In your opinion is cultural genocide as serious as physical genocide?

That, mindspell, is the attitude of cultural purity I'm decrying.

The Louisiana Cajuns have developed a wonderful culture, with its own distinctive styles of speech, dress, cooking, and attitude. That culture woud not exist if Nuremberg/Queecoise-like purity laws had been in effect to mandate that they stick to the "old ways" instead of creating their own new ways, naturally.

You're saying their old purely-French culture is different from and superior to the culture they practise now. That's the Nazi thing I'm talking about. Let them create their own culture--in a hundred or two hundred years, without cultural purity laws, this world's going to have a handful of new and amazing cultures we've never even yet conceived of. Or make purity laws and let cultures stagnate and revel in your purity.
 
Incidentally, the current state of the Arab world is to a large degree due to those exact kind of cultural prejudices. By all rights, the Arab states should be far more powerful and advanced that the Western states, given their history and newfound resources. But they're mired in a slew of laws that protect and elevate old-school traditions as superior and immutable (the oppression of women is just one of many of those). Once those laws fall by the wayside, the Arab world is going to kick some serious intellectual and cultural ass. And, if we start shoring up our failing culture with laws to mandate speaking English and eating McDonald's cheeseburgers, soon we'll be left in the dust like the Arabs are now.
 
Sorry for interjecting in your exchange, but I just want to add my 2 cents. Though I totally agree with you in essence xfer, your constant comparison with Nazism is a bit much. I think a culture's defense of its language against a very real threat of annihilation is understandable, not reprehensible. Only the means employed could be reprehensible, and I don't think anyone was ever executed for speaking English in Quebec.
 
welll that's my argument, in essence. my objection to the Nazis isn't entirely rooted in their mass murder techniques, but also in their monolithic and totalitarian attitudes toward purity and tradition. and no matter how you effect those--through fines or killing or whatever--they're still reprehensible.

if you think they're not reprehensible, can you counter the specific points i made above detailing why they are?
 
Well I think it's awesome that New Zealand doesn't allow immigration unless you meet certain qualifications (having been born in NZ or married to a native). They're keeping their country good. I am not against immigration in any way but I think in the case of NZ it's the right thing to do.
 
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xfer said:
if you think they're not reprehensible, can you counter the specific points i made above detailing why they are?

Not particularly, since I get the feeling we're basically on the same wavelength, though debating separate points. I'm entirely for the free evolution and inter-mingling of cultures (eg Canadian French vs. French French, both as valid in my opinion).
I fully agree with your cajun argument despite the fact that it's fundamentally flawed in this context. Their culture is the fruit of having had to lay their ancient roots in new soil, it's a subtle mix of different cultural flavours. They left their land to start a new life elsewhere, which is not at all the case in Quebec.
For the longest time, through its policy Canada's federal government tried to snuff out what was left of French-speaking Canada. Put yourself in the shoes of a quebecer for a second, what would you've done? Just laid back and said "Alright, I guess I'll just teach my kids English, then" ? Doubtful. Their reaction was one of self-preservation. All I'm saying is that it's understandable, though I agree that a government shouldn't be allowed to infringe on what the fuck you want your sign to say.

As a PS I'm reminded of a doctoral thesis I read about how even today, Canada's bilingualism laws actually contribute to the deterioration of French by propagating low-quality translations of official documents... Interesting read...
 
xfer said:
i just need to point out that mindspell is advocating throwing Cajuns into concentration camps and eliminating their culture.
And I am supposed to be the one with a short fuse? You are assuming things and putting words in my mouth that I did not say/write.

I never said anything about eliminating Cajun culture (whatever that is). I just pointed to the fact that remnants of the French culture in the Cajuns are almost inexistent and the culture that they have is more about their very location (ie: the local resources etc.) I never said anything about French culture being better or worse than any other. You jumped to a conclusion that I did not mean. I used the Cajun example because it is a vivid example of what could happen with Quebec.

French Canadian in Quebec want to stay french. If you or any other have a problem with that it is your problem and it has nothing to do with Nazism. laws are there not to oppress but to keep something that is important to people here. That does not mean that we are unlikely to accept other cultural aspects that aren't our own. In fact, none of the laws currently prevent anybody to live their life in whatever language and whatever culture they have. They only have the minor inconvenience of having French at the forefront. None of the laws discriminate any cultural heritage or practice, it simply ask for the French language to be proeminent.

I understand the parrallel that you are trying to make but it is you extrapolating things that you don't know, that you don't live and that you are not aware of. I would ask you to stop calling us Nazis because our language is something that we want to conserve and not force it down anybody's throat.
 
Re: Nut Butter

You teach your kids French and English, then. You get off the nationalism kick and accept that your kids in ten generations may not speak French and that's okay. Substitute "English" in the previous statement and it applies equally to Americans, if you're fretting about French-bashing. Where wuold we be now if some fools had made laws requiring Occan and Olde Englyshe spellings and languages to be used forevermore?

Re: mindspell

I think I've made my point. :)

Re: Toby

Do you mean the New Zealand thing?
 
xfer said:
Re: Nut Butter

You teach your kids French and English, then. You get off the nationalism kick and accept that your kids in ten generations may not speak French and that's okay. Substitute "English" in the previous statement and it applies equally to Americans, if you're fretting about French-bashing. Where wuold we be now if some fools had made laws requiring Occan and Olde Englyshe spellings and languages to be used forevermore?

My opinions are non context-specific, and I never construed any of your arguments as French-bashing. Allow me to reiterate: I understand your point of view but I think it would change somewhat if you were more personally involved with the issue. We'll see how Americans will react when Maine has as many hispanophones as California ;)
 
Your point doesn't make any sense. There is a difference between the evolution of a language and the evolution of a culture, although interconnected. Everybody in a major city in Quebec speaks both french and english. Montreal is half english. Does that make me want to remove all their english signs and speak to them all in French ? It's nonsense. The culture over here is evolving fine. It is like the American government trying to please everybody started releasing all the official documents in every language know to men because the US contains every nationality. It's ludicrous. You are comparing apples and oranges and strangely enough you manage to arrive to the conclusion that appange is a perfectly reasonable explanation for the two.

It has nothing to do with nationalism, it is about preserving something. The nationalist movement here is a totally different thing that has not much to do with the language issue.