The divergence between Canadien and French culture is actually very interesting and worth a deeper dive. A big reason for the colonization of Quebec in the first place was to establish a Catholic stronghold in case religiou wars in France started going the wrong way for the establishment. When Britain conquered New France and established the Province of Quebec, they put a guy named Guy Carleton in charge, who had grown up in Ireland and was sympathetic to the persecution of Catholics. He convinced Britain to allow a great amount of freedoms to Catholics and created alliances with the Church to perpetuate their power in exchange for loyalty. Many Candiens saw France as abandoning them, as Canada had been a royal province of France and not just a colony. Not long thereafter, the Americans invaded during the Revolution, turing many Candiens against the idea of revolution. With the subsequent French revolution and enlightenment ideals, the British-backed Catholic clergy and English speaking aristocracy convinced many that France had not just abandoned Canada, but godliness as a whole. The Church and Catholic identity held immense power in French Canada until the Quiet Revolution in the 1960s, which embraced many post-war ideals such as nationalism and decolonisation and sought to remove the yoke of the clergy and English-speaking dominance in Quebec, which lead to the subsequent independence movement. Since the 60s, formerly staunch conservative and isolationist Quebec has now become quuite socialist and nationalist and is more eager to connect with other parts of the Francophonie, especially France.
@@tulipalll lol yeah separate but not together. Quebec nationalism has traditionally been intertwined with left wing movements, though that has been changing recently with the rise of centre/centre-right nationalist parties
In history class, you learn that a lot of Québec's history is dependent on the export of beaver fur. Once beaver hats went out of style in Europe, the colony didn't really matter anymore. It's pretty crazy to think a fashion fad had so much to do with a nation.
It ended up becoming a colony based on the timber trade and a lot of that wood was being used to build ships for the British Navy which were blockading Napoleonic Europe right afterwards (as he mentioned).
As a Guadeloupean (a French Caribbean Island) I would like to see more videos about the colonial empire of France. It would be great if you could make one about theses french Caribbean island and their conflicts (like Haiti, or with the 1st slavery abolition in France during the French Revolution)
I'm glad the French had islands in every ocean, depriving the British of every having monopolized a single one, which is why the Spanish Empire under Felipe II was the biggest of all, but stupid non-free-thiking idiots will count oceans of sand but not oceans.
If all the Commonwealth countries in the Caribbean joined Canada, we'd not only have a warm wet place to go to in winter, we'd also HAVE THE usa SURROUNDED.
Il y a un contemporain de Samuel de Champlain qui a écrit: Lorsque les espagnols conquièrent un territoire ils y construisent un couvents. Lorsque les anglais conquièrent un nouveau territoire ils y construisent un comptoir commercial et lorsque la France acquière un nouveau territoire elle y construit un théâtre.
You can see General De Gaulle's speech in Quebec in 1967 on RU-vid. For the little anecdote, when he returned to Paris, his government was furious because he had called for separatism in a foreign country. It was the only time in his career as President that he decided to summon his ministers to justify himself. He told them: "You understand, Louis XV abandoned them, I had to fix that". By shouting "Vive le Québec libre", De Gaulle paid Louis XV's debt.
I read that CDG was still miffed that Canada did not take the side of France (and the UK) during the Suez crisis and offered to be a broker instead (peacekeeping troops).
Separatism in Québec only fuels blind nationalism, which in turn only fuels our provincial government attempts at doing the exact opposite of what the rest of the country is doing not because we disagree with them but just because we wanna be different and really where does that leave us today? Worst healthcare in the country, lowest minimum salary in the country, an education system that sabotages itself over the french/english split... Ça me brise le coeur.
And thats not to say its entirely our fault, the english elite tried many times to assimilate french into oblivion and the fact that we're still here and still speak french speaks to our tenacity and explains a lot of our internalised rejection towards the rest of canada. Les irréductibles Gaulois, c'est nous.
I’m Québécois, I must say that this video was extremely great with historical accuracy !! Informative. I love your videos so much, keep your hard work !!
It’s worth noting (if someone hasn’t already in the comments) that after Britain’s conquest of New France, Britain took steps to allow the residents of New France to retain important aspects of their culture, such as their legal system,form of property ownership, and religion. This was enshrined in legislation, and that legislation became part of what the Americans considered the “intolerable acts“, which were one of the factors that led to the American revolution. Thus, Britain’s clever diplomatic moves with respect to the Quebeckers had the unintended effect of fuelling the desire for independence among the residents of the 13 colonies. In other words, the British conquest of Quebec and the subsequent war for independence in the 13 colonies were closely linked. It’s also worth noting that although France never tried to reclaim Quebec, the Americans did. American troops led in part by Benedict Arnold (before his traitorous days) attempted to capture Montreal and Quebec City during the American Revolution. They failed miserably, partly thanks to the reliably brutal Quebec winter.
