Updates from July, 2022 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

  • Kate 22:03 on 2022-07-13 Permalink | Reply  

    A St-Jean party held in a restaurant parking lot in Lachine by a few dozen Black Montrealers was faced with the sudden arrival of the Eclipse armed violence squad, plus SQ and RCMP. A party held in the same location earlier this month was also raided by police. Gemma Raeburn‑Baynes comes across here as a voice of reason, wanting the mayor to have the interim police chief come talk to people in that restaurant and try to come to some mutual understanding.

    Not everyone would be so patient. Raeburn‑Baynes was in the news for an incident almost 20 years ago when police attempted to raid her and her friends as they cleaned up her garage. I can’t imagine how deeply angry and weary this kind of thing would make a person feel.

     

    • Ephraim 22:47 on 2022-07-13 Permalink

      There are only two real ways to deal with the police… a swift clean out… or a painful whittling until they learn their lesson. If Sex Garage has taught us anything… it won’t be a swift clean out.

  • Kate 16:46 on 2022-07-13 Permalink | Reply  

    Time Out’s best cities list for 2022 and Montreal comes in at #9 of 53.

     

    • PatrickC 09:15 on 2022-07-14 Permalink

      Two Scottish cities in the top 5? What are the odds? I notice the most important criterion is food and drink, perhaps understandable in a survey about visiting, not living these cities. It would also be interesting to know the geographical distribution and other demographics of the informants in each city.

    • Kevin 14:35 on 2022-07-14 Permalink

      Glasgow is a fantastic city, and if you visit you’ll feel like someone took the best bits of Montreal and put them all closer together.

    • MarcG 17:05 on 2022-07-14 Permalink

      +1 for Glasgow being awesome, a very walkable city with real people.

    • Kate 19:30 on 2022-07-14 Permalink

      I notice the most important criterion is food and drink

      Time Out also flogs food and drink, so it’s not surprising.

      Kevin: if I ever travel again, both Edinburgh and Glasgow are high on my list of places to see.

  • Kate 16:20 on 2022-07-13 Permalink | Reply  

    Radio-Canada has apologized for letting someone speak the N-word on the air, while maintaining that it is not obeying the CRTC ruling as such, simply making a civil apology to those it has offended. It’s not promising to ban the word in future, but will warn people that offensive language is impending.

    I note that, in its report, La Presse is using the full French version of the word, as part of the title of the Pierre Vallières book which was mentioned on Radio‑Canada. As someone commented here, perhaps the French word hasn’t got quite the same bite as the English one, as it also encompasses “negro” – a word we don’t use any more, but which is not felt to be quite so taboo – I think.

    This point is made by Robert Dutrisac in a Le Devoir editorial but he takes it much further, as othr commenters have done recently, making it into a symbol of the difference between English and French speakers and even claiming that the anglos have difficulty with the notion laïcité. It all gets built up into this big pile of righteousness when standing on your right to offend is not a good look for anyone.

     

    • Kevin 20:41 on 2022-07-13 Permalink

      Oh gawd, I couldn’t get through three paragraphs of that pretentious dreck from an old fart.

    • SMD 22:10 on 2022-07-13 Permalink

      I much preferred two other thoughtful pieces in Le Devoir today, a letter suggesting that people actually read the complaint (it wasn’t against the word, but rather SRC’s lack of context and warning) and Emilie Nicolas’ column on how we can all avoid this type of escalation in the future.

    • Nick D 10:58 on 2022-07-15 Permalink

      Canadaland’s new French-language podcast had an excellent discussion of this whole affair (episode 3 of Détours). It made me feel better knowing that there were French speaking folks who think the outrage around the CRTC decision is misplaced – I know I should have realized that that would be the case, but generally the only French media I consume are La Presse and la première chaîne of Radio-Canada, where commentators seem to be uniformly critical and overwrought about this.

  • Kate 10:06 on 2022-07-13 Permalink | Reply  

    A man was shot in Montreal North late Tuesday, by someone in a car. Little else has been reported and his life is not in danger.

    I notice that an incident like this is reported by TVA under the headline Tentative de meurtre, while other media will simply call it a drive‑by shooting or refer, as La Presse does, to a fusillade.

    Can we reasonably assume that a shooting like this is an attempted murder? I suppose, at the very least, if you shoot at people, you don’t care whether someone dies, and if you’re arrested, you may be charged with attempted murder. But a lot of these flying bullets stories – many with no victims at all – seem more to be in the category of warnings or statements than actual targeted killings.

     

    • Bert 11:36 on 2022-07-13 Permalink

      I can see this sort of both ways. I assume that if you shoot at someone you could be charged with attempted murder. However, since there has been no trial no one is yet guilty of the crime, though an act that apparently would fall in to that category. So, the French version correctly describes the act but if it is intended to assign guilt, it may be a bit off. As to the drive-by shooting, it is factually correct but does not try to assign what may be guilt accusation.

      Words mean things.

    • mare 13:25 on 2022-07-13 Permalink

      In my ‘book’ a drive-by shooting involves the firing of a lot of bullets (many miss, or hit innocent or not so innocent bystanders). Sometimes they all miss, because it was meant as a warning and they aimed to high or low.

      One or a few well aimed bullets shot from a car? A murder attack, or an attempted murder attack.

      (But what do I know, I’ve never even held a gun. I’ve just watched too many violent movies and tv shows, and read too many crime novels.)

    • dwgs 14:17 on 2022-07-13 Permalink

      Pfft, ‘attempted murder’. If I could quote Sideshow Bob,
      “I am presently incarcerated, imprisoned for a crime I did not even commit. “Attempted murder,” now honestly, did they ever give anyone a Nobel prize for “attempted chemistry?”

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