The best texts of the day, on all themes: society, politics, environment, economy, culture, health, science, etc.In Quebec where, as everyone knows, there are never any debates, one of these non-existent debates opposes two columnists from La Presse, Patrick Lagacé and Marc Cassivi, about remarks made on French radio by Wajdi Mouawad a man around which, as we know, no debate ever takes place.Patrick (total transparency: a friend) brought to light in La Presse on Tuesday some opinions given on Quebec in 2009 on France Culture radio by the playwright, in a very calm, very thoughtful, very calm interview.In contemporary Quebec, explains Mouawad:as soon as one begins to articulate an idea for a little longer than the minimum required, one is an intellectual.[…] All these ideas that seem to say that reflecting and reporting on one's reflection in words is something that belongs to the pretentious, to the French, to those who take themselves for others, it's buggering the flies, etc. , etc.Yes yes.We meet there.The anti-intellectual vein is very present among us, it is undeniable.One of our great intellectuals, Gérard Bouchard, had diagnosed the cause: it comes from the historical bias of the Quebec elite for France and its culture and that of the Quebec people for the United States and its culture.This large gap in cultural affiliation would, according to Bouchard, have long fueled the contempt of the lower town for the upper town and the disdain of the upper for the lower.It took until the end of the last century to bring about a reconciliation between Frenchness and Quebec Americanness.Wajdi Mouawad continues on the language, badly spoken and badly taught:There you go, walk into a grocery store, you say, "Milk."That's enough, the guy gives you some milk.And There you go.And it's good.We're not going to say, “Hello sir, I'd like to have some milk” – what's the point?And the other who hands you the milk, he says to you: "A piasse."So it's barter.I give him a word, which is “milk”;he gives me back a note, which is a piasse, well, a dollar.And There you go.We're still not going to get bored any further than that.And that was extremely, extremely, extremely recurrent, I would say.Hello ?I must admit at this point in the story that I grew up in Thetford Mines, a city not yet recognized as a hotspot for the international cosmopolitan intelligentsia.In addition, I grew up in the family grocery store, which makes me a privileged witness to the conversations surrounding the sale of pints of milk.My report: I never heard the dialogue: milk/piasse.Never.I call on Internet users (or Wajdi) to tell us where these monosyllabic conversations are taking place.A Quebecois eat?First, what does it taste like?Patrick Lagacé who is, as you know, outspoken and sharp, immediately draws his accusation of “Quebec eats” against the playwright.He accuses him of having uttered "generalizations, caricatures and enormities".He resents him for having presented these things as if they concerned “all Quebecers”.Being, for my part, a partisan of the benefit of the doubt, I believe – at this point in the story – that Wajdi meant “certain Quebecers”, or “many Quebecers”, even “a very large number of Quebecers”.That if asked, he will admit to not having perfectly introduced the nuances that wisely awaited in his considerable intellect.That he was certainly not talking about "all" Quebecers.Unfortunately, we do not stop at this point in the story because Mouawad continues:Very quickly I realized that this sort of thing, I could only talk about it with people who came from elsewhere.A separation (…) which has ensured that my most intimate and closest friends are all people who come from elsewhere.wow!We are not mistaken.No Quebecer is worthy of being his close friend.No Quebecer understands, or can discuss, this issue.I am sorry to have to tell one of our favorite Quebecers of foreign origin that in half a century of existence I must have had at least 100,000 conversations with Quebecers on these subjects.Take Denise Bombardier, for example, who regularly makes this speech.