If I'm not mistaken, it's also because the British were worried that people from Quebec would want to join the American revolution if they were considered "a conquered nation", so allowing more freedom to the Quebec citizens made Quebec fight FOR Britain instead of against them.
Well... They did that after failing to impose common law in 1763 for civil matters. They setup courts using this system, but French-speaking citizens ignored them and referred to the local catholic priests to solve private conflicts. Those priests still used the Paris coutume in resolving matters. On the political front, representatives of the French-speaking land owners put pressure on Britain to come back to that system, so they backtracked and allow for civil law to exist alongside common law for criminal matters from 1774 onward. The next benevolent step taken by Britain towards French-speaking Canadians was the Union Act of 1840. They abolished Lower Canada (Quebec) and merged it with Upper Canada (Ontario), based on the Durham report, with the affirmed goal of assimilating French speakers to solve the "problems" that led to the Patriots rebellion in Canada.
Also, the Indian territory was part of British North America and no settlement was to be allowed there. The 13 colonies had a need for that territory to farm. "Elbow room!" says Daniel Boone.
Worth noting that they only gave back those rights after failing to assimilate the french canadians to try and make them fall in line and not revolt even more.
Je suis Québécois "pure laine" et je dois dire que vous avez très bien compris notre histoire et vous la résumé avec brio malgré le peut de temps que vous vous êtes donné pour y parvenir. Bravo pour votre effort et votre respect dans la manière de traiter l'histoire. Vous êtes resté neutre et c'est toute à votre honneur.
@@Math_0402 C'est erroné ce truc des origines des premières nations parmi les francophones. Ça été démenti par les démographes il y a quelques années, me rappelant très bien de cet article dans le journal Le Devoir. Ce ne serait que de l'ordre de 5% des Québécois qui auraient des gênes des premières nations. Pour la simple et bonne raison que les distances à parcourir étaient trop longues pour la plupart et que c'était plus facile de coucher avec sa voisine. Comme aujourd'hui d'ailleurs.
There's a famous quote by French philosopher Voltaire that sums up the French elite attitude to Quebec at the time of the war, "Quelques arpents de neige" which translates to "a few acres of snow".
@@hankwilliams150 It's definitly not how the game is named in france since we don't translate brand name or title, but Quebec often translate english name in french and sometimes it's pretty much hilarious.
Father french canadian, mother english from Ontario. Grew up in Quebec, left in 77 joined Canadian Navy. Moved back in 81, left again in 86, been in BC since. Je suis de sang québécois. 100 % canadien. Thanks good one.
@@yveslorange2689 Okay, and according to you an english speaker is either Brit or American lol? If asked, I'd probably say that I consider myself to be a Franco Québecois first and foremost, even if my cultural reality is bilingual and includes interactions with people from outside of Canada. The fact that I'd probably choose "Franco Québecois" if I had to put a label on my cultural identity (which I'd rather not do) doesn't mean that I have any kind of disrespect or resentment toward English speaking Canadians...Actually, I consider it to be the opposite. I think that growing up with what I'd define as my "cultural identity" made me aware of the importance of being respected, as well as respecting others. People from all over the world watch American TV, but there also are french and english speaking Canadian productions, and there are productions from all over the world that are available in a multitude of countries especially with internet playing such a significant factor in today's world. Tell me, how should I dress differently than Americans or English speaking Canadians...or even brits since I'm a Franco Québecois? Should I really wear a ceinture fléchée lol :p? I'm really not sure I get your motivations here. P.S. Fun fact, my grandmother on my father's side was a Lorange...Hey, we may not agree, but we could actually be distant relatives ;).
“By the time they had called at the baker's and climbed to the top of Cap Diamant, the sun, dropping with incredible quickness, had already disappeared. They sat down in the blue twilight to eat their bread and await the turbid afterglow which is peculiar to Quebec in autumn; the slow, rich, prolonged flowing-back of crimson across the sky, after the sun has sunk behind the dark ridges of the west.” ― Willa Cather,
Another factor may have been this: In the run-up to the American Revolution, the 13 Colonies tried to get Quebec's predominantly French population on its side,to counter that the British government passed the Quebec Act in 1774, this act granted autonomy to the French speaking parts of the area,thus taking away a potential ally from the colonies.
During the Seven Years War, Britain captured both French Canada (later known as Quebec) and its Caribbean colony of Guadeloupe. During negotiations for peace in 1763, Britain gave France the option to either regain its North American colonies East of the Mississippi or regain Guadeloupe. So prosperous was Guadeloupe at the time due to its sugar plantations that, under the later signed 1763 Treaty of Paris, France forfeited its North American colonies in exchange for the return of Guadeloupe. It's rather interesting how at the time, a small Caribbean island was seen as far more important and profitable than a colony that took up nearly a third of the north american continent.
