[qwedf]

The only reason I see this relevant to HN is because lots of tech companies have been opening Montreal offices over the past 20 years. We have 4 universities and most educated people are bilingual in spite of the officialdom.

However the drumbeats of separatism are banging again [1], so might be relevant considering what happened to the Montreal economy the last times these idiots were allowed to lead by their inferiority complex.

Background: Native Montrealer, proud Canadian-Italian whose ancestors built the city, and have watched it decay over the past 40 years due to paternalistic and policies and a system of government that prioritizes the opinions of the "Les régions" over Montreal (it's like if voters in the Georgia countryside fully dictated how Atlanta operates)

What Quebec nationalism has resulted in:

-Literal language police (see: pastagate [2] - this stupidity had been doubled down on)

-Codification of racism and suppression that also increases the burden on businesses (see: Bill 21 and Bill 96) [3,4]

-Blatant disregard for the Charter of Rights and Freedoms (the "notwithstanding clause") [5]

-Montreal was the most diverse, vibrant city in Canada, truly a global capital - this movement handed that directly to Toronto

-Montreal was the financial and tech capital of Canada - this movement handed that directly to Toronto

[1] https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/mobile/video?clipId=1831353

[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pastagate

[3] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/what-bill-21-means-f...

[4] https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/language-law-bill-96-adopted-pro...

[5] https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/mobile/what-is-the-notwithstandi...

[angry_octet]

It's really depressing how little the wider Quebec population understands about the very serious economic consequences of separation. They don't understand that Montreal, and all it's immigrant workers, is paying for their doctors and retirement plans, the reason they can afford a big house, a boat and holidays in Cuba. Making cheap electricity and aluminium isn't enough.

There's a strong undercurrent of anti-Islamic and racial purity thinking in lots of the CAQ and PQ messaging. Frankly it's shocking how racist many of the policies are.

Meanwhile industry in general is being squeezed by lack of staff and the CAQ keep the flow of migrants to a trickle with painful bureaucracy. "Nous embauchons!"

[myth_drannon]

Look at Brexit. It's not about understanding the consequences but caring. And the populace just don't care. When you talk about nationalism, separatism and such, it's about emotions. Racism, antisimitism, the Others, that is the fuel of CAQ/PQ.

[mantas]

At the same time, the world would be a better place if people cared about more things than material well being.

If people are fine with less consumption and are willing to trade it for the sake of what they see as a better society.. Why not?

That's like looking at hippy community out in the forests. And then bitching at them that they'll have very serious economic consequences.

[angry_octet]

Health is material well being?

And really, people are not keen to give up quality if life to exclude immigrants, they've been suckered into believing immigrants are a burden on the state and are DESTROYING OUR CULTURE BY CAUSING MULTICULTURALISM. Yes, multiculturalism, the recognition that people of various cultures can benefit from that mixing ideas, is a curse word for the right-separatists. As if a few North African restaurants and a couple of mosques will cause Québécois culture to disintegrate.

Quebec has been next to the USA and anglophone Canada for it's entire existence and every American or Ontarian concept has been molded to suit, but has never replaced a local tradition unless the local wanted it to.

[mantas]

Health is primarily a cultural thing. Lifestyle, diet etc.

US is stark example how over-the-top money shovelled into healthcare may give abysmal results if culture is lacking.

Migrants may be a burden. Denmark recently published a detailed origin-based statistics if migrants are, materially, a positive or negative.

Nobody counts few restaurants as multiculturalism. And once you have significant number of outsiders... Various tensions come up. For example how Russians act in the light of Ukraine-Russia war in ex-USSR. Over here, we also had interesting issues in dealing with pandemics based on ethnicity.

[angry_octet]

In Quebec the health system (RAMQ) is culture. Everyone is incredibly proud of it (much like the NHS), while also understanding that it is underfunded and struggling. Immigrants understand they will never get a GP unless they move to the country because GP places are gerrymandered, but locals rarely experience this problem.

In Quebec, a few restaurants with foreign sounding names is enough to trigger the anti-multicultural police. God forbid they should have menu items with arabic or Chinese names.

The immigrants do all the shit jobs with low pay. But without them critical services wouldn't happen. I don't call that an immigrant problem. If you count building schools for their children a burden then yes, growth is a burden. Rich people snort cocaine like hoovers but no one counts them as part of the drug problem, but the entire Haitian ethnic group gets called drug dealers.

[mantas]

Why shit jobs stay with low pay? Because market economy is disrupted and there's no pressure to raise the pay.

In normal countries with social safety net (assuming Canada is one of them), those who do „shit jobs with low pay“, end up receiving from the state more than they pay in taxes.