(Yes, please take it!) Can she “only talk about it with people from elsewhere”?Strange because she talks about it almost every day on the most listened to news radio station, then almost every evening on the most listened to television bulletin.A profoundly anti-intellectual societyMarc Cassivi (total transparency: he is not an enemy) took up his pen and cause in favor of Wajdi Mouawad in La Presse this Wednesday, under thetitle: Anti-intellectual Quebec.Quebec is not just an anti-intellectual society.It is a profoundly anti-intellectual society.Where culture and knowledge have a suspicious smell.Where sufficiency and pretension are measured by the number of diplomas that one has been able to obtain, the number of books that one has been able to read or the number of authors that one dares to quote, almost apologizing each time to admit their existence.Anti-intellectualism is a North American trait, yes.But it is a phenomenon rooted in Quebec culture, where it is better not only not to flaunt one's erudition, but to hide one's intellectual curiosity, so as not to be perceived as a haughty elitist, detached from the concerns of one's fellow citizens.You have just read a sentence of 42 words.Our apologies for those who are stunned.Take a break and come back when you've recovered.Alright, are you better?We continue.There are several Quebecs within Quebec.There is, of course, an “anti-intellectual party” in Quebec.It is said that Duplessis made it on purpose to appear less cultured than he was.He died in 1959.But, it's weird, I remember having worked for the most popular prime minister of contemporary Quebec — Lucien Bouchard — who made no secret of his status as a voracious reader, nor the presence of the complete collection of books from La Pléiade in his office.When I put him a quote from Seneca in his inaugural address, said quote ended up in all the newspapers — and no one blamed him for using it.(In fact, not being, I admit, not a reader of Seneca, I had stolen the quotation from a speech by Claude Béland, presented before a meeting of directors of Caisses Po-pu-lai-res who, apparently , hadn't thrown tomatoes in his face.) Which one?It was: "It's not because things are difficult that we don't dare, it's because we don't dare that they are difficult".In fact, Seneca had been such a hit that Bouchard and I took the complete works of Seneca from the Pléiade to find another gem to use.Believe us, there is none!I know, I know, the premiers of Quebec don't always quote Seneca.No.I also placed Plato in a speech by Bouchard, Fukuyama and… James T. Kirk in a speech by Parizeau.The mystery of the sold tickets of IncendiesCassivi claims that Quebec is "profoundly anti-intellectual."If that were true, the normal Quebecer would not be able to understand a work as fine as, say, Incendies, by Mouawad, put on film by Denis Villeneuve.But who are the quarter of a million Quebecers who went to see the film?Why, in a "profoundly anti-intellectual" society, is the latest Umberto Eco 6th on Renaud-Bray's book sales charts.Why, if we refuse to name the authors we have read recently, are we stepping on each other's feet at the Salon du livre in Montreal, in Quebec City, and at the Grande Bibliothèque?Another pen from La Presse, Nathalie Collard, recently wrote that I was an “intellectual blogger”.If we live in a profoundly anti-intellectual society, why is your favorite blog the second in Quebec according to Wikio's ranking?In front of "Isa's delicacies" and the blog of this fiery populist that is Patrick Lagacé?Why are the market shares of ARTV and Télé-Québec similar, in this country that hates ideas, to those of ARTE in France or PBS in the United States?Mystery.I know, however, that the excellent program Apostrophe by Bernard Pivot (did I say that his last book is also on Renaud-Bray's list?) was, at the end of its life, broadcast in France after 11:00 p.m., but in Quebec, on TV5, in prime time.I know this because my father, a grocer and business school graduate, listened to him religiously.The problem is that it is difficult to quantify this kind of assertion.What does it mean for Quebec to be downgraded from its status of “anti-intellectual” to that of “profoundly anti-intellectual”?Fortunately, Marc Cassivi gives us a lead:Intellectualism is so perceived as a defect, a crippling vice in our media, for example, that intellectuals no longer dare to leave their universities, their seminars and their essays to speak.The Quebec public space has been purged of the discourse of the intellectual, who has had no voice in the matter for so long – with a few exceptions, which confirm the rule – that he now prefers to remain silent.The loss, we do not regret it enough, is immense.Good.Finally something measurable.The presence—in this case, the absence—of intellectuals in public debate.The fact that the Charest government chose two of Quebec's greatest intellectuals, Gérard Bouchard and Charles Taylor, to chair a commission on a hot topic must be nothing but an accident.The fact that dozens of intellectuals took part in this public debate, launching manifestos on pluralism and secularism in the newspapers and on the Internet and being invited to the audio-visual forums to discuss them must be part of the exception. which proves