why this is front page news? 

Mr. Magoo wrote:

All I know is that I spent countless hours parsing verbs -- "je suis", "il est", "nous sommes"... for nothing.  Quebec has totally different words.

All of those are perfectly valid in Québec, though for whatever reason the "on" construction is far more popular than "nous" here. (Sometimes you get both in one sentence, as in Parizeau's infamous "On va parler de nous".)

Québec French can be complicated on occasion. I've long since resigned myself to the fact I'll never truly sound like I grew up in Hochelaga. That doesn't mean I'm subject to endless daily mockery for my accent, or that I live here out of deep-seated masochism. One needn't be a perfect facsimile of pur laine to be accepted here (or even in the regions). I wouldn't be here if that were the case.

Pondering wrote:

I agree with every word Alan said but as long as you are from somewhere other than Quebec you won't get laughed at or disrespected for trying to speak French. Most French people appreciate the effort and many are also kind to Anglo Quebecers. Often they switch to English just because they know their English is better than your French so it's easier to communicate. Other times they switch to English because they want the practice. 

Don't hesitate to speak French in Quebec. Most Quebecers appreciate the attempt no matter how imperfect.

Thanks for relaying exactly what my experience has been over the decades, as a Canadian immigrant to Québec. Never a snicker or a hostile word, only support for trying to learn. And part of learning, for me, was politely refusing to switch to English just because someone spoke better English than my French. I embarrassed myself by carrying on in French regardless. And that worked. I sometimes feel bad about it, because I know (especially in rural areas, in the service industry) that young people are grasping at chances to practise their English. But I persist.

Quote:

There is absolutely hostility against anglo-Quebecers rooted in the older generation's experiences in being disrespected and higher level jobs going to anglophones because big companies were mostly national or international so operated in English in Montreal. Hence, the narrative that the English subjegated the French ever since they were conquered by the British on the Plains of Abraham.

Correct. And that hostility is a true reflection of historical reality. When I arrived in Québec, industrial workplaces which were 90% francophone Quebecers were still going through the throes of not only making French the language of work, but "allowing" unilingual francophones to get promotions and other opportunities. The Quiet Revolution, followed by Bill 101 and similar measures, represented real liberation of a nation on so many levels. It was a pleasure to see. Are there blemishes? Sure. But nothing close to the ignorant anti-Québec colonial attacks that we have to put up with, and which continue (in my humble opinion) to be the sole argument for those who advocate that Québec cannot thrive and enjoy sovereignty within a Canadian federation.

As an anglo myself living in Montreal, the paper I am by far the most likely to find lying around in cafes, restaurants etc. is the JDM. Sometimes there will be others reading Le Devoir in the same establishment. Perhaps they were quicker off the mark.

Whatever parallels right-wing Sun readers in the rest of Canada probably reads the JDM in Quebec. 

swallow wrote:

OK, in for this one.

Anglo-Quebecers [b]can[/b] get free French language education if they enroll, as children, in French-language schools -- a right available to all. And an increasingly popular choice. 

 

any way other than kind towards people who are struggling in the langauge but making a sincere effort. 

Do young anglos talk about leaving? Of course. Young people always talk about leaving home and going somewhere with better job prospects. Why this is front page news? 

I think what Pondering was pointing out is that anglophone adults (and when I say adults I really mean those who are 18 and over) cannot enroll in free intensive French lessons. It's absolutely true.

And you are right. You can enroll your children into French school for their education. That has always been the case. On the flip side Francophones can enroll into English schools.

Case in point was an old friend from my adolesence who went to English high school (and went on to McGill University). His parents were Lévéques era péquistes. When I'd go to his house,his parents didn't acknowledge me much and had a cast of Lévéques' head amongst their living room decor. His English was impeccable,as was (obviously) his French.

He'd invite 10 or 15 of us to his house most weekends where we'd drink beer,smoke hash and drop some acid or eat some mushrooms and listen to music cramped in his room which he decorated with phoney cob webs.coloured lights and a small disco ball. His parents would be sitting in the living room watching TV,they didn't seem to have any problem with the activities that went on down the hall in his room. Sorry for the drift,I had a flashback by talking about him.

But back to the subject at hand. Québec born adults are not eligible for these free lessons. You'd have to pay. And the only  aggressively intensive French language courses are available for money only. You'd have to go to College Platon. And that is not cheap by any stretch of the imagination. It's expensive.

And I agree with you that young people of any mother tongue in Québec will leave the province to go somewhere else for employment as is the case for anybody in any province. That is not front page news.

But as discussed earlier in this thread,it's le Journal de Montréal. They are provocateurs,agitators,shit disturbers who ran that piece because they had an angle. Like all the agendas that paper exploits. It's a right wing rag not even worth wiping your ass with. Québec's version of Sun News.

I wasn't endorsing College Platon. I was pointing out that Québec born anglos have to enroll in Institutions such as College Platon for intensive French language courses. There's no choice.I was making a point that these services are not free for anglophones.

You can also go to school in English in Quebec if your grandparent went to school in English in Quebec. But the paperwork on that is intense. 

Quote:

First off,if you actually read my post,I said as a teenager friends of mine would snicker,not laugh me into complete humiliation but they found my formal international French to be amusing.

Yes, that was in post #25.  I was replying to your earlier post #18:

Quote:

And if you're English and went to English schools (Elementary and High School) chances are your spoken French is poor or Parisienne which when spoken to French Quebecers,will get you laughed out of the room.