[thematrixturtle]

Illustrative fact: Quebec is the only place in the world where KFC is not KFC, but PFK (Poulet Frit Kentucky).

[raverbashing]

Or, summing up the financial impacts: the HQ of the "Bank of Montreal" have moved to Toronto

[qwedf]

Everything but the former Crown corporations like Air Canada and Bell moved their HQs. And the ones that stayed only did so because the federal government made sure they stayed

[thematrixturtle]

It's not just the banks, basically all major companies moved their HQs to Toronto.

[vasco]

You seem like you think about these issues and are not pro nationalism ideals but you type this:

> proud Canadian-Italian

Why are you proud of your nationalities? Seems weird in the face of the rest of your comment.

[qwedf]

To be clear I'm upset about these policies because they stamped out the ideals of Montreal and have strangled the city, turning it from a truly global capital to a provincial backwater that's now more renowned as a great place for Americans to get in some underage drinking.

My National ideals, and those of the majority from Montreal, are multilingualism and multiculturalism. Runs against the ideals of the ROQ (Rest Of Quebec) and it's disheartening to see my city suffocate under rules written up by people and for people who are not actually from the city

[rayiner]

> My National ideals, and those of the majority from Montreal, are multilingualism and multiculturalism.

Those are Anglo-influenced globalist ideals. The Francophone world is decidedly not multicultural. It’s proud of French history and culture and dedicated to protecting it.

London or Toronto are like the Android ecosystem. An eclectic if often inelegant free for all. Paris and Montreal are like iOS: carefully curated and strongly opinionated.

[qwedf]

During its ascendency as a global capital, Montreal was a decidedly multicultural and multicultural metropolis. One that native Montrealers (read: those with deep roots here) try to cultivate.

But today's Montreal is the result of heavy-handed, paternalistic social engineering driven by an external government over the past 40 years... And is a shell of its former self. One that is going to be further hollowed unless these laws are reversed.

[vasco]

Thanks for answering! It seemed like a contradiction but I understand your point of view.

[acoard]

While I'm not OP, I can earnestly say I'm proud to be Canadian. We are a liberal multicultural democracy, with beautiful natural vistas and nice people and I am proud of that fact. I'm proud of the imagined Canadian identity of polite and hard-working. Are there thing I don't like? Sure, but I think having full-throated pride for "Canadian values" is not a bad thing. And I also think by doing so, I can try and reclaim this from being political/partisan. Especially after the Canadian flag has been used so heavily in political protests, I think it's all the more important to re-affirm that being proudly Canadian is not a partisan decision.

[CoastalCoder]

I suspect it's more of a standard disclaimer to signal that he isn't anti-Canadian.

I.e., "I'm on your side, so I mean this with love..."

[cwillu]

Part of proud multiculturalism is being proud of the piece you contribute to it.

[vasco]

Yeah, I just struggle with the pride part personally, I would say I'm proud of my achievements but not my culture. Parent clarified though.

[rayiner]

I don’t see anything about “racism” in 3 and 4. The first is about excluding religious symbols from public, which is what France does, and is an extremely left-wing notion. Certainly not what folks in “Georgia” would do. And the second is about mandatory French education. Explain to me where the “racism” is.

[angry_octet]

But Catholic religious symbols are not excluded -- they're everywhere, but it's called 'history' and 'culture'. The lengths CSDM builders go to to leave a giant crucifix on a school building undisturbed even when demolishing the rest are truly noteworthy.

[magic-chicken]

The crucifix was removed from Quebec National Assembly a few years ago https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/crucifix-removed-nat...

[goosedragons]

They literally didn't mention anything about the National Assembly.

[magic-chicken]

The point is that the crucifix was removed from the most symbolic place it could be removed from. If thats not a strong, consistent signal that Quebec wants religions out of the public institutions, then what is?

[goosedragons]

Removing the rest of them? Changing the names of all the places named after Catholic Saints? Not having the municipality put up Christmas decorations every year? You know, actually taking action to do that?

They only took down the cross in the National Assembly after backlash and calls of hypocrisy. Originally Legault wanted it to stay up. That alone says to me how BS the whole thing is.

[magic-chicken]

About religon: you are correct, it's not racism, it's a different approach to multi-culturalism. The problem is, the ROC is intolerant and only consider that one valid approach to multi-culturalism exists: their own. Anything else is "racist".

[qwedf]

Because:

[3] exclusively targets non-Christian symbols and came after a campaign of primarily non-city folk freaking out because immigrants are different - most infamously Herouxville where the town published a manifesto warning immigrants against "stoning and burning women. It included, too, an explanation of the importance of Christmas trees." [1]. The Catholic symbology remains in the officialdom - see the giant cross that sits atop Montreal, and the crosses that were never removed from the public schools, or many provincial offices. Not to mention it's OK to wear a crucifix.

