A student was stabbed Tuesday morning in a Montreal North school specializing in helping young people complete high school. A fellow student has turned himself in.
Updates from April, 2023 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
A few thousand people are still without power Tuesday. Warming shelters are closing.
A rough count of fallen trees and large branches has been made, and the mayor intends a post‑mortem on the whole incident, to see where lessons can be learned.
Trimming trees is one option, but while people differ on burying cables – even in discussions in comments here on the blog – everyone knows it would be expensive as hell.
Tim S.
I would be very sad if we started cutting trees more aggressively because every 25 years there’s an ice storm. My landlord is already eyeing the 100 year old tree in our front yard and musing about the parking space he could have.
dhomas
If you cut a tree you should plant at least one to replace it (if not 2). Also, the trees within about 6 feet of the sidewalk are not the landlord’s to cut down. They are the responsibility of the city.
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Kate
A judge has spared the tent community under the Ville-Marie Expressway for ten days, but after that their fate is uncertain.
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Kate
East end councillors are asking for air sampling stations for their area, given the industries in the area and the nine years’ less life expectancy for residents there compared to the western end of the island.
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Kate
Liza Frulla, who heads the ITHQ, is making a crusade of rescuing the Institut des Sourdes-Muettes, that massive gray stone pile on St‑Denis that’s been left vacant since 2015. Frulla suggests student housing as a possible future.
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Kate
Richard Martineau got the we hate Montreal job this week at the Journal.
Matt G
Another gem from this useless public commentator.
DeWolf
Old man yells at clouds.
steph
Does he really believe that they used to just call the Hells and Mafia leaders and ask them to “play nice”?
Mark
Kate can I suggest that you stop posting articles from him? Unless he’s said something so outrageous that the reaction to his commentary is picked up in other news outlets?
This anecdotal and cherry picked drivel could be written by any “Old man yells at clouds” on Facebook, but it’s RM and the JdM, so we read him. A desperate newspaper pushing boundaries of controversy just far enough to maintain the attention of their dwindling readership.
Several discussion forums ban publications from certain outlets or authors. I’m thinking of Reddit and /soccer which has banned any articles from the Sun.
Again, completely up to you Kate on this one, but I for one won’t miss seeing this content.
Kate
Mark, my rationale for noticing articles like these is this: This item showed up in my general news sweep for the blog, because the topic is specifically Montreal. I didn’t enjoy reading it, but I feel I need to know about it, because – in the aggregate – this kind of content reaches people all over Quebec, influences attitudes to the city, and ultimately inflects voting trends and official policy.
As a Montreal blogger, although I find it distasteful, I also find a sort of gloomy comedy in how regularly Quebecor feels it has to put the boot in and remind us how terrible this city is.
Whether we like it or not, the “old men” at the Journal have a loud, influential voice. Completely blocking Martineau, Sophie Durocher, Gilles Proulx, Mathieu B‑C and their confrères means choosing to ignore the people who believe in the “grand remplacement” and its corollaries, who really believe that white people are being oppressed – and that francophone Quebecers, the only true Quebecers, can’t possibly be racist because it’s they who are oppressed.
It’s a way of thinking that always leaves me feeling riled, but I feel that if we want to understand Quebec, and in Montreal’s political plight within Quebec, we have to understand it’s there.
Mark
Good points, thanks for that explanation Kate. I find myself doing that as well, scanning the various sites to gauge the collective zeitgeist, especially those that I don’t necessarily agree with or consult often (Rebel Media, Fox, the CBC comments section :).
That being said, of the list of names that you put forward, Martineau (and to some extent Gilles Proulx) strikes me as someone who has simply run out of things to say. Having had long conversations with people who defend MBC’s view points, I feel like I’m at least learning something when I engage with them, even if I often disagree with their point of view. Interacting with RM feels like we’re having a discussion with a sock.
Chris
DeWolf, was your commented directed at Martineau or Matt G? 🙂
Mark, Kate, it is indeed important to read viewpoints you disagree with. I encourage everyone to do so. If nothing else, it helps you know your enemy better, and formulate better counterarguments. Kate, I for one love how you link to everything.
>francophone Quebecers […] can’t possibly be racist because it’s they who are oppressed.
Interestingly, a similar view is held by many American Wokesters, who say blacks can’t be racist because it’s they who are oppressed.
Tim S.
As I’ve said before, I’m glad Kate reads these columnists so I don’t have to.
(To be specific, I wouldn’t mind reading them for the reasons mentioned above, but I don’t want to give them the clicks)
Kevin
There are times you need to be aware of what people who dislike you are saying and doing, especially when they believe you are less than an equal.
Then some of them come along and prove that they are not your equal, and you can go back to ignoring them until they get dangerous.
DeWolf
@Chris, “viewpoints you disagree with” is being generous, given that Martineau’s only viewpoint is that “Montreal is gross.”
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Kate
Car thefts in Montreal continue to rise with an average 810 vehicles stolen every month.
Ephraim
The car manufacturers have no interest in stopping thefts, because they get to sell new cars. The insurance companies have no interest in stopping thefts, because they get to sell more policies. The police in Montreal don’t seem like they want to do anything about it, because if they did, they would have bait cars, like they do in YVR. That leaves the government to write new specs to lower car theft rates. The last changes were done by the British government… that’s why more parts have serial numbers and there are no key holes on the passenger side anymore. So either government needs to step in OR we need to shame the car manufacturers by pointing out which cars are the easiest to steal and WHY so they beef up the system.
What we need to do is make it hard to steal and expensive to fix when stolen. The simplest solution is a 128 bit or 256 bit encryption and/or PIN to drive. PIN to drive means that the cars electronics won’t unlock, even if you are in the car. And 256 bit encryption means that the computers on the car are encrypted and until unencrypted are worthless… so you need to replace the entire computer system when you steal a car.
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