François Legault wants us to undertake a moral contract involving periods of isolation before and after Christmas.
For a government so fixated on secularity, they’re going to a lot of trouble to clear the decks for a religious holiday.
Updates from November, 2020 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
Via Facebook, an imgur photo essay on the Architects’ Building from a 1931 architecture magazine. One of the city’s lost Art Deco treasures.
Jebediah Pallindrome
God wasn’t it though. Such a travesty given what it was replaced with… moreso given there was an abundance of empty lots all over the city when the current building was erected
Kate
The story is they had to demolish it to widen Dorchester.
Jebediah Palindrome
My least favourite street widening project
dhomas
I’m not sure that’s entirely true about the widening project. Dorchester was widened in 1955. The Architects’ Building (later, the DuPont Building) came down in 1968. No specific reason was given in the Gazette article I found about its demolition:
https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1946&dat=19681113&id=6XkyAAAAIBAJ&sjid=GrkFAAAAIBAJ&pg=5020,3315455&hl=endhomas
In fact, we can see the building here in a picture from 1963, with a widened Dorchester Boulevard right next to it:
https://www.banq.qc.ca/histoire_quebec/parcours_thematiques/HenriRemillard/VertigeDesHauteurs/vh_s01photo06.jspKate
dhomas, nice find!
I wonder whether there could have been some fundamental design flaw. I can’t see why else a major building would have to come down after only a couple of decades. I’d have to spend time trawling through old newspapers to find out more, and I won’t have time for that for awhile.
But big buildings do come down. The Laurentian Hotel only lasted a couple of decades as well.
Martin
And it should be noted that the building was demolished in the 60’s, but nothing replaced it before 1981. So it’s not like they had to bring it down to build something else right away. It’s really a big mystery. Why ?
Martin
Come to think of it, the only explanation is just land speculation. By demolishing the building, the owner wanted to increase the value of that prime spot and sell it when the right time come.
David274
I’ve been in a bitter mood since reading this morning that the Arecibo Observatory will be demoliahed, and that photo essay just ruined my day. I’m closing up shop and heading off into the afternoon to find a place to get drunk.
Michael Black
Sam Harris used to say “if an antenna stays up the whole winter, it’s too small”.
Then he moved down to Arecibo almost from the start. He wasn’t merely a technician, which seemed to be the way he was presented to the hobby world.
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Kate
The ongoing challenge to the Loi de la laïcité (Bill 21) has been suspended because one of the lawyers has been diagnosed with Covid.
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Kate
A man was shot at in his car in Villeray on Thursday morning and is in critical condition. Not much detail available yet.
dwgs
He didn’t make it. Loan shark killed by a professional.
Kate
Oh dear. Adding him to my map. Homicide #24, I think.
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Kate
A spat at city council followed Marvin Rotrand’s motion for more diversity when Cathy Wong pointed out how many terms Rotrand had taken a seat and wasn’t it time for him to make room for younger people?
qatzelok
Dinosaur: “It’s high time for more species diversity!”
Chris
Ageism. The last politically acceptable ism.
Ant6n
I recently saw a tweet from him where he pointed out the first time he was elected, the anniversary had come up. And it was like 1980 or something ridiculous like that. Doesn’t matter if he’s old, but like, after decades, it does seem rather stagnant. And the guy doesn’t seem to do anything useful. Just keeps complaining about his pet peeves.
Michael Black
It was 1982, I remember being at some event when he was campaigning. Something about turning his pamphlets into origami.
People are pointing out that he’s one of only 2 Jewish councillors, and anglophone, which is diversity, if not visible.
Most councillors don’t get much visibility after election, Marvin keeps getting mentioned. As opposition, he has limited power, but maybe he gets some balance in decision making.
He was of course on the transit board for a long time, and terminated not quit. I don’t like his campaign for Louis Riel’s pardon, but he has been bringing proposals which seem a bit different from the mass.
Maybe he should retire, maybe he will (I thought I saw a story about that, but didn’t notice the date) but he seems to be the one leading this motion for diversity.
It’s not perfect, but he is trying.
