Archive for the ‘Quebec’ Category

PQ cabinet minister believes there is a Great Risk of seeing francophone Quebecers join the armed forces just so they can secure the right for their children temporarily to attend English school in Quebec.

Maybe they ought to ban English altogether. Oh. Wait.

My buddy Eric Duhaime noticed the SAQ, Québec’s liquor store, advertises wine using big bad Italian words like “amore” and “pasta” without, it must be pointed out, getting in trouble with the language cops.

Jacques Parizeau wasn’t kidding with his endless visit to the dentist, was he.

After Pastagate, we get Pastagate part deux (in French). The French police are now demanding that another Italian restaurant – this one in Quebec City – change its menu because, you know, the word PASTA is too big.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go stick a fork in my eyeball.

No doubt you heard about pastagate, yes? The Office the la langue francaise in Quebec coming down on chichi Italian restaurant for having THE NERVE to have Italian on their menu? Language cops and Parti Quebecois politicians were in full damage control mode yesterday, saying this was overzealousness and that they’d look into it, yadda yadda yadda.

Yeah, right. It’s not overzealousness that caused this story. It’s the simple application of the law as it was meant to be applied. Here is the text of Bill 101, specifically section 51:

51. Every inscription on a product, on its container or on its wrapping, or on a document or object supplied with it, including the directions for use and the warranty certificates, must be drafted in French. This rule applies also to menus and wine lists.

The French inscription may be accompanied with a translation or translations, but no inscription in another language may be given greater prominence than that in French.

 
Watch out, Big Mac. You might be next.

The PQ government tabled its gun registry bill yesterday (story in French), with the support of opposition parties. If anyone in Quebec objects to this measure, they are not represented in the provincial legislature.