{"id":549450,"date":"2026-03-28T00:34:19","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T00:34:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/549450\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T00:34:19","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T00:34:19","slug":"i-support-quebecs-independence-because-the-alternative-is-its-erasure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/549450\/","title":{"rendered":"I support Quebec\u2019s independence because the alternative is its erasure"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Posters are seen at Club Pays, a Montreal cafe and gathering place dedicated to Quebec independence, on March 10.Christopher Katsarov\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

Mathieu Bock-C\u00f4t\u00e9 is a columnist at Le Journal de Montr\u00e9al and Le Figaro in Paris.<\/p>\n

Translated from the original French by Neil Smith. <\/p>\n

The Globe and Mail asked me to explain why certain Quebeckers (and probably a majority of them in the future) support independence. I admit the question is odd to me. To my mind, Quebec, like any normal nation, should enjoy a full political existence. Like the Greeks, Poles, Irish, Moroccans, Lithuanians and many other peoples, Quebeckers should have their own country. <\/p>\n

Independence, for a nation, isn\u2019t a gift or some symbolic token, but a fundamental good. None of these peoples would consider sacrificing their independence. Independence is a good unto itself. <\/p>\n

St\u00e9phane Dion: Here\u2019s what it would take for a province to lawfully separate from Canada<\/a><\/p>\n

When Donald Trump spoke about wanting to annex Canada, Canadians instinctively bristled at becoming American. They didn\u2019t need to lay out long arguments explaining why they were better off governing themselves than joining \u201cthe empire of our time.\u201d Political leaders in Canada even borrowed their slogan \u201cma\u00eetres chez nous\u201d from Quebec separatists. Yet English Canada and the United States have a culture and identity that are much more alike than English Canada and Quebec. <\/p>\n

Quebec\u2019s historical trajectory has led it toward independence, from its beginnings to today. From New France to the Conquest, the 1837-38 rebellion, Confederation and the Quiet Revolution, our vital instinct has always driven us to want a country of our own, even though, given the circumstances, we\u2019ve often adopted a strategy of autonomy over independence. I write this knowing that a good proportion of French-speaking Quebeckers have internalized the idea that they can\u2019t govern themselves and need federalism as a protective framework, as though their freedom and prosperity depended on it. <\/p>\n

But let\u2019s pretend this question requires an answer that goes beyond stating the obvious: Why should Quebec become independent, and why now? One could argue that during its founding in 1867, Canada was theoretically reformable: it could have been reformed in a dualist matrix, according to the theory of the two founding peoples. But I don\u2019t buy this argument since autonomy is never anything other than unfinished and incomplete independence. Still, enough Quebeckers believe this theory for it to be taken seriously. <\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Separatist supporters wave Quebec flags as Quebec Premier Jacques Parizeau kicks off the referendum campaign in Quebec City in October, 1995.Jacques Boissinot\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

When the Constitution was patriated in 1982, Canada was reformed in an entirely different way: it would become a large-scale ideological experiment, through a multiculturalist matrix that dissolves its founding peoples and turns them into ethnocultural communities among others, within a pluralistic federation, under the sovereignty of a government of judges invoking a Charter of Rights and Freedoms treated as a sacred text and transcending parliamentary democracy and popular sovereignty, which is another way to abolish both. This could be seen as a machine for dissolving the Quebec people. As for official bilingualism, it doesn\u2019t fool anyone: Canada is an English-speaking bilingual country. <\/p>\n

Let me explain. This rationale is far-reaching: it leads to the erasing of Quebeckers as a people within Canada (even if they get to call themselves a \u201cnation\u201d as a token gesture) to the point of challenging their right to self-determination through external controls. Such is the role of the Clarity Act (Bill C-20), which clearly has no legitimacy. This same reasoning has enabled Canada to dismantle Quebec\u2019s identity laws, like Bill 101, piece by piece over time. It may also lead to Bill 21, the Act Respecting the Laicity of the State, being diluted or struck down. We live under Canada\u2019s guardianship. <\/p>\n

This reasoning even challenges the founder status of French-speaking Quebeckers in Quebec. We\u2019re now treated as a demographic majority with an illegitimate status whose privileges must be dismantled. The fact is that Ottawa\u2019s policy of mass immigration will soon lead to the demographic drowning of the Quebec people. Obviously, to recognize this, one must view Quebec not as a mere administrative territory occupied by a population with an undifferentiated identity, but as the nation-state of a people, who may well become a minority in their own land within a few decades \u2013 and who\u2019ll certainly become a minority if they remain part of Canada. <\/p>\n

Alberta\u2019s push for independence is the culmination of decades of poor treatment by Ottawa<\/a><\/p>\n

This brings us to the present day. Canada has sought to demographically lock the political future of the Quebec people. The lock works well, as we saw in 1995, but it\u2019s not yet permanent. A clear majority of francophones could break it in a future referendum. From this perspective, independence \u2013 which is an existential necessity for escaping a provincialized and parochial existence where world affairs are settled in Ottawa and the quiet management of family affairs is left to Quebec City \u2013 also becomes a matter of survival. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what will happen if Quebec remains within Canada: people of French language and culture in Quebec will become Canada\u2019s bilingual population \u2013 before becoming an anglicized population with folkloric francophone remnants. Canada will have irrevocably quashed the nationalist and secessionist rebellion of a people who resisted. The Conquest will be complete. Only those unfamiliar with historical perspectives will find this funny. Conversely, an independent Quebec will be in a better position to integrate immigrants, who\u2019ll be coming to a French-speaking country rather than a bilingual country where French is optional. <\/p>\n

I\u2019m pro-independence because I\u2019m a Quebecker, not a Canadian. To me, Canada is an honourable country (even if it\u2019s structurally hostile to Quebec), but it\u2019s a foreign country. The contradiction between Canada\u2019s multiculturalist system and the Quebec nation will be increasingly extreme in the coming years. Again, Quebec\u2019s rebellion will fail if the demographic advantage of French-speaking Quebeckers is broken for good. This will happen soon, but we aren\u2019t there yet. This is the big issue for the years ahead. Vive le Qu\u00e9bec libre. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Posters are seen at Club Pays, a Montreal cafe and gathering place dedicated…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":549451,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[2428,2416,2429,4,2408,2430,103,2407,2422,2423,2418,2409,2406,101,526,192,2421,2414,2441,2410,2411,2420,2417,149,983,2431,2413,2436,2437,2439,2434,2438,2432,2435,2412,2425,2426,111,2424,2433,79,2415,74,2427,2419,194,965,2440],"class_list":["post-549450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-science","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=549450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549450\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/549451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=549450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=549450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=549450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}