{"id":366,"date":"2009-02-11T08:00:46","date_gmt":"2009-02-11T13:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/?p=366"},"modified":"2016-05-14T08:35:53","modified_gmt":"2016-05-14T13:35:53","slug":"plains-of-abraham-battle-brewing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/plains-of-abraham-battle-brewing\/","title":{"rendered":"Plains of Abraham Battle Heats Up"},"content":{"rendered":"

A battle is\u00a0heating up\u00a0in Quebec City regarding the Plains of Abraham, but it isn’t exactly the\u00a0sort of fight that the National Battlefields Commission was hoping for. As reported earlier<\/a> 2009 marks the 250th anniversary of the infamous Plains of Abraham battle at Quebec City that signified the defeat of “New France” to British imperialists, and the subjugation of French-speaking habitants<\/em>. It is ingrained in the collective memory of Quebecers and Canadians as “The Conquest”, and the federal government’s National Battlefields Commission plans to re-enact it with “four days of intensive siege<\/a>”<\/p>\n

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Essentially the outcome of this battle, the military defeat of the French forces,\u00a0represented a transfer of colonial power from one European country to another. The British ejected the\u00a0French elite, installed their own, and\u00a0picked up the colonial project where the French had\u00a0left off. The remaining French-speakers were relegated to second class citizenship, and\u00a0the First Nations were not consulted at all, despite the fact that this is their ancient territory. Despite francophone re-empowerment following the Quiet Revolution, the Plains of Abraham battle is still a touchy subject<\/a> because it signifies domination over\u00a0French-speakers by the British and later on Canadian governments.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0ongoing efforts to\u00a0re-enact the 1759\u00a0battle on the Plains of Abraham has continued to cause controversy over the past few weeks, and what started as a grassroots effort to cancel the offensive commemoration has blossomed into a full-blown political battle. It began with grumblings from sovereignty and anti-war camps, and it wasn’t long before prominent sovereigntists threatened to disrupt the event. A group calling itself operation1759<\/a> was formed and immediately set about demanding the re-enactment’s cancellation and began culture-jamming official propaganda.<\/p>\n

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On February 4th the Bloc Quebecois, the voice of Quebec in Ottawa, demanded that the re-enactment be cancelled<\/a>, and\u00a0shortly after\u00a0Quebec’s official opposition, the Parti Quebecois joined in the call<\/a>. Across Canada there appears to be little appetite for the divisive commemoration. It appears that many Anglophones, both in Quebec and\u00a0the rest of Canada\u00a0are adding their voices in opposition<\/a> to the re-enactment<\/a>, and even academics as far away as France are calling the re-enactment plans “stupid”<\/a>. More recently, the Bloc has\u00a0linked the Plains of Abraham\u00a0re-enactment with the sponsorship scandal\u00a0via a\u00a0posted video on their site<\/a>. There is also a protest<\/a> planned on Parliament Hill in Ottawa\u00a0on February 22\u00a0that aims to\u00a0pressure the Conservative minority\u00a0federal government to cancel it without delay.<\/p>\n

The obvious question that needs to be asked is why <\/em>re-enacting this battle is deemed so important. One needs only to look at the situation in Northern Ireland where every July the Protestant Orange Order launches loud military-style parades into Catholic neighbourhoods that often degenerate into sectarian violence, racism, and hatred<\/a>. Every July 12 the Orange Order parades are designed to\u00a0“celebrate” the British Protestant defeat over Irish Catholics during the 1690 Battle of the Boyne<\/a>, an unsubtle provocation directed against a traditionally oppressed people. The Orange Order “musicians” are known to hammer on\u00a0massive war drums as they\u00a0march through Catholic neighbourhoods.<\/p>\n

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The violence, rioting, and damage caused by these racist war-parade re-enactments\u00a0actually resulted in the creation of\u00a0a Parades Commission<\/a> that attempts to\u00a0keep the peace. Clearly the act of re-enacting military\u00a0dominance over an historically oppressed group is both morally reprehensible and likely to cause anger,\u00a0division, resentment, and possibly violence. Why would Canada support, let alone fund and organize\u00a0such an activity?<\/p>\n

More pressure is currently needed to ensure this Eurocentric re-enactment gets cancelled, preferably with a strong anti-war argument. To add your voice to the chorus of disapproval sign a pro-nationalist\u00a0petition<\/a> and\/or join the facebook opposition<\/a>. If you want to focus on opposing the re-enactment from an anti-war perspective, contact OTL (otl@optative.net<\/a>)\u00a0to help create a dramatic plan.\u00a0You can also\u00a0contact Dr. Amir Khadir of Quebec Solidaire<\/a> and ask him to take an anti-war\u00a0stance in the National Assembly of Quebec City.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A battle is\u00a0heating up\u00a0in Quebec City regarding the Plains of Abraham, but it isn’t exactly the\u00a0sort of fight that the National Battlefields Commission was hoping for. As reported earlier 2009 marks the 250th anniversary of the infamous Plains of Abraham battle at Quebec City that signified the defeat of “New France” to British imperialists, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[7,36,5,3],"tags":[82,165,137,164,9,136,81],"class_list":["post-366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-activism","category-community-issues","category-culture-jams","category-general","tag-amir-khadir","tag-bloc-quebecois","tag-controversy","tag-national-battlefields-commission","tag-optative-theatrical-laboratories","tag-plains-of-abraham","tag-quebec-solidaire"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=366"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2842,"href":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366\/revisions\/2842"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/optative.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}