La Presse has a dossier on growing chaos faced by libraries. The Grande Bibliothèque – a public building whose vocation to welcome everyone is facing the challenge of homeless, distraught and occasionally violent visitors – is calling 911 more often. City libraries are also coping with rising incivilities, so that libraries now have to have social workers on staff.
Updates from December, 2023 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
TVA looks back at the various notable incidents of 2023 and adds a second list of notable incidents which partly overlaps.
La Presse does political moments that made the news. 24heures has nine “woke” controversies in which gender looms large as a factor.
Ian
I have seen “woke” described as Godwin’s Law part 2 – if someone levies it as an accusation, the conversation is no longer serious and that person is probably a ding-dong.
Chris
Ian, is it just the word itself that triggers you so? If people went back to calling it, say, “PC”, would you be less annoyed?
Ian
It’s not so much what it’s called – I call it basic human decency – it’s that it’s usually accompanied by a sneering tone, much like “bleeding heart liberals” of a couple of generations ago.
Kevin
I don’t mind the term itself because it is incredibly useful in identifying hypocritical people who lack self-awareness.
dhomas
Here’s an example of how the term “woke” is used as an insult by some:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Etd3BxVOTUI
(While praising Maurice Duplessis, no less!)Chris
Many neologisms grate my ears, but what can you do, language evolves in strange and organic ways. Sometimes sneering condescension needs to be communicated, and thus there are words for it.
Ian
Thus proving my point – if someone levies it as an accusation, the conversation is no longer serious and that person is probably a ding-dong.
Kevin
Exactly Ian!
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Kate
Jacques Nadeau, one of the city’s top photojournalists, is retiring from Le Devoir after 46 years, but still has projects in mind.
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Kate
Quebec has made tentative deals on working conditions with all the Common Front unions, but salaries and benefits are still to be discussed.
The CBC insists on calling it the “so-called Common Front” – does anyone know why?
Chris
You’d rather they call it by its French name ‘front commun’?
carswell
Because the only official name is the Front commun?
Kate
Maybe. But it sounds rather reductive when it’s read out.
Chris
Is it the “so-called” you don’t like? The usage seems quite correct to me, meaning “commonly named”.
dhomas
The name is French. There is no English-translated name for it. If you go to their website (https://www.frontcommun.org/) it only exists in French (the same is true for its Wikipedia entry: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Front_commun_intersyndical_de_1972).
Calling it the “so-called Common Front” puts into question its legitimacy, IMO. See the second definition here:
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/so-calledMarcG
It’s a tricky expression since the other meaning (“to indicate that you think a word or expression used to describe someone or something is in fact wrong”) is perhaps more common now.
Joey
Would have been better to write “Front commun (‘common front’)”…
Kate
To me, “so-called” smacks of what MarcG says – to underline that someone is making a claim that’s patently false or, at best, pretentious. Wiktionary’s definition 2: “Commonly called by such a name, but not worthy of it.” Examples: “These so-called “assistants” are making our jobs harder, not easier!” and “…as if all the world and its millions of honest hard workers were created solely for the casual diversion of the so-called ‘upper’ classes.”
steph
You can’t settle work conditions without solving the retention problem. You can’t solve the retention problem without settling salaries and benefits.
Work conditions are always sector specific and only contribute to “divide and conquer” tactics. Our union leaders should be stronger, union members should have more spine, the general population should understand what’s at stake here (this is a fight against neo-liberalism)jeather
But if they come to a reasonable agreement on working conditions, the government can then say “see! we solved working conditions and they still want to strike, it’s obviously all about money for them!” and continue to assume people will ignore their 30% self-voted on raise.
Ian
In common usage so-called really is a contronym like “cleave” or “sanction”, but as the negative meaning is the one people think of first, it’s a poor choice of words.
Maybe “known as” would be more appropriate?
Blork
You don’t link to where the CBC used “so-called” but I can speculate that it’s possible (maybe even probable) that it’s not “CBC” using that term but the specific journalist, who may or may not be aware that it can be seen/heard as doubting the veracity of the term that follows. Given the historically dismal state of broadcast editorial oversight these days (including at CBC) and factor in the holidays so no one is trying very hard, my guess is that it’s just a flub that the journalist isn’t even aware of.
Kate
Several different news readers have read out “so-called Common Front” over the last month on CBC radio news.
I’ve texted them to ask whether this is policy – and, if so, why – with no response.
