nfitz
Superstar
What act is it? I thought banking issues were generally federal jurisdiction as per the 1867 Constitution Act. Offhand, I can't think of the equivalent at that level here.
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Montréal Transit Developments
- Thread starter Ansem
- Start date
p_xavier
Active Member
I'm on vacation so no PC but will try to refind the info if I can.
Urban Sky
Senior Member
Is there any way to make you keep your political opinions regarding Quebec for yourself or could you at least volunteer your country of origin (mine is Germany and can be found with three clicks by clicking on my user name, the “About” section and my LinkedIn profile I have included as “website”), so that I can also volunteer my political opinion of it for no other reason than making myself feel better at your expense?
CityStay
Active Member
I'm curious. How else would a group of people wait to board a bus? Stand in a big ball formation then go all Lord Of The Flies on each other when the bus arrives?
Bayer
Senior Member
I'm a French-speaking Torontonian originally from Québec and I am incensed by the legislation to which nfitz is referring, but to get back to the issue at hand: at Jean Drapeau station late in the evening after my partner lost his Opus card, we initially lined up at the manned counter only to realize that it was cash only - yes, this is 2019 - and of course we had no cash, like I would assume most people these days. So we had to line up at the fare machine for half an hour to buy a single fare. Obviously, whatever fare was on the lost card was unrecoverable, which would not happen with a registered Presto card.
nfitz
Superstar
Seems to work fine here ... have you observed real issues here without the one-person lines? Those who feel they need to get on first do so ... those that don't, don't. Some stand in shelter, some sit. Some are in shade. No one frets when the doors don't open in the expected spot. Some use the rear door ...
If one can't make a mild sarcastic comment about blatantly and horrid racism, in a 95% on-topic post, then what's the point?
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Urban Sky
Senior Member
I’m just as incensed about the same legislation and the overtly racist rhetoric of the current provincial government in my province of residence, but this is not the point.
The point is that your government is like your family: you might be their strongest critic, but if outsiders criticize them, you will start to defend them, regardless of how much their criticism actually overlaps with your own criticisms of them: because outsiders criticizing your own government is just as unwelcome as strangers criticizing your family. Maybe I can demonstrate to you what a pain in the ass it is to feel compelled into defending people you actually disagree with if you simply answer my question for your country of origin...?
nfitz
Superstar
So we shouldn't criticize the Ontario, Toronto, and Canadian governments because they aren't family?
Or Trump because he's not family?
No, that's not how it works.
Criticizing government policy is fair game. Asking for individual's ethnicity isn't. I'm not sure why you counter criticism of government policy with personal attacks. Particularly a policy you yourself have criticized!
The same way criticizing VIA's HFR boondoggle is also not personal.
Or Trump because he's not family?
No, that's not how it works.
Criticizing government policy is fair game. Asking for individual's ethnicity isn't. I'm not sure why you counter criticism of government policy with personal attacks. Particularly a policy you yourself have criticized!
The same way criticizing VIA's HFR boondoggle is also not personal.
Urban Sky
Senior Member
Once again I'm wondering if you are just trying to troll me or if your reading skills (or attention span or maybe both?) are really as poor as they appear to be when you write your replies to other people's posts:
I was only comparing someone's government to someone's family in one very specific situation: when that person hears outsiders (government: foreigners, family: strangers) criticise them. That's why the thing I find so irritating is not what you wrote, but who wrote it: a non-resident (or more precisely: a non-native ex-resident).
You are right: this forum is full of posts criticizing the Ontarian government for all kinds of reasons, but close to 99% of all posters here are either native or residents (and overwhelmingly: both) of this province, which makes it only natural that they criticize their government, as they are of course their biggest critics (just as they are with their owm families). However, as someone who was born and raised outside of this country and who lives and works outside your province, I am reluctant to volunteer my political opinions about the government of this province, because I am undoubtedly an outsider.
Now why did I ask you for your ethnicity? Because it is much more difficult to feel personally attacked if someone criticises your government if it is the government of basically the entire group which is criticised than if it is just your's. And as cheap as it would already be to call Doug Ford the "Donald Trump of Ontario" in this forum, doing the same in a forum of Quebeckers where people identifying as Ontarians are a small but still visible minority would be much worse. Now, I identify as a Quebecker (by choice, not by birth) and as a small but still visible minority I wish to not get targeted by your political or social views which you compulsively shout out at every unfitting occasion. If you struggle to understand this, then please blame your reluctance to reveal your origin, as this would actually allow me to provide an example for an political view which you might take personal as it makes you feel targeted as a minority.
Thank you!