the rule.I, for example, at CÉRIUM, can attest that not a day goes by without one of the researchers/academics affiliated with the center being approached by a Quebec media.But let's exclude this call for knowledge by the small and large media, which only concern international affairs.Would there be a way to verify if, in the real media, those of the real anti-intellectual people, this disdain for thought, ideas, is palpable?Well, it's true, on the day of publication of Mr. Cassivi's column, the sociologist Mathieu Bock-Côté published in the opinion page of La Presse one of his texts in which he uses words of more than three syllables and sentences of at least 10 words.It doesn't prove anything.Like the fact that he writes a weekly column in a free daily distributed in the metro.Hubert Reeves who, I have been told, does not hide his status as a committed intellectual, held the pencil well for years in Le Journal de Montréal, where he still makes appearances.These are exceptions.All the more numerous as they confirm the rule.And don't tell me that visiting French intellectuals are almost all invited to Radio-Canada radio (worse: when they are guests of CÉRIUM, it happens that the programs fight among themselves to have exclusivity. It's boring!) It's a public radio, which does not speak to the people.Only to close friends of Wajdi (and perhaps of Marc) who alone love ideas and come from elsewhere.(But I think about it, Marc… In what year did you immigrate to Quebec? Never mind, I welcome you.)The Staggering Silence of Quebec IntellectualsIt would also be an epiphenomenon to note that the dialogue between Quebec academics, particularly in the social sciences and law, with the designers of public policy in Quebec (even more so under PQ governments, but not only) is remarkably fruitful.And that many of our public policies are the direct result of this dialogue.This network, this fluidity between the Quebec worlds of ideas and public policies often surprises our French and American colleagues.(How do we know? In a normal year, CERIUM units receive 180 foreign academics.)No.I wanted to do things seriously and see if, in a private information radio station, therefore completely subservient to the ratings of the deeply anti-intellectual plebs, the immense-absence-of-intellectuals-expurgated-from- the-speaking was verifiable.If we had deigned to bring them down from their ivory tower (see photo).So I searched the website of the program Isabelle le matin, from 98.5.You know ?Isabelle Maréchal, whom even my friend Patrick Lagacé, in a very nasty interview with the Francs-Tireurs a few years ago, criticized, basically, for being too populist.For the month of June alone, Isabelle-la-populiste-à-la-radio-privée dared to bring out their silence:Estelle Bouthilier, monarchy specialist at Concordia University Christian Dufour, political scientist at ÉNAP.(5 times!) Marcel Leboeuf and Carl Béchard to talk about… Molière!Jacques Florent, editorial director of the French-language dictionaries of Larousse editions André Richelieu, professor of marketing at Laval University Donald Cuccioletta, associate member of the Observatory on the United States of the Raoul-Dandurand study chair at the UQAM.Michèle Prévost, full professor at École Polytechnique André Normandeau, criminologist and professor at Université de Montréal Martin Courcy, psychologist specializing in crisis management, Karl Weiss, microbiologist and infectiologist at Hôpital Maisonneuve-Rosemont Dr Anne Fortin, physician council for infectious diseases at the National Public Health Institute Mathieu Bock-Côté, UQAM, (4 times!)And I'm not counting doctors and lawyers, senior civil servants and directors of cultural associations.It would take too long.Just before her, for this same month of June, the populist Paul Arcand received:Céline Anthonin, economist at the Sciences Po Economics Research Center (OFCE) Louis-Gilles Francoeur, columnist for the newspaper Le Devoir.(yes, I dare to count him among those who have ideas) Raymond Chrétien, former diplomat and Canadian ambassador: on the conflict in Libya Marcel Mazoyer (Agricultural engineer) Dr. Dominique Synnott, general surgeon.Head of the breast clinic at the Sacré-Coeur Hospital in Montreal and professor at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Montreal.Dr. Marie-Chantal Fortin, Nephrologist-transplanter, Researcher at the CHUM Research Center: organ donation, trafficking and sale Martin Coiteux (Professor, Department of International Business Education, HEC) and yours truly, for a debate (as there is none in Quebec) on the comparative wealth of Americans and Quebecers.I didn't have time to count the number of