Juno News - November 25, 2019The weaponizing of “official bilingualism”
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
162.18427
Summary
Bilingualism in Canada has gone too far. As I ve said time and time again, official bilingualism has gone far too far, and all Canadians have to pay the price when disgruntled people decide to take it upon themselves to become the bilingualism enforcers of Canada.
Transcript
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As I've said time and time again, official bilingualism in Canada has gone too far.
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The latest example sounds pretty much exactly like the examples we've had in recent months.
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Individuals who have decided to take it upon themselves to become the unofficial enforcers
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of bilingualism in Canada and continue to receive payouts from organizations and from
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Michel Thibodeau has now received $1,500 from the Senate of Canada after a federal court judge
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ordered that his complaint against Parliament was valid.
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That the drinking fountains in the Senate hallway had the word PUSH embossed into the push button
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rather than the French equivalent PUSSAY or English and French.
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$1,500 because a drinking fountains push button said PUSH instead of having an English and
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Now, Parliament Hill right now is going through massive renovations.
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The judge in the case said perhaps this is an opportunity to replace it with bilingual
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Although in the meantime, signage has been put up telling people in English and in French
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I bet you didn't know that French people have just been dying of dehydration and dying of
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thirst for years in Canada because they didn't know that they had to push the button because
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You have to climb over the bodies of dehydrated Francophones to get anywhere in the Senate these
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But Monsieur Thibodeau was the same man who, along with his wife Linda, was able to get
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$21,000 from Air Canada just a few months ago after a complaint about a number of things,
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one of which was that the seatbelt had PULL written in English but not in French.
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That was one of the major complaints that led to them getting a five-figure judgment against
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Now, you've heard of class action lawsuits where a whole bunch of people team up and
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The Thibodeaux seem to be engaging in reverse class action, the two of them filing complaints
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against as many people as they can find under this official languages bureaucracy in Canada.
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For example, according to a CTV News article, in 2016, the two of them filed 22 separate complaints
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Now, the purpose of this act is to ensure that Anglophones and Francophones are both able
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to access the same fundamental public services in Canada.
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It was never meant to be a grievance mill for people who find a way to catch the government
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because a drinking fountain button or a seatbelt lever doesn't have bilingual lettering on
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And all Canadians have to pay the price when a few disgruntled people decide they're going
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to take it upon themselves to become the bilingualism enforcers of Canada.
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We have a country that has an English identity and a French identity.
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But you're never going to have cohesion between these two groups when basically the federal
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court is engaging in this gotcha-ism with the other.
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You know, maybe you just can't find bilingual lettering from your drinking fountain manufacturers
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Is there not a way to work through this by discussing rather than taking everyone to court?