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Kate
Quebec has withdrawn its support for a REM spur to the airport.
steph
Who owns/runs Aéroports de Montréal ? seems like they’re the ones putting the breaks on the build. Seems irresponsible to push the blame on Quebec for not fronting them a loan…
And then I read “C’était l’une des conditions de départ de ce projet et c’est une condition essentielle à la vitalité économique de Montréal.” Who writes up these contracts that lets the parties involved do what ever they want without safeguards or punitive consequences for failure to abide? It’s construction corruption as usual aided and abided by the government.Bert
Andrew
The tunnel boring machine started working a month ago:
https://www.westislandblog.com/alice-the-tunnel-boring-machine-of-the-rem-begins-her-great-journey/Supposedly at 1.7 M/hr it would currently be somewhere under the runways on the north side of the airport.
So this sounds … insane
Kate
It smells like political leverage to me, but I wonder what the counterweight is.
Raymond Lutz
The boring stalled: I heard Alice was requisitioned as an extra on Villeneuve’s Dune set.
Faiz Imam
I wonder what the rationale is for Quebec to not give the loan?
We know the airport is struggling due to covid, but it’s also pretty Clear that air travel will be back to full swing in the years ahead. A loan to cover the difference and allow that line to get done without delays seems obvious to me.
david122
As I mentioned, the rumor I heard is that this is a done deal – they’ll finish the boring, supposedly to Dorval circle, but they’re not going to build out the boxes for 2-3 years.
Brett
Because of the border closures (inside and outside Canada) as well the quarantine requirements upon return, make air travel basically out of the picture. As long as the federal government imposes these rules, the airport is going to be pin-drop quiet. It’s up to the feds to loosen restrictions and allow travel to resume which would put the airport in better financial health.
Kate
Brett, you make it sound like the federal government is “imposing these rules” arbitrarily. They’re not playing games for fun – we need controls until the pandemic is over.
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Kate
Firefighters used to make up Christmas grocery boxes for needy families, but this year they’re simply giving out gift cards, which seems colder, but at least allows people to get what they like.
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Kate
Last month’s ransomware attack on the STM’s servers cost them $2 million although it’s implied here this was the cost of fixing them, not a ransom payment.
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Kate
A Montreal woman has been murdered in Cuba, where her body was found on a beach.
jeather 18:49 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
I am so annoyed by this.
Kate 19:33 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
jeather 19:34 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
I really hope this bites them in the ass in the Bill 21 lawsuit.
steph 19:37 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
This is inline with Bill 21 protecting catholic heritage.
Kate 20:51 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
But jeather, it’s culture, not religion! /s
jeather 21:06 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
I wonder if they even see what they say.
Ephraim 21:39 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
Will the Chinese restaurants and cinemas be open on the 25th for the non-Christians?
JS 22:21 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
Maybe “Christmas” is like “kleenex” or “aspirin”
Blork 22:22 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
Oh for Pete’s sake, people. Even church-goers barely see Christmas as a religious holiday anymore. There are a bunch of non-religious reasons why Christmas unfolds the way it does. Such as:
History. Even if people no longer go to mass or whatever, historically it’s been a holiday when people gathered for elaborate meals and social events and gift-giving. That is still the case, and it has nothing to do with the church.
Calendar. Combined with New Years it’s the last holiday of the calendar year. Even if the calendar year is an arbitrary invention, humans tend to be orderly about these things, and when a year closes out it’s historically been a time when people as individuals and in groups look back on the year and think ahead to the next one. This is something we do collectively; everyone’s doing it to one extent or another, so there’s a sense of togetherness and community that can build around that.
Ritual. Two holidays within a week, plus the sense of shared experience with the closing of the year, plus the long-standing rituals of shopping and bargain hunting, plus the fact that a lot of offices close for a few days between Christmas and New Years — adding to the existing two holidays — makes it feel like an early winter vacation. And it’s a vacation at a time when lots and lots of people are doing the same thing.
Opportunity. It’s a time when young people are home from university, younger people are on break from school, etc. Combined with the above item about holidays, this adds up to a lot of socializing (outside of pandemic times).
Multicultural. The end of the year is not just Christmas and New Years, but it coincides with Hanukkah, Kwanzaa (even if that’s a recent invention), and possibly other holidays (I don’t know if Festivus counts).
