Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!watmath!kgdykes
From: kgdykes@watmath.waterloo.edu (Ken Dykes)
Newsgroups: can.general
Subject: Re: postings in the French language
Message-ID: <29518@watmath.waterloo.edu>
Date: 28 Sep 89 05:00:25 GMT
Reply-To: kgdykes@watmath.waterloo.edu (Ken Dykes)
Organization: S.D.G. UofWaterloo
Lines: 57

In article <1989Sep27.172943.15615@jarvis.csri.toronto.edu> doc@dgp.toronto.edu (Blaine Price) writes:
>In article <29462@watmath.waterloo.edu> kgdykes@watmath.waterloo.edu (Ken Dykes) writes:
>>   Are you trying to tell me that 3 years of public school, mostly ORAL
>> french education while conjugating a few simplistic verbs is going to enable
>> me to EASILY/QUICKLY/I_READ_A_LOT_OF_NEWS_AND_HAVE_NO_SPARE_TIME_TO_WASTE
>                       ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>		       this is a contradiction
  Not really.  I *choose* what I have time for.  Many newsgroups are of
value to my EDUCATION in my chosen field of work. And I choose those social
and political things I am interested in, however -- time is a limited resource
and everything gets put into the "priority list" as it were.  I do not give
high priority to language translations of dubious political topics on a
computer news network.
Yes i have spare time, but i choose the definition of waste.

>> read Quebecois-french (the schools tend to teach a very clinical french)
>> more than 18 years LATER? hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
>I'm sorry that you had such a poor education, but I think that things might
  I had an excellent education, and i'm sure at the 4-6th years of french
it may become useful after the "ground laying" of the first 3 years.  However
i *again choose* what topics I spend time on, the topics I chose in high
school were very well taught.
(silly me, choosing triple-science credits when a single-science & french
  AND GERMAN IN THE COMMUNITY I LIVE IN
  would be all I need for a happy life; only the most vacuous of people would
 ignore language instruction...)

>have improved in the last two decades.  The fact remains that the country is
>officially bilingual and if you choose to know nothing about one of the 
  keyword is *officially*, PRACTICALLY I need german and italian where i
live, portugese would be useful too.
Idealists and Officialists must have some wonderous way of ceating time
for ALL THOSE GOOD THINGS EVERYONE SHOULD DO.  ...or perhaps they have nothing
better to do...

All I was trying to say in my last posting is, *ON PRACTICAL TERMS* if you
want the masses to read it, write in the language of that particular mass.
I HAVE NO OBJECTION to postings in french, fully support your rights, and
am sure many (but not massive numbers) of people get great benefit from it.
To repeat: if you *want* the masses... if don't want them fine. One must be
practical in the REAL world you know -- I hate to be the one to break the
news(-: to you.

And now, in respect for my precious priority list, I will probably not answer
any more messages on this topic since I have already repeated the point i
want to support; but I don't begrudge this one clarification since english
may not be some peoples strongest language, and I want my thoughts easily
accessible :-) :-)

i wonder, can.talk? this sure isn't a very can.general topic anymore, the
same problems can occur anywhere dealing in multiple languages -- and dont
think there arent places with bigger language problems outside this continent.
  -ken
-- 
   - Ken Dykes, Software Development Group, UofWaterloo, Canada [43.47N 80.52W]
          kgdykes@watmath.waterloo.edu  [129.97.128.1]
          kgdykes@waterloo.csnet      kgdykes@water.bitnet     watmath!kgdykes