It’s consistent enough that I don’t think it’s a quirky flub.
dhomas
If you searched Google for “Common Front Quebec” earlier today (when this post was made), almost all results included the prefix “so-called”. They have pretty much all been amended since then. This includes the article Kate linked to. The articles seem to have been edited about 2 hours ago. CityNews still has the original text:
https://montreal.citynews.ca/2023/12/27/ftq-union-reaches-possible-settlement-quebec/amp/
Compare it to the amended text of The Gazette:
https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/quebec-reaches-non-monetary-agreement-with-final-ftq-teachers-unionsMaybe the editors read this blog?
CE
@Kate, if you direct questions through the CBC ombudsman, you’ll get a response along with their office looking into it and making corrections if necessary.
Kate
CE, if I hear it again, I will inquire. But I listened to the local news Thursday and nobody said it!
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Kate
With snowless mild weather expected all week, both CTV and QMI have suggestions for outdoor activities under the circumstances.
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Kate
CBC has a video interview with the architect of the revamped Maisonneuve Library, with views from inside. They visited when it was open, and the library is clearly already popular with residents.
My only quibble was that one of the two commercials before the video, when I watched it, was for online gambling. Really, CBC?
Blork
Lucky me: no ads at all.
FWIW, CBC doesn’t choose who advertises; that stuff’s all done through a third-party partner, and the ad selection is almost certainly programmatic (meaning the ads are automatically selected based on what information your browser sends it combined with any identifying matches they can make at the ad exchange).
That said, CBC should be able to provide the ad service with a list of things it does not ever want to advertise. It would appear they haven’t populated that list with much thought, which might be because (a) they couldn’t be bothered, (b) they don’t know how, or (c) they’re afraid of being seen as “judgmental” so they leave it wide open.
Kate
If CBC thinks its ad service is running cleverly targeted ads, it couldn’t be more wrong. I almost always get car commercials.
Tim S.
Lots of gambling ads on CBC TV, where I’m pretty sure they do choose the advertisers, and during what should be clearly ‘family viewing’ shows. One particularly awful ad suggests gambling as a solution to a bad marriage.
Ian
I use an ad-blocker that is apparently quite effctive; I didn’t realize CBC ran ads at all until someone here pointed it out to prove that they are part of “car-dominated corporate media” or somethign to that effect.
Kate
As I may have said before, I do the blog with basic Safari, no blockers or other extensions, because I want to see what the basic sites look like, and not make any false assumptions what others will see.
I use a different browser (actually, 3 to 4 other browsers) for personal stuff and other things.
Blork
The thing is, sometimes they don’t have enough info for a clearly targeted ad, in which case they basically take a guess.
Blork
Also, if there isn’t much targeting in the initial request they can default to things like demographic surveys of the site’s readers (CBC probably has a lot of west island car commuters visiting them), and there can be cross-referencing with other sites you’ve visited, such as this one, where there is no shortage of car talk (even if it’s not positive car talk, but the algos don’t tend to be judgmental).
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Kate
CTV reports that shoppers flocked to big box stores on Boxing Day looking for deals, Global says many were disappointed, but TVA seems let down that nobody had been camping outside Best Buy.
There were also demonstrations in support of Palestine downtown and at some malls on Tuesday.
Chris
Well, it’s not the the old days when Boxing Day discounts were one day, now it’s a whole week.
dhomas
Nobody has money left after Black Friday and Christmas. It’s about 10 years (or more) that Boxing Day has lost its luster in favour of Black Friday.
Kate
I find it so odd we’ve adopted the day after a holiday we don’t have here, as a sales blowout festival.
dhomas
I think it was done out of necessity. About 10-15 years ago, the Canadian dollar was worth about par (or at times even more) to the US dollar, but US prices were still 20 to 30% lower than Canadian prices. The discounts were even greater during Black Friday. Many Canadians would go cross-border shopping to take advantage of the discounts (myself included!). Canadian retailers had to respond with their own sales at the same period, to avoid losing sales to US retailers. Since then, the sales have stuck around.
Ian
I remember that in the 70s and 80s that prices were higher in Canada was explained away by shipping, & distribution costs but when we were closer to par, by they were explained away by lower sales volume.
That American sales-by-volume model is what keeps their costs low and also makes Black Friday work as it gives enough manufacturing lead time to meet Christmas demand. The goal there is to make more sales atlower prices so you overall profits are still good despite lower margins. Problem is it’s a race to the bottom and the lead time gets shorter and shorter every year.
In truth we all know why Canada pays more for consumer goods of all varieties, it’s because of profit and a captive audience. It’s much like how “inflation” led to our grocery prices going through the roof and never coming down, or how gas prices were never over $1.50 before covid and “supply chain issues” and haven’t been below $1.50 since.
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