Welcome To Quebec

Welcome to Quebec, if you plan to speak French exclusively and vow to relinquish all vital aspects of your religious beliefs to the practicality of living a life honouring only those Quebec 'values' that will be certain not to give offence to the famously prickly feelings of francophones. For, as an immigrant coming to Canada to share the opportunities in this country to advance personal ambitions, it should be understood that French sensibilities are extremely tender.

They will not, under any circumstances, accept that newcomers to the province - those from other cultures and certainly those who practise religions other than that most familiar to francophones and which they have themselves mostly shrugged off - will interfere in any measure with what Quebec considers to be 'normal'. To tweak things so that religious dietary laws continue to be carefully observed by immigrants is to risk arousing great passions and shocked objections.

The premier himself echoed bleats of disgust and outrage on the part of the Parti Quebecois, insisting that stricter labelling be imposed to make certain that poor unsuspecting Quebecers are not unbeknownst to themselves, forced to consume meat slaughtered according to Islamic dietary rules. Meat labelled 'halal' conforms to the Islamic code, and a local Quebec-based processing plant has been certified to produce 'halal' poultry.

For their Islamic clients a label is slapped on the poultry certifying that it qualifies as halal. That same packaged poultry is sold sans the label on supermarket shelves for all other consumers of the Olymel processing products, produced at Saint-Damase in Quebec. To qualify for halal the killing methods, humane and approved by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, are overseen by an imam.

But horrors! Quebecers take grave exception to this deception. They will not have it! They refuse to eat poultry that is certified halal, why should they accept it, after all, it is so obviously un-French!

"I say to those who process [meat] today, if they are halal animals, do yourself a favour as a producer and at the same time for the consumers, and say so on your products' labelling. That way consumers will know exactly what they are buying." Liberal Premier Jean Charest

"We're in Quebec and [halal slaughter] must be an exception. It must not be the rule in Quebec. the consumer must be informed when there is halal meat", according to the leader of the Coalition Avenir Quebec, also utterly outraged on behalf of the plight of the poor non-suspecting Quebecois.

Insufferable, those Muslims and their feelings of entitlement to alter things to suit themselves!

Olymel spokesman Richard Vigneault explained: "In no way has this certification changed anything in our method of slaughtering"; to no avail. No upstart businessman, in serving a minor market accommodatingly as a good business would seek to do, will tell the French that they have no reason to be upset.

Particularly when to do so is harmful to the animals, they claim. That line works up to an indignant head of steam among the righteous and the sanctimonious meat-eaters who never give a second thought to the comfort or discomfort of animals sent to the slaughterhouse.

And just to make sure that the French know they're not the only ones feeling indignant about the absurdity over the entire episode, Salam Elmenyawi, president of the Muslim Council of Montreal let it be known that he believes the PQ is "fanning the flames of intolerance, ignorance and division", when everyone knows this is what they are famed most for doing to the best of their ability.

French-Quebec intolerance for those of other origins, other faiths, other cultures and heritage is alive and well. Welcome to Quebec, where manufactured mass hysteria over the bloody nerve of outsiders to tamper with the French way will simply not be tolerated. So there.