Not caring about the Franco fest: opinions
I noted this piece by T’cha Dunlevy about anglos not caring about the Franco fest (used to be Francofolies), but didn’t immediately blog it because it annoyed me, especially his taunt that “anglo Montrealers prefer to pretend they live in Toronto.”
It always annoys me to be told it’s sad or lectured that it’s deplorable that I don’t devote part of my dwindling free time to earnestly consuming cultural material that isn’t in my home language, as a duty. Don’t think this is about hating French. I speak and read French every day, and for that matter I don’t watch much TV or listen to top-40 radio in English either. I reserve the right to choose what I listen to (or read, or watch).
A hot take from Reddit that I liked:
The Montreal Gazette has sunk to a whole new low. I’m a fucking Anglo, and I try to fucking pretend Toronto doesn’t even exist. Wtf is this rag going on about? Maybe the god dman problem is that the Montreal Gazette is trying to pretend to be CJAD or some shit like that.
Let me tell you, no self-respecting Montrealer of any linguistic background tries to pretend that Montreal is Toronto except maybe a few idiots in the west island but, it’s the west island, who gives any shits at all what they think.
Oh, and that remarkable introduction is based on the premise that anglos like to say “we’re billingual city” and then don’t go en masse to Francofolie.
What a stupid comparison from a stupid author of a stupid news paper. It’s stupid all the way down, stupid.
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