Speaking personally, I haven’t been to a church service in decades and I’m not religious at all, but I always look forward to the end-of-the-year holiday season for all sorts of reasons, primarily because it’s a bit of a touchstone in our loops around the sun and it comes with some quiet time as well as a lot of festivities. Zero of that has any religious meaning for me, and I think what I describe about myself also applies to millions of other people in Quebec. So FFS stop griping about your perceptions of some kind of hypocrisy around so-called secular Quebec and the fact that the holiday season still exists. There is plenty of other hypocrisy you should be complaining about that is real. This is not.
Ephraim 23:07 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
Blork… do you even see you bias? Do you even know what it’s like for someone to feel completely outside society because of this? No… because you aren’t. Do you know how much griping there was within the Jewish and Muslim communities because they couldn’t get together… and then the government fucking backflips for Christmas? Really, honestly, truly… fuck this… because no one in the Jewish or Muslim community gives a Flying F about Christmas… they wanted to get together for THEIR holidays… but the government wouldn’t bend for their holidays… just for Christmas. Why was it okay to do this for the majority for Christmas, but not for the Muslim or Jewish communities for their holidays? Everyone should be treated with equal respect… you don’t get more respect because you follow the majority religion.
Michael Black 23:53 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
I’ve never celebrated Christmas as a religious holiday. Blork’s comments address that. This isn’t aboeit “promoting a religious holiday”.
The oversight is that it defines “normal” as people who do something around Christmas. It leaves out otgers.
But does this instance mean a ban on other religions? Or just a forgetfulness? If Jewish people or Muslims have the same sort of activities in December, will they get in trouble, “that’s not Christmas!” or is it equivalent but Legault didn’t mention it? I
People are constantly forgotten by the mass, until they are noticed.
Kevin 00:16 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
While there are lots of people who celebrate Christmas as a secular holiday, there are way more Quebecers who will go to midnight mass on Christmas Eve.
Maybe not this year because of the pandemic—but I thought exactly like Blork did until I spent Reveillon on the south shore with extended married-in family.
Blork 01:10 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
Ephraim, I just wrote several hundred words about how the end of the year holidays are no longer about the Christian religion, and you bring other religions into it. Everything I mentioned: the days off work, the kids coming home from university, the shopping, the office parties, the end-of-year reflection; those things apply to everyone, or at least anyone.
There are no office parties that are only for Christians. Boxing Day sales are not null and void if you’re Jewish, Muslim, or atheist. The calendar year is ending for everyone. That all adds up to a tradition that started as a religious thing but has long been a social and cultural phenomenon that applies to anyone. You can’t compare that to a strictly religious holiday in the middle of the year that has no other events or traditions coinciding with it.
Kevin, despite what you experienced in that cluster, I guarantee that most Francophone Québécois do not go to midnight mass on Christmas or any other time.
JP 01:45 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
The concerns raised about Jewish, Muslim and other holidays are completely valid.
Insofar as Christmas, a lot of people don’t realize that Christmas was moved to December in an effort to convert the pagans who celebrated the Solstice. As a non-Christian who likes participating in commercial Christmas, I like to think what I’m really celebrating is the Solstice, which is what a lot of Christmas traditions have actually evolved from. I’ve felt reproached about celebrating Christmas in the past, and my standard answer is that I’m celebrating the Solstice, and so are they. It’s the darkest time of the year and I need the celebration and cheer.
I’m not trying to invalidate the other concerns raised here about other holy days and being treated fairly and respectfully. but trying to add to the discourse that “Christmas” is more than just the religious holiday.
I don’t know what to make of the unfair treatment. Maybe they should’ve had a better plan in place for the holy days and times of other religious and minority groups.
Ephraim 03:47 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
Blork, BUT that is exactly the thing. I don’t give a flying F about the end of the year at all. Do you know what people in Israel, Jordan and Shanghai do on the 25th of December? Go to work. Do you know what they do on the 1st of January? Go to work. It’s about family getting together to celebrate a holiday…. well, there is no holiday at all. And the artificial time off doesn’t have any meaning at all. And for everyone, holidays are about family. Except the government has told everyone to sacrifice their holidays… except Christmas. Easter doesn’t have a tenth of the meaning to a Christian family that Passover does to a Jewish family.