Its not that uncommon though,look at Russia that has a smaller GDP than Italy and its the largest country on Earth,the panama canal or suez canal that made fortunes and so on and so forth. Point is that big doesnt necesarly mean better atleast in economics,i agree though that they should have though more about the vast land and large population that could have helped them later on more than said island.
France didn't see colonies as long term investments, mostly short terms cash. In general, France was more focused on the European continent in the 17th/18th centuries, it wasn't mainly a colonial power like Britain or Spain. France changed completely that stance in the 19th century (probably because of Germany), and colonized hard, so we tend to forgot how little they cared about colonies in the previous centuries.
Correct. That's really what happened. Québec was supposed to be called "La Nouvelle France" during the Seven Years War but the British Empire took it over
@@wertyuiopasd6281 Well, not really that much, and anyway how would it make what I said wrong ? That's off topic. I'm just saying it really wasn't a priority for the state. The kings showed that several times in the 17th and 18th centuries, their priority was Europe, and the cash from lucrative colonies. That's also why they didn't send that many people in their colonies (compared with the British which were massively incited to migrate). That's why despite the fact that France had more than twice the population of Britain, in the colonies the French colonists were totally outnumbered, like 1 to 10 or even less.
The bit about WW1 reminds me of this time in high school history class when we were learning about the Quebec conscription crisis (I am a Canadian) and we were having a mock debate about the topic. I was in the English Canadian group and the French group was saying that they shouldn't be conscripted bc they have no attachment to the UK. I then said, "Well, what about your loyalty to France???" The whole class thought the debate was won and it felt pretty epic until the teacher explained that Quebecois aren't loyal to France either. It felt good for a few seconds tho lol.
My arguement wouldive been that quebec should be conscripted because if england and france lost theyd be owned by the ottomans or germans rofl. the other arguement is because france is a neighbor of quebec (theres an island off the cost of canada thats owned by france still u can take a ferry to)
Makes sense - after all, (US) Americans are their own people, and those of European descent hold no loyalty to their various ancestral nations, with nobody questioning why they ever should. Sure, they come over as tourists, but it's only for interest's sake. (They're pretty ignorant, can't point out Europe on the map, and seem surprised it doesn't look like Disneyland. So I guess that's separation for you).
How do you deal with Frances constant criticism of the Quebec accent? Also do Parisians really complain that it’s as bad or worse than the Jamaican accent or is that just a English Canada myth?
@@petergould9174 Actually, French people and most of the French speaking part of Europe love the accent, every single french person I've talked to told me they loved the accent. Parisians have some difficulty to understand certain words but they will find it funny :D I've never heard of Parisians complaining about the French Canadian accent
@@petergould9174 French and Canadian here The accent from Québec is quite special on it's own, really distinct, yet absolutely understandable. Source of a lot friendly fun and joke, but nothing mean. It is just différent. Thurthermore, people from Paris are quite often assholes, almost all French agree on that (and it is rare we agree on something)
@@lamevegetation572 Bruh i see people all the time in the comments under video cracking up at the Quebec accent. "Putain je comprends rien MDR", "Mais c'est trop mignon votre accent" They'll do anything but engage with the actual content. To them the QC accent is some funny anomaly not to be taken seriously (including what's actually being said).
Québec is the only MAJORITY french speaking canadian province, however french is also spoken in New-Brunswick (the only officialy bilingual province of the country) and in Ontario (about 1 million Franco-Ontarians)
@Simon Bolduc ben non, la majorité du monde savent pas qu'ils y a des francophones à l'extérieur du Québec. C'est quand même important, selon moi, un franco-ontarien, de nous mentionner de temps à temps à risque d'être oublié.
In Alberta there are several bilingual towns. I’m from Quebec, Alberta has a lot of french speaking people but its just you don’t often know because they mostly speak english.
@@jonathanlafleche5984 To be fair, I live in Alberta, and have never seen a Francophone here. Not a single one. Hell, I’ve been to Ontario on occasion and still haven’t seen many outside of Ottawa.
@@Darkspace. that’s because Franco-Ontariens are not spread out in the province but packed in some places, like Sudbury, Timmins, Ottawa and others most of which are way north of what people know of Ontario (the Toronto region), so if you don’t go to these particular places you won’t see them.