academics invited during the rest of the day, to the programs of Dutrizac and Paul Houde.I don't have that to do, anyway.I am in the middle of the Cerium International Summer Schools where, in addition to students, a whole host of people from civil society — NGOs, trade unionists, business people, retirees — take several days of their summer to hear from academics their talk about the Arab world, China, Scandinavia, human rights…My theory on anti-intellectualismBut I have a small idea about anti-intellectualism.In my ivory tower at the University of Montreal, which I never leave because no one ever invites me anywhere in this society where there are neither ideas nor debates, I tell myself that anti-intellectualism , especially the profound, is to affirm things without taking the trouble to demonstrate them.No seriously.It's weird, in this society where there is no "intellectual curiosity", during the last year alone my books "For an effective left" and "Imagining the post-crisis" have earned me be invited to give talks to: nurses, school principals, lawyers, steelworkers, food workers, cooperative managers, health executives, accountants, teachers and students of cegeps and secondary schools.It was not the absence of intellectual curiosity that struck me at each of these stops.Rather the opposite.In fact, the best compliment I get sometimes after these performances is: “You didn't insult our intelligence”.As if the opposite happened to them regularly.Interesting.Hey, I'm trying to say something.I would say: “Quebec is not a society where the elites insult popular intelligence.It is a society where they deeply insult popular intelligence”.But I won't tell.First, because it would be a gross generalization of the elites.Then because I cannot demonstrate it.It would be, basically, profoundly anti-intellectual.Mouawad's interview is now available online here.Receive a summary of political news, directly in your inbox.Highlights, analyses, decryptions, discover the essentials to know everything about politics in Quebec and Canada.There is a crass anti-intellectualism in Quebec.For example, populists on the left in Quebec spit on nerds like Hayek, Rand, Rothbard or Mises without having read them.Cheer!And you made me laugh even more.In my humble opinion, Mouwad is just a French version of Mordecai Richtler, that is to say, a guy who despises the society where he grew up.The right does the same, here as elsewhere.Does this mean that the mythical quasi-biological anti-intellectualism of Quebecers exists?We all understand what Mouhawad said, and meant;whether we are for or against what he said and/or that he said it.For my part, I have rarely heard a Quebecer boast of being intellectual as another boasts of being a golfer.However, I have heard hundreds of times people swear at an intellectual, with pursed lips and low voices, as we used to do with Jews or fags.André Malraux or André Gide do not run the streets, nor the universities in Montreal.On the other hand, we often see Guy Chevrettes treating environmentalists as masturbators.Could the level of education in Quebec schools be in question?Basically, knowing whether Quebec is more or less anti-intellectual than elsewhere is not the spark of this whole debate.The spark is the virulence of Pat Lagacé's column.Why so much gall, so much contempt for Wajdi.Wadji has the right to express opinions.He is a full-fledged Quebec citizen as far as I know.Other Quebecers before him have criticized the rejection of intellectuals (eg Jean Larose or René-Daniel Dubois).To spit so much in the face of Wajdi for his position.What is the patent?Because he was not born here, he has no right to criticize Quebec!!!You raise some interesting points, but I have known a whole series of intellectuals who refused to do business with the media.Because unfortunately, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict cannot be explained in a two and a half minute clip.It is not the number of intellectuals in the public square, in my opinion, that poses a problem than what they are made to do.I believe that in Quebec there is a difficulty in accepting that in certain fields, people can be “specialists”.Culture is the best example and it is in this sense that we regularly “eat reviews” to paraphrase your friend Patrick.But it's broader than culture again.One of the commentators on Lagacé's blog wondered about the fact that thinkers (but he's not contemptuous, huh!) always have ideas that are disconnected from the real world, for example on the Turcotte affair debate .It doesn't seem to occur to this individual that perhaps the “thinkers” have skills that the “real world” doesn't.In the field of