And normally, because I work in tourism, I don’t have that time of year off anyway. For the past 15 years or so, I have worked every single day of that “holiday” and been up at 7AM to do so. So, that period has no special meaning to me at all. Chinese families want to celebrate Chinese New Year… but nope, they have to celebrate and see their family for Christmas…. and be happy we are letting you do it for Christmas, because your holiday… means nothing….
You say it isn’t about religion, but it is ENTIRELY about it. Telling someone who isn’t Christian to sacrifice their holidays, to not see their family for their holidays, but then making an exception for those who Christian… is an affront to the sacrifices they have made for their holidays…. those dates mean NOTHING to them. They mean NOTHING to me. And in a normal year… they would just be work days for me.
Oh and PS… I haven’t had a summer vacation in over 20 years either. Even when I worked as a teacher… I was scheduled to work in the summer.
You don’t think this is about religion? Okay, try to NOT listen to Christmas music? Not watch Christmas TV specials? Not see Christmas around you…. But you can’t. Your Netflix feed is full of it. Your TV is full of it. Your stores. Your bank…. everyone else is shoving it down your throat.
dhomas 05:39 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
I celebrate Christmas as a way to get together with family at a time of year when most of us are available to meet. I was hoping to get tested around December 21st or so (the kids finish school on the 18th), then hunkering down until Christmas so I could have my parents over (they’re in their 70s). I think the government is caving on Christmas because they know people would do it anyway, regardless of having “permission”.
That said, I also have Jewish people in my family. I also have Hindu and Muslim friends. There were no exceptions made for the Jews at the end of THEIR year and high holidays. There were no exceptions for Diwali, either.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/boisbriand-quebec-jewish-gathering-covid-19-1.5760749
https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/police-break-up-diwali-gathering-at-montreal-sikh-temple-1.5189567
In fact, the “dispersal” of gatherings was celebrated by the media, the population, and the government alike. “Health Minister Christian Dubé praised the officers who responded to the gathering, saying they did a “a very good job in displacing” the crowds”, from that first article. “What are those people thinking!” most of my friends and family would say. Until it comes to Christmas, then all bets are off. Why are the Jews/Muslims/Hindus/Sikhs/etc asked to make sacrifices for their holidays, but Christian holidays are allowed to proceed? It is quite insulting to those that DIDN’T gather for their religious holidays and made a sacrifice, to see that others need not make the same sacrifice.
Tim S. 09:20 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
I’m waiting for the new slogan: “Most of us are in this together”
Raymond Lutz 09:21 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
Since forever, every societies in the North hemisphere celebrated the return of longer days around the winter solstice. In the 4th century, the Christian church hijacked what was seen as pagan festivities statuting it was a period to commemorate Jesus’ birth .
Ouups… 😎 JP m’a devancé… Joyeux Noël!
Karen-off 10:00 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
Someone angry wrote: “I haven’t had a summer vacation in over 20 years either.”
It’s probably time to take one. : )
Kate 10:59 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
Legault could easily have made this pause about New Year’s, which isn’t everyone’s New Year celebration but is at least not specifically a religious holiday*, and is still close enough to the Solstice to count. But no. He chose the festival of the birth of Jesus because, and I quote, most people will be happy with those four days.
The only benefit I can see about Christmas is that doing it this way may stimulate the most shopping.
*At one time the New Year holiday was celebrated as the Circumcision of Christ, but I don’t know how long ago that was more or less waved off.
jeather 11:00 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
After a few hundred years, we don’t really need to discuss when Christmas “should be” or whatever. I skipped Passover this year, which is, for me, the big one, the last one when my father was alive. I’m not sure there will even be one next year. But no, Christians need FOUR DAYS of parties. (I don’t care about Chanukah. We usually used it as an excuse to have a family meal, but it is a minor holiday.)
You can pretend Christmas is totally secular all you want, but it isn’t. Yes, some people who are neither religiously nor culturally Christian may choose to do some Christmas activities. That doesn’t make it a fun, inclusive holiday for all.