I had and have quite a few Franco-Albertan friends and acquaintances in Edmonton, Alberta. Also met many more folks with more recent/direct connections to Quebec. I have heard most of these folks express a lot of pride in that identity. I have much respect, and so (I think) do most folks I meet. But I have also encountered shocking disrespect from members of my Anglophone majority. I literally encountered an oil worker who almost exactly said it was weird that Quebecers wouldn't just "speak white"; and that he was entitled to everyone speaking English to him. It seems all minorities attract frightful bigotry :(
Every car plate in Québec bears the province's "motto" : Je me souviens. Which translates to "I won't forget". It's open to interpretation but as I understand it , points both to the centuries of abuse at the hand of the english speakers and to the shameful abandonment by the French.
@@unreal4139 I would say that it means, "I remember. . . " Which means something like, "I won't forget my history." I think Jacques Godbout said the motto should be "I forget". The French-Canadians don't remember much of their history these days.
As a Québecois our french is actually derived from an old French used in the 17th century because of our isolation from the fench culture in France and our stubbornness to not wanting to learn English. So there is actually a lot of difference between French Canadian and metropolitan French. Some Examples of different pronunciations (metropolitan French is right, french Canadian is left) : Me : Moi - Moué Car : voiture - char Boyfriend: petit copin - chum Also, the letter a is pronounced differently and many sentences are also. So much that french Canadian movies have metropolitan french subtitles!
The head of the French department in our English high school in Montreal (1960s) denied there was any difference between Quebec French and European French. I have always wondered why he maintained this obvious absurdity. They taught us European French - which is why I never understood the "natives."
@@floxy20 the french itself is 100% the same. Accent/slang is different. Kinda like London english vs Newyork english for exemple. Same but very diffrent.
It might be worth mentioning that the last time Quebec was under the control of France, France had a King. When the French Revolution happened, France really wasn't the same country anymore. This was a key point in the french of France and the french of Quebec becoming more like cousins than brothers, as the colonists still had loyalty to a Monarchy that had helped them settle, instead of a president who really didn't care about them at all.
The ending bit reminded of how Spain and Mexico also see each other as cousins but not being that close. Despite this I have seen Spanish people online try to compare Spanish and Mexican relations to the US and UK and Im like nahhhh that's stretching it 😅
@@declannewton2556 yeah but it's not like they're best buddies watching each other's backs or anything. Spain would rather hang out with France, Italy, and Portugal
No love lost for the Portuguese in Brazil either. But even though the Portuguese are not very fond of Brazilian immigrants, to put it lightly, I was quite shocked to see how influential Brazilian pop culture is in Portugal when I visited Porto
As always an excellant video. Short, brilliantly explained with nice dry humor. Perfection as always. Literally got my BS in History because I love the topic and videos like this are so facinating to learn from. Keep it up!
This is an extreme oversimplification, that omits many important details. France was following the separatist movement of Quebec in 1960-70, but not in a desire to retake the territory. Charles deGaule’s “Vive le Québec libre” is now understood as a momentary inspiration to tell québécois to affirm their identity and culture, rather than separate from Canada . But the phrase was seized by separatist politicians who used it to their advantage. “France endorsed us!”, could they now say, but in fact France would never have gotten involved, financially or militarily, in Quebec’s separation from Canada. It was suicidal
Trust me, buddy, the feeling is mutual. Your roads are sooooo sooooo much nicer. But then you get to Ottawa and realize that Ottavians have a driving IQ of about -150. Then we get to Toronto and we feel right at home with everyone driving like posessed retards but with skills.
As an Anglophone Quebecer, driving to Ontario feels like you're in a completely different country, yet so does driving to the East End of Montreal and beyond.
As someone who knows many Quebecers and French people, aside from language the culture isn't really that similar. Sure it's similar enough but it's more like America and Britain. Yeah they speak the same language and broadly have the same kinds of values but Americans are not British and vice versa.
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Just an info for americans i think: the 7 years war did in fact last 7 years but there were already some conflicts in north america between french and english settlers before oh and excellent video
Why is this information for Americans? The whole damn war kicked off when English colonists (soon to be Americans; George Washington was one of them) fought the French in what is now Pennsylvania and Ohio.
@@timmccarthy872 because in america they think it lasted 9 years. But north america was really not the most important theatre. But the actual conflict started in 1756. The 2 main reasons for conflict were the austro prussian rivalry in silesia and the franco british rivalries in the caribbean and india. The " french and indian war" was a secondary front that would not have huge impacts in the short term as Québec was a very unimportant colony of the french
that's because the seven years war happened 2 years after the start of the French and Indian war and since it ended the same time as the former it is considered just one big conflict.