science, in the field of economics, we have no trouble admitting that people, intellectuals, specialists can enlighten us.In the field of culture, education, social affairs….hiiii… not sure.You are talking about Messrs. Bouchard and Taylor.Indeed… and how did we welcome them?How many times have they been told they thought they were other people trying to lecture?Have you read the citizens' comments on Radio-Canada's license renewal?I swear to you that we break sugar on the back of all this waste of time (and money).Finally, I will venture a question (having sincerely no answer): the Eco and the Pivot, how many were sold, in truth?Because seriously, I can do a survey in my neighborhood if you want, but Umberto Eco...I couldn't agree more with your post.We have all noticed that there is a race of people, everywhere, here as elsewhere, for whom only what comes from elsewhere can be valid in their eyes.Could we talk about snobbery?In some cases, yes.But in other cases, the evil is deeper.It's like Freud's death drive but diverted from itself because it cannot be confessed, like the Oedipus complex, and attributed to the community to which it belongs.It might appear to them less unnatural to murder one's loved ones than to commit suicide.It's a point of view...There are probably also cases of big heads.Those whose success goes to their head.But in order not to appear to have the big head, they play the humble.And with an often very honeyed tone they will try to rise above the dregs by crushing, always with humility, the society that built them.These are the most disgusting and very often hoaxers of the worst kind.“An intellectual is a type who is reassured when he is not understood.”You put the package there.Cheer!Small addition: I really like your point on conferences.And you're right.Each time I organize conferences I see how far I can afford to invite speakers who will go far in thought, and people welcome that with great openness, enthusiasm and a certain appetite.We wonder all the more why there are no more great interviews, obviously, people are passionate about it… But maybe not to the point of synthonizing it on his television set.Go find out why!@Marc-Antoine Daneau: I'm just reading "Barney's Version", and I'm enjoying it.His gaze on society (ALL society) is certainly cruel, merciless, but with such a grating accuracy, such an irresistible humor, such a universal misanthropy that one can only laugh at it.Long live this awesome iconoclast!@David: I don't like Britney Spears, I wouldn't say I don't like the music… I don't have to listen to her latest record to know I wouldn't like it… I know her style , I know his words: not my type.It is not because they do not like right-wing intellectuals that they are not intellectuals... To believe because someone does not like what one likes, therefore does not like the field is precisely very reductive and populist.Otherwise, for the article, indeed, I believe that you touch what.It's because in general, in Quebec, we don't like people who have manners, who are smug, who use big words to explain simple things... Society here is less hierarchical, if only for the population number.I remember having discussed, by chance, with Armand Vaillancourt in a bar, I was with two French friends and when they found out who he was, poof!, the good manners, the smiles... Here, I believe, that 'We just people by deeds, not by title.“Wajdi Mouawad a man around whom, as we know, no debate ever takes place.“…like his promotion of French rocker Bertrand Cantat, who beat his partner to death in 2003.A nice presentation Mr. Lisée.A nice way to return to Wajdi Mouawad and Marc Cassivi their words of perverse narcissists (or narcissistic perverts, as you wish).Right in the target.I will dare here to share with you an error that I noticed, at the beginning of your text: “and the disdain of the top for the bass”.Of course, I imagine you meant “high”… 🙂 Yours dear Mr. Lisée!!!!I'm going to sound like I'm attacking Mouawad himself rather than his arguments, but I'd like to relate an anecdote that underlines the character's sometimes short and too “on the nerve” (therefore not very intellectual) conclusions.It's not well known in Montreal, but Mouawad has just completed a 4-year term as Artistic Director of the NAC's French Theater (in Ottawa).On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the death of Albert Camus, he invited, last September (a North American exclusive), the production of the National Theater of Brittany of the play "Les Justes", in which Mouawad shone in a particularly difficult role.One of the few female roles was held by Emanuelle Béart (come on, don't be jealous….)A few days