The thing is, I understand how they chose it. They wanted retail to do well, so they couldn’t do a real lockdown. They don’t want to close the schools much, so they had to stick it dead centre of the holiday period (instead of around NYE). And Legault is playing to his base, which is Catholics and secular Catholics. And yet, it’s the most bad faith thing — both on the secularism issue and on actual health concerns.
I really don’t give a fuck what Christians (cultural or religious) think about how completely secular Christmas is. This was done for you, so at the very least do non-Christians the favour of letting us complain about the complete bullshit that this is without trying to convince us we’re wrong.
Ephraim 11:03 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
@Karen-Off I take about 4 weeks a year off. Just not in the summer and not at Christmas. You clearly missed the point. It’s not about the time off. This is a total FU to everyone else who sacrificed their holidays.
JaneyB 11:07 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
I’m with Blork on this one and I wouldn’t be surprised if this ‘moral contract’ thing actually worked given the hive-mind that Quebec can have. I think exceptions should have been made for the other religious traditions though. Unfortunately the High Holidays come earlier in the contagion season and we needed to see what the school openings would bring first. Also, the anti-masky behaviour of the Hasidim, here and elsewhere did not help and most Quebeckers are unaware there are other kinds of Jews, sigh. I suspect this Xmas idea only recently occurred to Legault. Feels really seat-of-the-pants to me anyway.
Ephraim 11:17 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
You know, if this kind of thing had been discussed earlier…. do you know how many private schools would have adjusted their calendars so that they can enjoy their holidays… ALL of them.
Su 11:19 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
I guess religious folks of all persuasions are intent on spreading this plague when most of usfolks have no problem sacrificing identitarian mob feasting and carrying on for one measly year in order to get things back to normal.
We know these gatherings lead to surges in cases.
Why not enjoy the solitude!
MarcG 12:53 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
The proposed isolation time also doesn’t make any sense. It should be 2 weeks, visit, then another 2 weeks. It seems like what will happen is a bunch of vulnerable old people are going to be exposed to their superspreader school-age grandkids. Give grandma a kiss!
Michael Black 13:21 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
Some places have quarantine for ten days, maybe a week. So there’s debate about how long.
A month won’t be viable. Kids have to go to school, not everyone is working from home. I’m not sure this will work even as planned.
It’s more like “if you really need thus, here are the conditions”. I didn’t read the fine print, but maybe masks and 2M apart are still required.
Blork 13:28 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
The plan does seem sort of weird and ineffective. It’s true that 14 days on either side is pretty hard to pull off, but you’d think they’d at least insist on 14 days before. It’s all rather moot, since most people will just hear “It’s OK to gather with 10 people” and will just leave it at that. (The extent to which people follow arbitrary rules instead of logic and reasoning is shocking.)
So despite my comments above, I certainly won’t be gathering in any groups and I wish others wouldn’t either. I’m not a fan of the government’s approach here. (My only point above was the issue about thinking of the holiday season as “religious.” Its history, and how it’s treated in other places, are irrelevant to this discussion. All that matters for this discussion is the reality of Christmas in 21st-century Quebec.)
Michael Black 13:42 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
When I posted last night, I’d not read that it there was a whole protocol, which leaves out anything but “Christmas gatherings”. But it will just be gatherings, but on a few days. I’m sure many will give up visits with grandparents for “traditional Christmas sex”
And that is the danger. Just as “squeeze out 25% more contact” doesn’t apply to people being careful, this is safe only to the extent that people are already being cautious.
MarcG 14:20 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
How hard would it have been to include an apology or acknowledgement-that-it-sucks regarding other people having their celebrations cancelled? “Oh I didn’t even know you were here!” is ruder and more hurtful than the honest “I dislike you, go away”.
Kevin 22:23 on 2020-11-20 Permalink
Drainville Pointed out a few days ago that the idea of closing schools exactly 2 weeks before Christmas was the stupidest idea ever. I gave everybody time to go shopping get infected and have the exact time necessary to develop a full-blown case of the disease when they see Mamie et Papa.
I expect the government will spend the next month. Hammering down the idea that if you have symptoms stay at home.
At least that’s what they would do if have any sense