Defenestrate Them All: Canadian Politics 2021

L’Université d’Ottawa, pourtant considérée comme le repaire ultime des wokes

Uh, by whom?

Isabelle Hachey, duh.

I don't even think it's as woke as Carleton!

I doubt she’s ever heard of it tbf.

As a native English speaker with a PhD, I got 5/10 on this quiz from the "Language Portal of Canada" on the use of pronouns in English: https://www.noslangues-ourlanguages.gc.ca/en/quiz/jeu-quiz-peaceable-pronouns1-eng

That reminds me of a statistic I read one time that 1% of all PhDs were illiterate.

wow that quiz is insane.I got 7/10 and I strongly object to the supposedly correct answer to number 8

As a non-native speaker with a PhD who has a bone to pick with this kind of anal prescriptivism regardless of language, I also got 5/10.

That reminds me of a statistic I read one time that 1% of all PhDs were illiterate.

who is this site possibly intended for? exercises like that are actively harmful for language learners imo

got 5/10. I guess I should stop saying I'm fluent in English.

To get 10/10 you need to be a non-native speaker who learned English through the ‘Language Portal of Canada’.

the pronoun must agree with the closer antecedent, father

What the fuck?

And because nurses can be male as well as female, the feminine pronoun her does not agree. The right answer is c) the.

Ugh, yes, thank you quiz, I know that nurses can be male, but all of the other questions were priming me to look for possessive pronouns. And what if, in context, I happen to know that all of the student nurses use 'she/her'?

I got 6/10.

Neither the children nor their father had his picture taken.

Why does gender inclusiveness suddenly fly out the window in favour of some obscure antecedent rule here, quiz?

wow that quiz is insane.I got 7/10 and I strongly object to the supposedly correct answer to number 8

exact same. also apparently canada has yet to learn about the singular "they/their".

who is this site possibly intended for?

My spouse is preparing to tutor a cousin's kid to get ready for an English board CEGEP in Gatineau - apparently, they linked this site.

Afaict, it seems to be based on a weird combination of old-fashioned quasi-Strunk & White grammatical prescriptivism with newfangled gender-woke linguistic prescriptivism that ties itself into knots to avoid having to use the singular "they" or "their".

It’s uncanny.

yeah combining two terrible prescriptivisms to create a monstrous pedantry. nobody would notice the supposed mistakes in speaking in just about all those example sentences, and many of the wrong sentences would be fine in formal writing as well

lol I’m illiterate too.

By the logic of their supposed antecedent rule, you would have to say "neither Jason nor Jennifer got her picture taken". I don't think I've ever heard a native speaker speak like that, nor do I recall seeing that type of construction in writing.

Or does the rule only apply to number? What do they do with gender?

going by the weird dictates of this quiz I would guess: "neither Jason nor Jennifer were one of the people who got their picture taken at the picture-taking location that we neglected to mention in the question part of the quiz"

btw I got 9/10 but only because I read y'all's posts first and knew what was going down. Even with that cheat, Q8's "ah, but you see the children are also male" got me

Question 8 doesn’t even say that they are male children though, I think? Some of the children could be female, but suddenly no one gives a fuck when the dad is the closest noun. Or something. Probably you all can’t even understand my incorrect sentences.

Sent it to an English lit PhD friend of mine. He’s a native speaker, and he also got 5/10. His ESL wife got 8/10.

L’Université d’Ottawa, pourtant considérée comme le repaire ultime des wokes

I have three diplomas from Concordia and i'd like a word please

Seriously.

Then again, there was this back in 2015:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/university-ottawa-yoga-cultural-sensitivity-1.3330441

with a BA in English lit, 6/10

4/10, this is the hardest I have ever done.

It's not like I think Canada is doing an exemplary job, but am I jealous of how the **UNITED STATES** handled / is handling Covid? Jesus christ no.

Btw, I think this is my issue with these kinds of comments I see sometimes making dire comparisons of our vaccination pace to the US's or UK's - vaccinations aren't an end in themselves; they're a response to a problem and part of an overall strategy. Ofc faster would be better but no, I don't think countries with 2x-3x our per capita death rate are better off; they probably do need to be vaccinated sooner.

(Another example, from a National Post writer):

Can now immediately tell Canadians from Americans on my Twitter feed. Americans my age are celebrating their second jab, planning to see friends & redownload dating apps. Canadians of all ages are miserable, heading into a 3rd “lockdown” and losing their minds.