[4] goes way beyond education. Montreal is a functionally bilingual city and those of us from here speak "franglais", a mix of the two and have no issue switching. This new law massively restricts access to: education, medicare, legal services, to name a few in the official language of your choice. It even gives powers to the language police to, for example, raid a law or medical office, get access to confidential documents to ensure you are only being served in French [2]. I live in a nation with 2 official languages in a city where the majority of people are bilingual and happy to serve in either language- and Quebec just effectively made one of those languages illegal. How is this is not discrimination?

Georgia-Atlanta is an analogy. The rural areas are 99% white, unilingual francophone - a group who genuinely believe bilingualism and multiculturalism is a problem - Montreal's two key, unique strengths and defining characteristics. If we had representation by population, these would be non-issues but because the rural areas are heavily weighted, the ruling CAQ has a supermajority after winning only 37% of the vote.[3]

[1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/herouxville-quebec-r...

[2] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/bill-96-explained-1....

[3] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_Quebec_general_election

[rayiner]

You’re grafting an Americanism onto Canadian politics and it doesn’t fit. White folks in Georgia may discriminate against Black folks in Georgia even though the two groups share a culture and language. That’s racism.

A distinct cultural group seeking to avoid cultural or linguistic change created by an influx of outsiders isn’t “racism.” It’s a human right for distinct ethnocultural groups to seek political autonomy on that basis: https://unpo.org/article/4957. Quebec is by its very nature a province for French speaking descendants of French immigrants to Canada. Québécois are perfectly entitled to say it should stay that way. It’s alien to modern Anglo notions of multiculturalism, but that doesn’t make it “racism.”

[qwedf]

In no case am I grafting Americanism onto Canadian politics. I'm using an analogy to illustrate to non-Canadians how outsiders (nationalist extremists from the ROQ) are able to impose their values and views on the multicultural, multilingual city of Montreal and it has systematically strangled the city since 1976.

Or do you have another explanation for the population , capital, and cultural flight that occurred over the 80s 90s that we have never recovered from?

[rayiner]

Reducing all conflicts between different cultural groups to “racism” is an Americanism. “Racism” is a specific concept that explains why, for example, British Americans in Georgia might feel more affinity for German Americans in Indiana than more culturally similar Black Americans in Georgia.

That’s not what’s happening in Quebec. It’s not like rural Quebecois are welcoming of Anglo Canadians either. They simply oppose multiculturalism, just like China or Japan or France itself.

[qwedf]

Racism plays a major role here [1,2], and it's certainly a motivation for Bill 21 at least. Remember, this is the ultimate culmination of a village writing a handbook for immigrants that included not eating babies, like they do in their home country [3].

Bill 96 is a direct violation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, so you're right it's not racist, just a denial of my guaranteed rights as a Canadian Citizen. Ignoring First Nations, of course, many of whom speak neither French nor English. If you do count them, then Bill 96 can also be considered racist

[1] https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/two-thirds-of-qu...

[2] https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/quebec-coroner-feels-joyce-echaq...

[3] https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/12/world/canada/canada-herou...

[jpambrun]

Religion is not race and the law targets Christian religious symbols as well.

[ozmodiar]

It tends to be discriminatory towards Sihks, Muslims and Orthodox Jews, who all have head coverings as important religious garb, basically excluding them from government jobs.

[magic-chicken]

I understand how it can be perceived this way. However, did you look at Quebec history? You will find that Quebec was very religious until 50-70 years ago. Education was provided by members of catholic institutions. At that point in time, teachers were wearing their religious uniform. Quebec made the decision to re-take ownership of the education system and to get the religions out of there. In the beginning, religious people were still providing the educuation, but they were asked to stop wearing religious symbols.

The current movement is a continuity of the work that was started 50-70 years ago to get religious symbols out of public institutions, and in that sense, it's coherent.

[realusername]

I'd argue that it's the opposite, there's are a lot of discriminations against Québec from the english side, it's very apparent online and it's a bit shocking to watch to be honest.

Those discriminations for sure helping the independence movement.

[goosedragons]

Besides criticism of laws like Bill 96 and 21 what discrimination is there? I don't think most English Canadians really care what Quebec and Quebecers do unless their pushing bad discriminatory laws. I think you'd see the same push back from the rest of Canada if Alberta decided to implement similar policies.

[realusername]

Most people? Sure I agree. But you can't really deny the degrading statements online, I've seen very harsh words against them and surveys against discrimination in Québec are showing a growing feeling of discrimination.