This video isn't strictly accurate. The French *did* try to reinforce/resupply their troops in New France in 1760. Britain held Quebec, but there were still large numbers of French troops in New France. A relief force sent from France with supplies and reinforcements was destroyed in the Battle of Restigouche. Had the French force succeeded in making its way down the St. Lawrence River, then perhaps history would be a bit different. Disappointing that this video chose not to mention what was actually the final battle between the two sides over control of New France.
"A few acres of snow" is taught in Québec history classes, and I think that disparaging comment is fundamental in Québec-France relations. It displays such utter contempt and dismissiveness. Which is further compounded by the rest of France's history with the Americas: they never tried to regain Québec, they did however fight to hold on to various other islands and southern territories, they sat indifferent during times of persecution, and they never displayed great interest in Québec affairs, aside from the De Gaules comment which was greatly criticized back home. To further excasberate the divide, there is the cultural divide. The French often affectionally call Québec their "little cousin". They often view the accent and regionalisms as quaint. And overall tend to have a very patronizing and belittling attitude towards Québec. In Québec, the French tend to be viewed less as cousins, but more like that annoying old aunt that lacks manners and is always pinching your cheek saying how cute you are. I'd say animosity is rather rare, but it explains what would otherwise be an anomalous lack of a re-unification movement. I don't think I have ever heard someone sincerely arguing that Québec should reunify with France. Besides, France always sounds like such a mess, even the French complain about France all the time, and a ton of people emigrate from France to live in Québec every year, and Québec universities are very popular with French students. Centuries of seperation also does a lot to cleave a people apart. The people from Québec didn't live European history during all those years. They didn't live through the destruction of their lands during the world wars. They didn't live with the threat of invasions for well over a century. And before then, the bloody revolutions, religious persecutions, the napoleonic wars. They also were never part of the Republic(s). Québec grew under British rule. It is a parliamentary monarchy, and we have our lieutenant-governor under Canada's governor-general. We do have a civil code, but also greatly use English common law. Québec spent most of these years as a very catholic people, while in France the Roman Catholic church lost a lot of sway a very long time ago. Even linguistically, Québec still uses a lot of words, meanings, and pronounciations that the French eventually stopped using. Both have a very different approach to the feminization of titles, and various other minor linguistic rules. The Québécois can be very proud of their French heritage, but pretty much none of them feel any significant connection with France in a more modern way. We are now very different people.
I wouldn't say "contempt and dismissiveness". More like, yeah we literally segmented in different people, and why the heck would you want to spend precious ressoucres, fighting against the arguable top world power nonetheless, at a time when you are broke, torn by revolutions and enemies at your doors, and there are easier and more profitable targets elsewhere? Historical context is, imho, not enough brought up here on the French side, like no mention of what's happening in France aside that they were broke after the american independance war? No wonder it looks like people just sailed away to eat cake at home... But reality was different. Also the way Britain and France handled the new world were quite different. While Britain sent people and settlers massively and tended to claim and take at the expense of the natives, France had a more conservative approach and didn't sent expeditions as much, resulting in magnitudes smaller populations actually moving to the new world, and a more cooperative approach with the natives. Even Voltaire's "A few acres of snow" needs context, starting with what he meant by that, and what other things he said it with.
There actually was still a large population of loyalists before and during the American Revolution that helped out the British army during the war. But when Britian lost many either surged and stayed with the Union or fleed to British controlled Canada.
As a fellow Québécois, this independence of the quebec is really important to us. we need to protect our language, french, but other big canadian leaders, like air canada’s CEO (i think), disrespect our language and culture, and make fun of it. we have i think two laws about it, and for a couple years we tried to reinforce it, but people still thinks quebec is an english nation and that it won’t bother us. we need to learn english to go to other provinces, why do other provinces can’t learn to speak french to get here?
Bien peu de gens connaisse vraiement l'histore de Quebec . Tous les garçons et filles devraient lire un peu plus . Saviez vous qu;il y a eu 2 batailles en 1759 , les Français gagnèrent la premieère . Wolfe comme tout bon Anglais clomomialiste e enragé avait établi son quartier général sur l'Ile d'Orléans pour des aisons stratégiques bien sur .Avant de qyitter l'Ile il y appliqua le principe de la Terrre Brulée ainsi détruisant batiments, récolte et vétail . Pour cela je n'aime particulièrement pas les Anglois . Les pauvres Anglois de Westmount et Outremount qui se disent persécutés dans leur droits . Alors en 1759 ils établirent donc leur agenda ' Nous soumettrons les Frogs'
@@linefrenette9116Imagines qu'en 2023, tu continues d'haïr un peuple pour les actions de leurs ancêtres il y a 100 ans. Continues à nous détester, mais clairement, c'est toi et ceux/celles qui pense comme toi le problème.
If the French had known about all the natural resources that exist in Quebec they may have attempted to retake it. A lot of those resources were inaccessible at the time (or weren't considered to be natural resources because, technology) but a lot just hadn't been found yet.
