It is important to note that this question is far from being a recent one, in fact, it goes back to way before Confederation, back to the original Conquest of Québec itself.

A list of historical, political, social, cultural, linguistic, and psychological reasons for Québec's independence will be posted slowly in point form a little at a time in the next few days.

Historical Reasons

1763 - New France becomes an English colony and loses much of its territory.

1837 - Patriots Rebellion is crushed by the English army.

1839 - Four patriots are hung on February 15.

1839 - Lord Durham's Rapport recommends assimilating the French whom he judges have no culture.

1867 - Confederation, designed to assimilate the French by making them a minority. NO REFERENDUM was called to actually consult the people who didn't even want to join Canada.

1885 - Louis Riel is hung after having defended French language rights.

1914 - World War I. The French are conscripted against their will to fight for the British.

1942 - The French are again conscripted against their will to fight in World War II.

1970 - October Crisis. Trudeau declares martial law and evades Québec by sending in soldiers to patrol the streets even though there is no real apprehended danger of insurrection as he falsely claims.

1973 - RCMP steal the Parti Québécois' members list at Trudeau's request. This is just one of many illegal operations by the SCRS, the secret service of the federal govt.

1980 - Referendum. Ottawa illegally spends $17 million on the campaign against official referendum regulations.

1980 - Just before the referendum vote Trudeau promises to modify the Constitution to the satisfaction of Québec saying that a No vote is a Yes vote for Québec. Later, it is actually the opposite of this promise that happens as Québec loses powers.

1982 - The "Night of Long Knives". Québec loses a lot of power in Constitutional negotiations when the other 9 provinces go behind René Lévesque's back to make a new agreement. Québec doesn't sign the new Constitution but the unilateral ratification by Ottawa is paradoxally considered "legal but not legitimate". Québec loses its veto, is no longer considered a founding nation on which Canada was built and no longer has a specific statu in the new "multicultural" version of Canada which seeks to further assimilate the French by making them one of many peoples. This is the first time since 1867 that one province loses powers due to agreements made solely by others.

1984 - Supreme Court overrules parts of Bill 101 in the area of English schooling.

1990 - Meech Lake Accord fails after Manitoba and Newfoundland fail to ratify it.

1992 - Canada rejects Charlottetown Accord not wanting to give anything to Québec. Ovide Mercredi says Québecers are not a people.

1995 - Hard-line tactics designed to scare Québec with propaganda into voting No. Love-in illegally finaced according to campaign regulations.

1996 - Info Canada is created with a $20 million budget for unity propaganda.

1996 - Questions sent by Federal govt. to Supreme Court on sovereignty to try to deny the will of the people.

Political, Linguistic, and Social Reasons

Politics is the act of self governement, thus Québecers want naturally to govern themselves without always having their policies shot down by Ottawa.

Why should francophones be a minority and badly treated in Canada when they could be a majority and control their own futur in Québec?

Demographically speaking, French is deminishing. An astounding number of franchophones outside of Québec have been assimilated into speaking mostly English, and Montreal risks to soon fall below the 50% mark of francophones making up this city.

By becoming independant, Québec could control its own immigration laws to increase the number of francophones as well as make it mandatory for English-speaking immigrants to learn French. They could also restore parts of Bill 101 shot down by Ottawa and thus make new immigrants go to French schools upon their arrival.

Linguistic clivage = language determines voting. Francophones are divided on most issues including sovereignty in a way that is normal and healthy in any good democracy. Anglophones, however, almost invariably all vote exactly the same way every time, whatever way is against sovereignists or French rights. This is not at all normal and is in fact linguistic discrimination of sorts that makes a healthy dialogue between linguistic groups almost impossible.

Bilingualism is really most of the time a francophone who speaks English and is much more rarely the opposite. Bilingualism was really an idea designed by Trudeau to assimilate the French.

It is a huge myth propagated by unworthy English-only-speaking journalists who say that English-speakers in Québec are somehow oppressed. This is not at all true. The English make up only 10% of Québec but are much more powerful and treated much better than the 25% of Francophones who make up Canada.

Economic Reasons

Financially, Québec's independence would not be a disaster. In fact, it would be far from it. For proof, check out the case of Slovakia which secceeded from the Czech Republic. This case, which closely ressembles the case of Québec, shows that there was little ecomonic loss, even though this succession took place during the years of a world-wide recession. (The text is in French.)

In reality, Québec's sovereignty would most likely bring about a better economic situation for both Québec and Canada. There would be less unemployment and more development, not to mention less money wasted on duplicated federal and provincial services and administration. To get more info on this in greater detail, check out Jacques Parizeau's book Pour un Québec souverain.

Don't forget that while Ottawa is constantly blaming Canada's poor economic development on the national unity debate and says that this "political uncertainty" is supposedly hurting the Canadian dollar, it is important to remember that the debate has been going on for almost 40 years. That is about a certain a thing as possible and definitely nothing that would shake the international markets. As well, before the referendums, Québec's economy was just fine and actually surpassing that of Ontario.

For details on the money and passport issues of sovereignty, see the text A Wake-Up Call for English Canada.

Cultural Reasons

There is absolutely no doubt in the mind of anyone who speaks both French and English that Québec and English Canada are have distinctly different cultures. "La petite vie" for instance would never exist in English on the CBC and no English Canadians actually know who Noir Silence is. On the other hand, Québecers know significantly more about English culture, being exposed to it more often, but still are oblivious to Sesame Street or Great Big Sea for example. There's a ton of other examples that would take too long to list, but suffice it to say that most Anglophones are completely unaware of the distinct culture that makes Québec what it is, and for this reason often find it hard to understand why they want to be independent. Basically, they are not at all like English Canadians and have on top of that a whole other set of values and attitudes and cultural references that are impossible to understand without speaking French adequately.

Psychological Reasons

Always being a minority can easily lead a people to fall into the trap of défaitism, always putting themselves down. For a long time, this was the case in Québec and only now after years of slowly learning to take control of their own destiny has this monkey been shook off their back. For a long time, francophones were used to the idea that only those who were or who spoke English would get decent jobs in Québec. They definitely don't want history to repeat itself and naturally are sick of getting stepped on. By being an independent country, this risk is practically eliminated.

The confusion of the minority/majority situation is also eliminated by independence. Québecers are always being told that they are already "masters in their own homes" but at the same time they have to listen to Ottawa who interferes with their development. The French also believe that they are a majority in Québec, but when they are part of Canada they are a minority and lose all their rights. It's extremely hard to get service in French outside of Québec, even in French-speaking communities because these place associate success and business with English.

Conclusion

This list is far from exhaustive and really only gives an overview of the whole question. It should however still prove useful for those who didn't know really what the problem was, but for a more in depth and complete explanation, it takes a lot of reading, and unfortunately most of the books explaining the Québec side of the story are in French, making it absolutely necessary to know French to get all the exact details that would take too long to put here.


© 1998 pantagruelle.geo@yahoo.com

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