http://primetimetv.suite101.com/article.cfm/why_canadians_cant_watch_tv_shows_on_hulu_etc

To educate you, yes, Canadians are forced (for the most part) to learn French & not only that, companies are forced to put French on ALL of their labeling. For me this is a HUGE problem because this means Canadians are not privy to a huge portion of products. Tons of American companies refuse to expand to Canada because they would have extra costs in relabeling all their products.

While this wouldn’t matter to me if we had a huge selection of products to choose from, I feel we DON’T.

Not only that, I feel Canadians are inept when it comes to business online & I’m not the only one who has noticed this. Canadians are probably not as good in business in general like Americans are & while there are the exceptions to the rule, I’m talking the majority.

You can even tell by their lack of customer service. Again, there are a few companies who are really nice & care for their customers, for the most part Americans are much better at customer service than Canadians are.

Back to purchasing products…

If I want to purchase a product for something & search online, I can never find anything. It’s either because it doesn’t exist, or the company has no website, or they have a website & don’t know how to utilize it properly, or even get themselves picked up in the search engines.

That means I have to purchase from the States.

While this is a positive thing, a lot of American companies don’t want to ship to Canada because Canada makes it difficult for them to ship here & I get the feeling it’s not because of the French labeling.

Not only that, the shipping costs just to cross the border are extreme which really pisses me off & I am pretty sure it has nothing to do with mileage because I’m sure if you calculated how much it would cost to ship a package from one end of the US to another, it would still be cheaper than shipping that same package to a nearby city in Canada.

Re: the mandatory labeling…

I could understand if at least 75% of all Canadians speak French, but they DON’T. Even in Quebec there are many areas in Montreal where they only speak English & they don’t even know how to speak French even though they were raised in Montreal.

Most Canadians are forced to take French in school & then once they graduate high school, they forget it unless they feel they will have a need for it out in the real world.

In fact, in the last 15-20 years I’ve noticed that a lot of companies require people to be bilingual just to get a regular job.

Again, this makes no sense to me & I get the feeling it’s just a political thing (look, we as a company speak French too OR, maybe they are doing it just to prove how different we are from Americans. If that’s the reason, it’s just childish behavior in my opinion.

While I think it’s great if people learn a 2nd language, I don’t think it’s fair to force a person to learn any one given 2nd language. While it’s logical to learn French here & Spanish in the States, citizens shouldn’t have to be forced one way or another. There are what’s called “French Immersion” schools in every bigger city, so if it’s that important to the parents, they could always send their kid there to learn French, but again, once the kids graduate high school because they aren’t speaking it on a regular basis, how many can actually speak, read & write fluent French?

Have a lovely day.

Michelle

Americans:
1. Americans tend to have the passion, but how that passion is channeled is much to be desired.

2. Americans (once they have the need to) will embrace all cultures. I truly believe that. As far as racism in america….this is nothing new! All over the world they have racism. American racism tends to be between “classes” not necessarily “skin color”…like a popularity contest. I say WAKE UP AMERICANS and WORLD!

3. America is still a young country…and the freedom that we stood for tends to be forgotten because we are working 50+ hrs a week…forgetting about life….forgetting about the freedom we once fought for.

4. America will always be ‘closed minded’ until they are mandated to learn a SECOND LANGUAGE. I find this vital. Think about it…if you learned French (which – if you’re Canadian – I’m sure you’ve had to learn some French) you would have to “learn” how to take a step back and evaluate what another person is trying to communicate…taking the time to understand due to the language barrier. This not only allows you to understand, it allows you to learn that people think DIFFERENTLY depending upon the lanugage.

Canadians:
1. I like them…I really do! NOT because they “hate” americans but because they understand (or at least take the time and ATTEMPT to understand) another culture…now, I must ask…are they “forced” to do this? (Is French Language a requirement in other provinces other than Quebec?)

2. They DO speak their minds (especially if they are from Quebec ) I give a lot of respect to that.

3. Canadians are very smart…but I feel they believe they are constantly being criticised for being “Canadian” which – from the American perspective – is false! Americans will rarely criticize another country unless 1. They feel threatened by them 2. The are feeling criticized themselves. 3. They are uneducated….

It’s hard to generalize “Canadians are smart – Americans are ignorant”…we simply cannot do that. We must judge on an individual basis.

You assumed I was American & you criticized my brain for no reason which is very immature. You clearly know nothing about Canadians if you think they don’t bash Americans.

I deal with Americans ALL THE TIME & yes some aren’t very smart, but then there’s tons of others who are & who know where Canada is & even have family here.

If you hate the States that much, why don’t you just leave?

I’m not here to start a war with you as much as you may love to, so this will be my last post as I’m sure you will stay angry.

Take care

Michelle

I HOPE YOU LEARNED SOMETHING FROM MY ANAYLSIS

With Telus (I’m leaving them as soon as my contract is up in a year) I pay almost $70 for a plan I don’t want to give up, but I barely use any minutes plus I can’t go into the States & use my phone without paying a fortune.

http://thestar.com/article/688547

Michelle

Michelle

but if they wanted to use us as an excuse for not legalizing then i guess that’s a winner…cause it really does sound plausible, doesn’t it?

anyway, to add to the list of “cons of living in the US” you might want to put the bit about canadian techies on there. see, livin’ here in the states every so often a canadian techie decides to move here & make life for everyone else on the team a living hell. (i only wish i were jokin’ but it’s true!)

it’s really odd too…i don’t get it. it’s almost like lack of self esteem forces certain people to up the amount of self-importance…where any attempt to belittle another tech person on the techie team is deliciously devoured…so they do.

again, really odd this stuff… however i think it’s just males & techie-types that have to deal with this…cause the rest of the non-techie canadians are actually quite creative & cool…and genuinely good people.

i just don’t get the techie jerks. and i want them to go back to canada, sadly. that’s the only time you’ll ever hear me say that… but that is my opinion.

america has enough techie-jerks in their co’s; we don’t need any more help.

again, strictly my opin.

however they never tell you the finer print – my canadian friends told me about the extra amount taken out of their pay which goes (to the govt?) for healthcare. oddly enough if americans did the same, we’d bitch & moan about it (‘why do i have to pay so much for healthcare?’)

so – in america you get bigger checks (at least from what i’ve heard from my canadian friends)…but if you want better healthcare ya gotta pay for it. but at least you get to choose what yer payin’ for (and budget appropriately).

mind you, all this is stuff i’ve heard via canadian friends so maybe they’re just trying to say this stuff so i don’t move to canada and get the free healthcare.

they are so cute!