@@thyagarajant.r.3256 wtf? Russia didnt sell for a song,they sold it for money to fund their war in Crimea,which failed but they needed said funds,rash? Yes but who would have known about oil? No one can accurately blame them.
I love the dead-pan humor that sometimes exploits the silliness of life/events (0:29): "...accepted defeat in the Seven-years war--named so because it lasted for nine years." LOL!
@@emericdion but he said the respectful "quebecois" as kay-beck-oa, so he should have used the respectful kay-beck given qweebek has recently gained a noticeable pejorative undertone.
@@Game_Hero If the English prononciation is viewed as pejorative that's definitely something not known to most people outside of Quebec for the vast majority of people it's like saying "tomato" versus "tohmahto". I myself was unaware that pronouncing Quebec with an English accent was now pejorative there was certainly no offense intended by it.
@@Seisachtheia If it's not known, that's great, gives me the chance to make it known then! If you want a point of reference from a local, It has given me, for instance, the same vibe as "jap" to describe japanese people. Of course, I wouldn't blame people to not know about it, given how it is mostly anglophone Canadians who get to talk about us on the world stage, not actual Quebecois.
@@Game_Hero With respect, I think that's an entirely self afflicted comparison. Few English speaking Canadians (and I live in an area with some significant hostility toward Quebec) view pronouncing the name a particular way as a sleight. In fact, it is often considered better to pronounce it with an English accent given the degree to which people who aren't fluent in French can be ostracized for getting it wrong. If you're English pronounce it the English way because it's more offensive to pronounce it the French way, most people would view it as "putting on airs". The term "Jap" on the other hand is explicitly meant to be racially derogatory and crafted that way. It is interesting though to hear that there are people who view it entirely the opposite way.
It's interesting that you'd say 'Infamously this period saw French President Charles De Gaulle shout 'Long live free Quebec.' Most Québécois I know view de Gaulle's statement as a proud and significant historical moment, not as an infamous one. Obviously, it was controversial. De Gaulle knew it would be controversial and confided about it to both his aide Jacques Foccart and his son-in-law Alain De Boissieu. Canadian federal officials in Ottawa did not appreciate De Gaulle's address in Montréal, but that did not come as a surprise to De Gaulle; it was part of his 'plan' all along.
As an AfricanAmerican I can totally relate to the Québécois. I don’t have any connection to the African countries that sold my people into American Chattel Slavery. AfricanAmericans are 100’s of years removed from Africa and cannot relate to the people there and their problems. We are own people, unique to the United States of America. I just wish we had AfricanAmerican majority states to fight and advocate for AfricanAmericans nationality, like the Québécois does for all the French Canadians.
That's not entirely how the Quebec/French-Canadian-outside-Quebec relationship works. There was a "pan-French-Canadian" congress decades ago and it fell apart because the Quebec delegation (the only province that is majority French) wanted to give more power to provinces to safeguard their language (and other unrelated economic interests) while the non-Quebec French-Canadians wanted to give more power to the federal government to prevent anti-French laws being passed by the provinces (like Regulation 17 in Ontario in 1912 that forbade teaching in French after a certain grade, or Manitoba passing the Official Language Act in 1890 which made English the sole official language of Manitoba (from 1870 to 1890 Manitoba had both French and English as official languages)). But it is true that Quebec is the main driving force behind the continuation of French in Canada, and if Quebec separated the existence of Canadian bilingualism would be in jeopardy and French minorities in other provinces would likely face an uncertain future. There are separate French-Canadian identities separate from Quebec. While Quebec is the largest, there are also the Acadians, Franco-Ontarians, Metis, etc... who have their own identity and culture separate from Quebec. A rough analogy would be how a Black man from the Bronx and a Black man from a rural town in Louisiana have different realities and histories. Both are African-Americans and share things in common but also have differences.
The FLQ (front de libération du Québec) had ties with the the black panthers and fought along the same lines of political alignment. Pierre Vallière’s book “white niggers of America” is frowned upon for several reasons in English speaking circles, mostly because of the n-word (which is 100x less emotionally charged in French since we have for all intents and purposes next-to-zero history of African slavery) but in which the plight of the mostly economically exploited and disenfranchised French-speaking Canadians rise up to unite against English-Canadian dominance. It’s a pretty ordinary diatribe but historically significant nonetheless. English Canada cancels anyone who mentions it because of woke sensibilities, even in an educational context, since English Canada has zero concept of its own history and based its thinking on everything the USA tells it to think.
