Monday, January 29, 2007

Apologies for our yokels

Today in the news I was reading about the small village of Hérouxville north of Shawinigan. They set a declaration laying out a code of conduct for imigrants who might wish to come to their village. Here is a small example: since all women are equal, you mustn't stone them or set them on fire. You are not allowerd to wear a veil, unless it's Halloween. Carrying a kirpan is strictly prohibited in schools (even if the highest court in the land has stated otherwise) etc. etc.
I hereby declare and categorically state that these yokels do not represent me, my family, my friends or anyone that I know.
I live in the West Island (western part of the island of Montreal) and there are many immigrants. I have yet to participate in a stoning much less in an auto-da-fé. We all live and let live.
I must say that I find Hérouxville's attitude rather disgusting and more than a little disturbing. Yes there has been some problems with "reasonable accommodation" lately and the media is making a big deal of it, (which is a problem in itself, without the media coverage it would just fizzle out) so it has sometimes escalated, but that is no reason to be so xenophobic. As for "reasonable accommodation" as far as I'm concerned if we can do it without taking away rights from others then why not, but if we can't and it becomes unreasonable then all we need to say is simply no. Maybe that is one of the reasons why we have had problems with "reasonable accommodation" because the people in charge don't have the guts to say no, to say that it is unreasonable. But that is neither here nor there. Even though there have been tensions that is not a reason for labeling immigrants as savages that go around burning and stoning their women. It is also strange that this declaration makes no mention of the good "Québecois de souche" getting piss drunk and beating the crap out of their wives and children, or sexually abusing their children, or driving down the highway drunk as a lord and wiping out a family in a car wreck, or murders, or rapes or the other things that any society has to live with.
This declaration just besmirches the good name of all resonable Québecois and Québecoise and paints us as a gang of ignorant yahoos. The democratically elected representatives of the village that came up with this asnine idea should be impeached. They obviously don't have enough to do if they have time to come up with such bigoted trash. Unfortunately what is really frightening is that they are getting support from like minded bigots. I am ashamed that these are my fellow citizens.
So please ladies and gentlemen do not put us in the same basket as those yahoos, they do not represent the majority of Québecois who are tolerant and open.

Here are some web sites with more information:
http://www.cbc.ca/cp/national/070129/n012979A.html
Municipal Web Site -> http://municipalite.herouxville.qc.ca
Municipal Web Site with documents -> http://municipalite.herouxville.qc.ca/avispublic.htm
PDF of declaration -> http://municipalite.herouxville.qc.ca/Standards.pdf

4 comments:

Jazz said...

Yeah, 'cause there have been lots of stonings and burnings in Quebec. Remind me never to move to Herouxville... scaryass fuckers they are..

Big Brother said...

They have been living there too long without any imigration bringing new blood and ideas...

Jazz said...

This being said, despite anything the Supreme Court might say, I'm totally against kids wearing kirpans in school. I don't care how symbolic they are, they are still weapons.

Anonymous said...

I do agree with Jazz, I am totally against wearing kirpans in schools or anywhere else for that matter... and I do think that we need to say NO sometimes, but as long as they respect the law and they do not affect anybody's liberty, I welcome them. Live and let live, hey daddy?
I certainly do not want to be associated with those "yahoos" in Herouxville!