— Sabrina Maddeaux (@SabrinaMaddeaux) April 1, 2021

(Tbf, an arts/lifestyle reporter)

I will never understand those who compare Canada with the US or feel jealous that the US has done X-thing better than Canada.

Despite the difficult ties and times the US gov't has bullied the Canadian gov't, I'm thankful the US is seeing a decline in Covid cases and is sending more vaccines to Canada. This can only be a good thing for neighbouring countries, especially ones that are bound to each other like the US and Canada.

im extremely jealous of americans rn

Same tbh. Doesn't have to be 100% rational.

I totally understand. I think there is a lot of jealousy and anger going around in Canada. There is a reason we are where we're at. Whatever happened to mandatory face coverings? The mandate was clearly not being followed enough, despite so many people saying they were. At least in BC, we can no longer use care homes as a scapegoat.

americans had it worse over the course of the pandemic and i don't envy them for that (they're currently at 0.15% of the population dead from covid vs 0.06% for us) but seeing them go full buckwild this summer will be rough

Being able to do everything from my apartment has mostly been pretty sweet tbh.

ya there's a non-insignificant portion of the population who will mourn the end of the coziness FOMO-less homebody pandemic. not me tho

I have heard so many horror stories from the US, I am just glad they can celebrate.

Ottawa Medical Officer warning about outdoor transmission now, calls downthread for social distancing even outdoors:

Ottawans, we moved into the Red zone as COVID-19 levels were rising 2 wks ago + the curve has only worsened. 2 weekends ago we had lovely weather + a lot of socializing. I am seeing many people test positive after being in groups at restaurants, with transmission even outdoors.

— Dr. Vera Etches (@VeraEtches) April 4, 2021

MUST WATCH

Dr. Michael Warner walks us through the story of one patient.

A woman in her 40s who got Covid. Earlier today he fought to save her life.

But before the day ended Covid stole her from us.

Please listen to @drmwarner share his anger and heartbreak. pic.twitter.com/LzreBOxwrS

— Natasha Fatah (@NatashaFatah) April 4, 2021

no thx

i feel like telling people not to meet up outdoors could backfire

Peel schools are going online for two weeks--or one, with the second week the scheduled break.

I'm getting supply work where I live now, so personally, it probably won't affect me--I'll get in my 50 days if the schools here stay open. But who knows anymore.

The thing I don't get is that I thought it was the government's call, not the boards; I would have thought Toronto would have been in lockstep, but only Peel has made an announcement. With the break coming up, the timing is bizarre--virtually nothing will be accomplished in the next four days. Should have happened three or four weeks ago; they may as well take a two-week break at this point. And if they know they're going online for the rest of the year, announce it now.

All of which is easy for me to say. I don't think they have any idea. They're just making it up as they go along.

Been reading some things and perhaps there is good evidence for concern about co2 levels after all (so my bad for being dismissive). Unfortunately it’s related to evidence of genuine airborne transmissibility (vs droplet) though that being still controversial after a full year baffles me.

There does seem to be frustration from the doctors and medical officers that they prefer we not close schools, but it becomes necessary where the vaccine rollout isn’t yet reaching the workplaces and populations that are the actual primary vectors. Sounds like they want a lot more targeting than we are getting.

Oh great:

(1/12) The Brazilian #COVID19 variant is up to 2 times more transmissible, more likely to cause serious illness in young people, and may evade immunity.

Worryingly, it’s starting to spread rapidly in British Columbia, Canada. 🇨🇦

A thread summarising the latest evidence. 🧵

— Dr Zoë Hyde (@DrZoeHyde) April 5, 2021

With regards to the 1M vaccines that are sitting in freezers in ON and the large # of seniors not getting vaccinated, I wonder how much of a factor the accessibility of vaccination clinics is. We live right downtown and we had to drive about 25 minutes to the Canterbury area - sort of a tony residential neighbourhood in Ottawa South - to get my spouse's first shot. By public transit, it would have been two buses, 45m-1h. My parents live in a west end suburb and had to drive to an east end suburb. It seems odd. I don't know why they couldn't have clinics set up at nearby community centres or, say, somewhere like University of Ottawa Health Services, v central and near a bus/train terminal. Testing was a lot more accessible. Is it like this elsewhere?

Yep. See here:

https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2021/04/05/il-y-a-quelque-chose-qui-ne-tourne-pas-rond-dans-la-vaccination-1