What you say is true. Culturally and historically, French Canadians and Québécois often referred to themselves as "white niggers", in reference to the oppression with the afro-american ethnicity they shared on a socio-economical level. Each country has their own dominant ethnical minority with which they sort of struggle with. In Canada, it's the French Canadians. In the US, it's the Afro-Americans. In the past 100 years, several Afro-Americans migrated to Quebec for several reasons. Many of them were very surprised to notice how non-racial the integration to their people was: it was linguistic. White people not discriminating on the basic of race was something quite shocking at first. Indeed, for the French Canadians, therefore the Québécois, the current and main national historical cleavage has always been linguistic, whereas in the US it's racial. "When I started speaking french, they couldn't see the difference" would tell Oliver Jones. As historically as poor as French Canadians, the Afro-American immigrants shared the same labour jobs as them, working for the English rich elite of Montreal; "speak white" the English would tell the French Canadians, as if the race was, for them, something intertwined with the language too. As being fully accepted and learning the language, several Afro-American immigrants married French Canadians. For most of them, being discriminated on their language (the language always has been the number 1 characteristic to spot invaders, just like the Afro/Americans did it with the race to spot oppressors) rather than on their race was almost like a gift. This is the reason why, notably, black immigrants like jazzman legend Oliver Jones learned french, then converted to catholicism, in order to marry the love of his life. I wish you well, and I hope your people will find a way or another to thrive on their own land. May you don't forget who you are,
Something not considered - after the American Revolution, Canada was receiving a lot of loyalist migrants from the USA. They settled mostly in Ontario and the Atlantic provinces but plenty settled in Quebec too. A large population of loyalists to Britain are not going to be sympathetic to French invasion.
The British gave Quebec more autonomy through "The Quebec Act" to avoid another "Boston Tea Party" scenario from spreading to its other colonies in British North America.
The frog and snail eaters could have tried, but having seen the new food of Quebec, poutine, they were so disgusted that they wanted nothing more to do with the former colony ever again.
Okay. I had always assumed that Quebec independence movements were in some sense predicated on a greater sense of French identity, at least on language lines**, as opposed to English / British. But, via the video, I have the sense there is a stronger estrangement between the two, Quebec and France. While perhaps not that having that same strong "special relationship" that exists between the US and UK since the mid-ish 20th century in terms of cooperation (military, economic, etc.)--I still had assumed a stronger cultural tie--perhaps overly conditioned by De Gaulle's visit to Quebec in 1967 with his "Vive le Québec libre." So, how to parse this? All clarifications welcome. Thanks. ** though I'm sure there are differences here, like the noted contrast between American English and British English
The Québec-France relationship has similarities with the USA-UK relationship, but differs greatly in many important aspects. For one, with the English, it's a bit of a scenario where the child outdoes the parent. The UK lost its empire and it's superpower status, while the USA became a hegemon. But they maintain pretty much the same, or largely the same, geopolitical interests. Québec, on the other hand, is dwarfed by France, and likely always will be. While the USA is the offspring that grew big, strong, rich, and with a global reach, Québec is relatively small, weak, with an okay but small market, and little international reach. The UK has great interests in maintaining a strong relation with the US, be it in terms of geopolitics or economy, while France gains very little from potential similar ties with Québec. From the opposite perspective, while the USA can and wants to involve itself globally, and needs allies such as the UK to do so, Québec neither can nor wants to play world police, and so France can in many ways be a liability more than a boon. Economic integration could maybe have benefits, but it's much easier and more profitable to trade with the USA with whom we share a land border, rather than shipping stuff to France, which is part of an economic union anyways. Québec did build a lot of bridges with France and other French-speaking countries over the last many decades, but that's more out of pragmatism and a desire for state-building. With the effort to make Québec independant, the eventual state would require partners to thrive, and the nations with whom we share a language are the easiest to try to work with. As such, there's a very generous student exchange program, for example, which results in a ton of French people coming to study in Québec for university. Culturally, the French are also reputed to be rather snobby. The UK has a certain image of sophistication in American media, typically, but France in Québec (and even French) media, not so much. Arrogant. Condescending. Pretentious. The French often view themselves very highly, but the Québécois don't consider them to be any more sophisticated than themselves. Arguably less so. European French is typically considered as inferior, more bastardized, despite the abundance of loanwords used in Québec. France itself is not seen as having done anything great in quite a long time. They turned murderous and fratricidal during the revolutions. Then were defeated. Then won, with great aid, WW1, and are largely credited with settling the peace in a way that's said to have caused WW2. Then they lost, and surrendered, and collaborated with the nazis. Then there's all the questionable stuff with Algeria and Africa as a whole, and the other colonies such as Indochina. Overall, the French come out as very proud, but it's not very clear to a Québécois what they have to be proud of. Instead, they are mostly remembered as the nation that dismissingly gave away New France, and never saught to claim it back.