before the premiere, the troupe gave a public reading of excerpts from this play on Parliament Hill during the noon hour.He came... nobody.When we say that “no one came”, it usually means that very few people came.But this time, there was absolutely no one from the public.There were the cultural flash cameras of the Téléjournal ("Coup d'oeil");that was all.In front of these cameras, Mouawad indulged in a little mockery of this public which was conspicuous by its absence.It was all the more cruel and hard-hitting because he did it with a murderous, very haughty smile.Except that …Except that the event had not been announced anywhere.It was not even announced in the leaflets and on the website of the French theater of the CNA, which nevertheless presented the event and of which Mouawad was then artistic director (that is to say, responsible in part for the work of the service of communications).It was not announced in any cultural calendar (written or electronic).It wasn't even on Mouawad's personal website!Worse: the day before the public reading, the cultural weekly “See” (Outaouais section) interviewed the troupe;interview announced on the cover of the magazine.There wasn't even a little “plogue” for forgetful reading inside this interview.To express oneself in non-intellectual language (therefore Quebecers): “E Nothing”.Obviously, a people with the bare minimum of culture and intellectual interest should have rushed to Parliament Hill, in case Camus was read there.Once again, I seem to be attacking the man instead of arguing, but I can't help but think that there is a touch of hysteria in his vision of society, in his reactions.Faced with the total absence of the public (while the tickets for the play flew away at the CNA ticket office – information to which he had access as artistic director), faced with this void, any intellectual, having the rational guide, would have immediately thought: "There should be a lot of people and there aren't: something has gone wrong";and when the something wrong is the lack of an audience, even the least knowledgeable guy in marketing guesses that it's the communication that's gone wrong.But him ?he immediately accused the indifference of the public!The man is brilliant, but I maintain it: there is something irrational, hysterical in his reactions.A last example (more briefly) on the strange contradictions of Mouawad.When he finally explained himself on the Cantat affair, in April, Mouawad (according to what the journalist of “La Presse” Marie-Claude Lortie reports) “remains amazed by this society where we discuss without fighting.Discussing without fighting: not so bad for a non-intellectual people!Much has been said here about this issue that touches me so much: scholarship, culture, critical thinking and popular mentality.I will share with you 3 observations which, on their own, made me think a lot.I did a BACC in education at UQAM.What struck me the most in the classes was the lack of critical interaction between the teacher and the students.The majority of students I encountered were far more concerned with note taking and earning a degree than with the unique opportunity they had to engage in substantive discussions, critical exchanges , debates.Some teachers held out poles that very few students grasped.I met few students passionate about knowledge and ideas.I also studied at the BACC in Philo and I experienced roughly the same phenomenon.On TV, few critical programs have very good ratings.Reality shows, quizzes and TV series are doing much better.Finally, on the internet in the discussion forums, Quebecers don't give a damn about the quality of their written French.It is extremely common to encounter messages that are so badly articulated (poorly developed ideas, badly constructed sentences, non-existent thematic links, messed up grammar, etc.) that you have to try to GUESS what the interlocutor wants to express.And if we have the misfortune to point them out politely, we are entitled to a mountain of invective and a bunch of worn-out clichés about those who express themselves well on the internet (they are snobbish, pretentious, boring).Yes, I know, this is not the case everywhere.FORTUNATELY!But it is very very common.Having a good general culture and not hiding it means running the risk of being accused of being pretentious or cloud shovelers.I speak from experience.No, I don't hang out in the city slums, bars or alleys of Montreal.;o)😉Have a good day.Good weekend.Maybe.»😉Thanks!»Ref.Phew!Why ?Why ?»Good morning!Phew!»»»".»🙂The best texts of the day, on all themes: society, politics, environment, economy, culture, health, 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