PS: once again, I feel that this would be rather the job of our moderators to reign in your repeated derailments of discussions with your needless excursions into completely unrelated political statements, but as with every single post I reported so far (all from you, by the way), they didn't even bother to reply. Therefore, I'm back to wondering what kind of connections exempt you from any intervention here, while other posters are sent to repeated (and sometimes: permanent) "vacations". I could be wrong in accusing you of benefiting from favouritism, but there is a simple way to avoid this impression: by actually starting to respect other posters and to take previous feedback from other users into consideration before writing your next posts (your "haha" reaction to my last two replies to you speaks unfortunately speaks volumes)...
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nfitz
Superstar
Please stop with the personal attacks. I have not attacked anyone here - you've said you don't even support the policy I made a sarcastic comment about.
I'm posting from Quebec. I'm allowed to criticize the Quebec government. But this is a free country - anyone can criticize any government. And surely every Canadian should be criticizing a government that is suspending the Canadian Charter of Rights. The same way that any Canadian is quite welcome to criticize how Ontario's incompetent Premier is cutting and scewing up transit, and many other things.
Interestingly, during my current visit, I've heard a lot of negative comments about the REM - particularly about the lack of consultation, and long suspension of service on the Deux-Montagnes line without any adequate substitute service. I've even been told that current commuters are in desperation selling their houses, to move elsewhere, to the point that it's impacting house prices in some neighbourhoods!
And also I've heard comments that the narrow and relatively short REM trains are happening because no one designed the new Champlain bridge to handle the same width, height, and weight of trains that the current line currently has, forcing the restriction in vehicle size on all the other branches! Not sure if that's true or not ... but doesn't sound well organized if true! I'm also hearing comments that the construction isn't being organized with much consideration for anyone else. I'm surprised at how little positive I'm hearing actually - with little positive said about what this line will be when the construction ends, and it's running.
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Urban Sky
Senior Member
I could copy and paste here the same comment which you quoted when writing this comment, but we would be just turning in circles, just like we are clearly talking past each other, which is why I'm so disappointed that the moderators in this group don't do what they are supposed to do: which is to intervene and "moderate" (hence their name) any apparent interpersonal conflicts...
You wrote at some point that you left Montreal (and not with the best feelings), so I assume you now live in Ontario. You are of course right that you are free to criticise whoever you want. The question is just whether this forum (and especially: this thread) is the right place for such discussions and I strongly believe that it is not and that it doesn't serve any purpose other than to bring frustrations and hard feelings into this discussion, which unfortunately deviates the discussions from the otherwise good points you are making, such as the one below:
My friends (and colleagues) can testify how much I get myself into a rage when someone mentions the REM project, as it is the by far most wasteful and damaging transit project I've ever seen (and I've read a lot of reports on countless projects). I wouldn't be surprised if an honest benefits-to-cost analysis would actually show that the project's BCR is below zero (at which point it would be more beneficial to simply burn the taxpayer money (approx. $3 billion upfront and then $240 per year) than to do something more stupid with it...
You see, our disputes here are on a purely interpersonal level!
nfitz
Superstar
Hmm, interesting.
I'm really not too concerned with what happens during construction. My biggest concern is that without knowing all the details, they may have created a 407-like situation, where the government is going to be paying a lot of money for this service to run, to the point that it will make it difficult to offer free transfers to the Metro and buses within the same fare zone, and will have to raise transit fares. If the financial aspects seem to have been poorly thought out as the other issues, it could get ugly.
(BTW, have you seen how harshly I've criticized Metrolinx, TTC, and the current and some past Ontario governments and Toronto mayors? I'm not sure why I'm supposed to treat Quebec differently ...)
Urban Sky
Senior Member
The difference is that with virtually everyone else than us being Ontarian here, the chances of someone feeling personally concerned by your criticism of his government is much lower than if attacking the government of an odd minority (which even Quebeckers are in this forum). However, it would already make all the difference if you would make your sarcastic remarks about “our government in Quebec” rather than “the government in Quebec”, as Sarcasm is best when the joke is on yourself (and if it’s just as being a member of a society, which happens to let itself being governed by a bunch of [insert your favourite insults here])!
However, we should probably revive our private conversation if you want to continue this interpersonal discussion, but to get back to my initial point: I would still appreciate if you could stop making sarcastic remarks which make me feel targeted as a resident of my province...
felix123
Active Member
Aerial structure installed over autoroute 10
[source: REM Facebook page]
CityStay
Active Member
The Ford government, on the other hand...
They know the voters they have to cater to! Don't for a minute think that they give two sh*ts about minorities. You've seen them, how minority do they look to you?
These are people who were making paki jokes until the day that they decided to run for office and their advisor said "Cut the Paki jokes. Repeat after me: Diversity..."
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