When Voltaire wrote about New France (what Québec used to be called) he said that it wasn't worth fighting just for ''a few acres of snow''. This attitude was representative of all of the french elite views on Québec and the people living there at the time and we're taught about it extensively in our school. Basically, France abandoned us not only once but twice and both times, it was by their own admission just because ''we weren't worth it''. We weren't a colony you know, we were an actual Royal Province of France with the same right and importance as a place like Normandy or so we thought anyway. We still have strong ties with the French people, a lot of our immigrants come from France but the French government? Not so much. I'd say that even amongst the frigging separatist, there's a greater degree of respect for the early British governors who respected our culture and religion (even though almost none of us are religious anymore) than there are for the old French governments who rejected us. In fact, I'd say that the complete lack of attachment for France is probably a big reason why both independence referendums failed. Not that I'm complaining, I'm not a separatist but still, if any french politician before De Gaulle ever gave a crap about us, we probably would have joined them again. Anyway, while the French elite of today still arrogantly views us as their ''little cousin'' as he said in the video we mostly view them as our smug, racist grandma who rambles on about their youth at every family dinner.
The French don't consider the Quebecois French, they're Americans that speak French (this coming from an article written by people exploring the cultural differences). Also, yes, the French tend to be EXTEMELY proud of their language so unlike between the USA and UK (where it can be seen as quaint or excitingly foreign) the differences can be seen as insulting or derogatory
@@Seisachtheia I totally agree with your statement. Back in the day working at Concordia university bio labs we had a french professor visit us from France(Leon to be exact) and our "pure Laine" french Quebecer fellow students talked to him in French and this part I'll always remember... He basically asked them in french what language they were speaking, they of course said french. He dryly replied back with a hint of sarcasm " of course you are". Man the look on those students faces was priceless. I had to bite my lip not to laugh.
By and large, this is fairly accurate. The missing part : why so many Québécois want out of Canada. Suggestion: why not a serie of videos on that theme, secessionist movements in the West (Scotland, Catalonia, Quebec)? I can help with Quebec.
It's root cause was an identity crisis after the quiet revolution. Losing their religious purpose, French Quebec society then needed something to hold on to in order to stay sane(ish) and that was nationalism. Ironic as so much about saving their french culture when catholicism was a huge part of it here and was drowned out during the following decades. Figuratively speaking, the French Quebecers basically threw the baby out with the bath water.
Quebecois separatist movements have been hijacked by white nationalists as of late, funnily enough separatism used to be popular with the far left. Dialectics win again.
@@robertmainville4881 no bs just facts. I not only live here but unlike you I can read and understand demographic charts and see correlations the effects of major social events and it's impact on society. If you think the french culture of Quebec will be the one that the parties Quebecois envisioned 20-30 years ago, then spoiler it won't. Go read their stats on these. Infact it's already not happening. But live in your bubble with your fingers in your ears. European french Quebec is a dying thing, brought on by themselves. And no one will care because the ones that did wiped themselves out with low birth rates and immigration from non European french countries ( and that's not a bad thing, but for seperatist nationalists it is a nightmare)
I always wondered about this. They could have taken Quebec back after the American Revolution. Anyway, Quebecois are not French, British, or Canadian, Quebec is Quebec tabarnak!
They did try, they had a whole war over the territory dispute. The outcome was thousands of french farmers whom the english were not cruel enough to deport. It's worth noting Washington did almost the exact same thing with the Hessians, but they didn't have a large enough population to retain german as their primary language
As someone who lives in Ontario, I’ve always appreciated and loved Quebec and understand their plight. I’ve always felt annoyed when some people bash Quebec. To be honest, it is the most defining province in Canada that actually has its own identity apart from the general North American culture we share with the States. They also care about their people and environment rather than the capitalists mindset of other provinces. Anyways, just want to comment to show my appreciation for Quebec and I hope they stay in Canada and continue to be the belle province of our country.
you forgot about the island Saint Pierre and Miquelon which is part of france. it's right off the coast of newfoundland and france used it to try to declare an economic zone 200 miles of ocean all around . i think they got 20 miles.
The province of Quebec as shown in the thumbnail was NOT the territory of New France as it stood at its defeat. New France was little more than Quebec City, and Montreal, and the villages along the St. Lawrence.
@@jfbrunnervandersmouf1977 -Perhaps you are unfamiliar with our English adjective phrase, "little more". Areas CLAIMED and areas dominated, and fully controlled BY are two different things.
@@projektkobra2247 Glad the French and Spanish explored Louisiana before the English reared their genocidal heads in there. Lewis & Clark were not really pioneers. :-) By the way, did France commit genocides?
