I was always torn between my thirst to embrace the whole of North America where I was born and raised, therefore the English language, and my deep inner need to rather embrace my own culture, an improbable island of 8 million French speakers surrounded by near 400 millions English speakers in which I was also born and raised;
for the Province of Québec is much alike the USA, I'd say more than the rest of Canada is, in the sense that even before the British conquered us, we rejected monarchy.
That's why the Continental Army invaded Montréal and Québec-City in 1775 (Invasion of Quebec 1775), hoping the Canadiens would join in their anti-king and independance movement. Personally, I think we should have joined but one must understand that just a few years prior, they were The enemy, often raiding our farms and killing our peasants.
At the time, the British had been ruling us for a little more than a decade and... not much had changed. So I guess my ancestors saw that one king or another ruling us is pretty much the same: we don't hear of him and we do our business.
It's actually us that started the American Revolution. Yep, it's the Quebec Act 1774 that was the straw breaking the camel’s back; Catholics were seen as freaks and evil, and now they were free to practice their faith?? and the borders of the Province of Quebec set by the British parliement stepped greatly on the 13 colonies' expansion vision, and there were no elected officials in that newly aquired North American land. This all infuriated the Patriots.
Well this law was imposed on my ancestors, we didn't really have a say, although the local Catholic clergy might have played a role in negociating this, but for them it meant that nothing would change. The only difference was that the king was to be in London instead of Paris, very far away in both cases.
The Canadiens society was very tightly knit society (at that time and for another 150 years, Canadien meant french-speaking catholic; other inhabitants of that land up north were British subjects), and was able to run just as before, not even needing to speak English, for we were a very rural society, not much into trade and commerce, which les Anglais grabbed totally, eventually dragging the rurals to Montréal and other cities as the Canadiens became cheap labor for les Anglais, or they moved to New England to be cheap labor for the Americans, but all that was a century later.
I understand that my ancestors foresaw that the Quebec Act was actually a good deal, no need for more turmoil, so they stayed home when Generals Richard Montgomery and Benedict Arnold were calling to join them; the English army pushed away the Continental Army and les Canadiens went on for another Century of oblivion... actually no, not a Century, precisely 61 years, but our 1837-38 Revolution was crushed by the same English Army, the World's greatest at the time and we then went back into oblivion for 150 years (1960).
Anyways... I always felt American in the sense that we Québécois occupy the same land as them, for as long if not longer, we share a lot of the culture, food, ways to build and technology since USA was born. Mostly we both rejected monarchy. Just uhhh, we prefered dealing with a mostly absentee king than living the turmoil of a war or revolution. The big difference between US citizens and les Québécois, then the Canadiens, is that we are peaceful.
So I'm still teared apart, as nowadays Québec is in a political nonsense situation within Canada, and it's very difficult to tie links with them Canadians as they basically hate us, and on the other hand the Internet linked us with... Americans.
The United States of America is so huge, so many people, so much of their culture pouring on us for decades through television... we grew side by side...
The same redneck way of living and seeing things as in Southern US can be found in different places of Québec, the same intelectuals and artists concentrated in cities... Maga could have happened in Québec. When I'm horrified by what's happening in the States, I also realize it could very well have been here; could also have been in Alberta that's obvious, but what's less obvious are the similarities between Québec and Alberta: the way their people won't just accept any shit; like we built this place and so we decide what's next. There are of course many aspects that differentiates Albertans and Québécois, the first one being the language.
And so anyways, I feel American, North-American, I have more ties with USA than with France even if I studied French Litterature and all their classics, even though I can listen to their TV or movies in my native language: their references don't connect, I don't even understand their politics nor any institution, all is different, schooling, universities, workplace... except the language, nothing links me to France.
There are of course many other aspects of Québec society that are very different from the USA; there is here a very strong social net and women's rights are probably the strongest in the world; the work force is unionized in much greater proportions. But that's not an impossible situation in the USA I think, Vermont is very different.
I'm not saying Québec should join the USA, I'm just saying it's very much alike the USA, very similar in essence; while in the rest of Canada (we call it "le ROC") they share much more cultural traits with the Americans since they speak the same language, support and respect for the British monarchy and institutions is strongly the base and defines them; they actually have a very weak culture of their own since Hollywood and American publishers are huge, and their artists all move to the US and become Americans like Neil Young and many more, while Québec's culture is very strong and exports in France and in the US and the World (Céline Dion, Cirque du Soleil, Denis Villeneuve...).
Culturally, Québec is more of a Nation than Canada is. Historically too, sorry but yeah. The sugar maple leaf that's on the flag grows mainly in Québec, it was our symbol before Canadians stole it (Toronto Maple Leafs), the national anthem was written and composed by French-Canadians to celebrate the French-Canadian Catholic Nation long before it was poorly translated and adopted by the ROC, the rest of Canada, not to talk about the 150 years we were here clearing and growing the land before they conquered us. Like we were North-Americans loooong before Canadians were; we actually discovered and mapped the whole continent before any English speaker did, making alliances with (almost) all First Nations along the way.
In so many ways, les Québécois are actually the real North-Americans... if you look up history. Well of course after the Inuits and all First Nations, I meant the first real European-Americans.
Dominique Rock
