Michel Thibodeau, a self proclaimed French language rights activist has successfully sued Air Canada and has been awarded over $12,000 claiming that Air Canada failed to provide French service during his flights during 2009.
The straw that broke the camel’s back…he requested a 7Up and received a Sprite instead.
His claim was that Air Canada did not respect its linguistic obligations under the Official Languages Act.
The saddest part about this whole story is that Mr. Thibodeau is bi-lingual… he understands and speaks both languages perfectly well; he just was out to prove a point and nail Air Canada.
In fact, this is the second time that he has sued Air Canada and won. In 2002 he stiffed the company for the same exact reason.
Now I don’t think that anyone disagrees with the fact that Canada has 2 official languages but has this political correctness crap not gone way too far?
In every other province in Canada, every federal building or location must have bilingual signs posted everywhere. Heck the provinces surrounding Quebec still have bilingual highway signs 100’s of kilometers away from the border and yet having just recently come back from a road trip to Quebec you can’t find one sign that has any English on it.
How long are we going to let this nonsense go on.
The irony is that Mr. Thibodeau actually works for the federal government as an IT support specialist and yet files frivolous lawsuits to prove his useless point.
It was a 7Up and he got $12,000 for it! Have the courts lost their mind? I could understand if he ordered a poutine and got an order of onion rings with mayonnaise on them but his self righteous French tongue couldn’t spit out “7Up”.
Did the courts even consider that maybe the airline had no 7Up? Ever go to a restaurant and order a Coke and they only have Pepsi? Should there be a massive class action lawsuit for all the Coke drinkers out there that would like “to buy the world a Coke” but can’t because they don’t have any?
With Canada becoming the melting pot that it is, can we still cling to the ideal that Canada has two official languages?
Applying for a Canadian federal job is getting harder with so many new Canadians coming in with their own other language and even though we encourage this international blending of our country, people who need jobs can’t have them because they don’t speak a language that is only spoken by 20% of the country.
The arrogance displayed by Quebecers when it comes to their province and their anti Canadian stance has to end. We work hard at having our country as one and yet we have a province full of separatists that want to form their own country and the others just want to sponge off the rest of Canada.
I use to say that the only good thing that has come out of Quebec is the road to Ontario and reading some online posts about this whole court decision, the predominant feeling is that people are sick and tired of our governments and now our courts tip-toeing around one province because of a language.
If Quebec wants to separate than fine go and take your Michel Thibodeau’s with you. Otherwise accept the fact that we are all Canadians and no matter what language we speak, we all face too many taxes, crappy politicians and horrible traffic congestion.
And the next time you want a 7Up, just ask in the language that the flight attendant speaks or shut the bleep up and enjoy your Sprite.
The great phony bilingual scam. Its all about jobs and money…
The simple facts are as more francophone’s get hired for all government positions less and less English speakers are working for their own governments across the country. Don’t believe me; Go check the stats for yourself. Francophone’s are over-represented in all levels of government including hospitals, law, policing…etc. No fairness, no representation by population. They call it bilingualism, yet the term is never defined on purpose and believe me it doesn’t mean fluency in 2 languages in Canada, at least to the French it doesn’t. No political party will speak for the English speaking majority in this province and country. Practical bilingualism, where numbers warrant… is never defined on purpose. In Ontario it now means segregation. The French (they are actually metis, a mixed race, not french) are demanding French only facilities all over the province, not bilingual, French only. $ Bilingualism is really nothing more then a hiring quota for francophone’s and that is a fact…just ask yourself, why are francophone’s over-represented in all government jobs and how come more and more positions are being designated bilingual all the time? And just as important, how come they are NOT fluently bilingual? Some can barely speak English!
Go learn our proud, real BNA and UEL history. These were the builders of our country since 1763, not this phony, revisionist lie, spin, nonsense, this bilingual, multicultural,2 founding nations, linguistic duality lie, spin, propaganda that we’ve been living with since Trudeau and Kebec (original spelling) forced this upon the nation. We’ve been part of the British Empire since 1763 and officially and English speaking country for over 200 years, again just the facts…We were never a bilingual country. This is one big expensive lie/fraud that’s been going on for over 5 decades now.
Liberal, Tory same old story. No party, no politician has touched this issue since it was forced upon the nation. The public has complained for decades yet the scum bag politicians remain silent. They are not listening to the people. Liberal, Tory same old story.
· So while Quebec bans the English language (bill 22, bill 178, bill 101…), wipes out its real BNA, UEL history, while ethnic language cleansing is going on in Quebec, the rest of the country is forced to fund whatever the French (metis) demand. This is going on in every province. Go check. See what’s really going on? What are they really up to? “First Quebec, then we take over the rest of the country, one step at a time…through bilingualism…” PT, “How to take over a country through bilingualism…” SD. How? First comes the right to communicate with gov’t in a minority language (ie French),then comes bilingualism, then comes the right to work in the language of choice(ie French), then comes a bilingual boss,(ie French) then comes a exclusively French department and on it goes until its all French. Its happening all over the country, Ontario, New Brunswick… Go check the stats for yourself.
Time to end this phony, expensive hiring scam, this bilingual farce outside Kebec.
James Wolf comment is perfect.
I work in the federal government and you have no rights if your English.
The Liberals did this to us and it appears we cant get out of it.
Every executive in the Federal Government is a francophone.
Its your taxes being wasted on undereducated Francophone.