Chirac takes his ball home

[DaGaffer]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4840160.stm

I know its petty, but I always get a little thrill when I see a Frenchman getting pissed off by something like this.

 

[ECA]

Hahaha you no talky my languagy me cry like baby.
The french think the EU is for france, they get stroppy about everything.

 

[Tilda]

Its funny, but what is today? Post links from bbc day?

 

[Furr]

BBC rocks though!

and haha, maybe Chirac should just give up and realise that English is Lingua Franca for pretty much everything now.

 

[xane]

maybe Chirac should just give up and realise that English is Lingua Franca for pretty much everything now.

Its always raised a smile over the irony of the term.

Lingua Franca is literally the "Language of the Franks", where the Franks were the ancestral peoples of modern France, although the term "Franks" was never specifically applied to the French (the Kingdom of France did not exist at the time) but rather to any of the Western Europeans, in later historical terms the country of France is synonymous with the Franks and their culture and germanic influence on the language.

France did attempt to get a modern lingua franca in place in its worldwide empire, but ultimately failed when the colonies slowly rejected French rule and consequently their associated customs and languages, although many of them still speak French officially, they have reverted to more local languages. French was the de facto lingua franca of European diplomacy for many centuries after the Middle Ages, but was eventually surpassed by English, which was the business language. Finally French was surpassed as the sole Language of Europe when the EU expanded in the 1990s.

So the "language of the Franks/French", is English !

 

[Tilda]

I thought lingua pura was english too?!

 

[Utini]

Chiraq. Coq.

 

[ECA]

Chiraq. Coq.

Surely it should be "Le Coq"

 

[Utini]

That would piss him off less.

 

[Ypnos]

To play devil's advocate, this kind of stance has kept French companies french (sparked when Pepsi tried to buy out Danone).

If only the British car industry had such a loyal attitude to itself. Ford XJR/Discovery/Vanquish anyone?

 

[old.user4556]

ah oui! a'haw hee, haw hee, haw!!

 

[DaGaffer]

To play devil's advocate, this kind of stance has kept French companies french (sparked when Pepsi tried to buy out Danone).

If only the British car industry had such a loyal attitude to itself. Ford XJR/Discovery/Vanquish anyone?

Yeah coz yogurt is such a strategic industry

As for the British car industry, if it had occasionally made a decent car it might still be around; protectionism wouldn't have helped (in fact protectionism probably caused the ultimate demise of Rover; if Ford had been allowed to buy it in the eighties, they'd have probably done a better job than British Aerospace, who only ended up flogging it to BMW anyway...)

 

[Ypnos]

I assure you they don't only produce yoghurt.
You might wanna look Danone up, you'll find their income is quite sizeable. But that was just an example.

(1.46 billion euros in 2005 accoring to Yahoo biz)

 

[Tom]

To play devil's advocate, this kind of stance has kept French companies french (sparked when Pepsi tried to buy out Danone).

If only the British car industry had such a loyal attitude to itself. Ford XJR/Discovery/Vanquish anyone?

Yep, France's economy is something to be jealous of! Including its massively subsidised car sector.

 

[DaGaffer]

I assure you they don't only produce yoghurt.
You might wanna look Danone up, you'll find their income is quite sizeable. But that was just an example.

(1.46 billion euros in 2005 accoring to Yahoo biz)

I know who Danone are. The point is that protectionism in the EU is illegal unless its an agreed 'strategic industry' (like defence, some financial services). Or if your French, who seem to have a slightly different version of 'free trade' to everyone else...

 

[ECA]

France is gonna go down the shitter in the next 20 years unless they seriously change their ways.
Then they're gonna cry for EU money.
Sigh.

 

[Earl]

and president blair will hand it all over (we'll be running under his dictatorship in 20years)

 

[Gog]

It has been fighting for a long time to establish the presence of the French language - whether it be at the Olympic Games, where it was contested for a while, whether it be in the European Union, or at the United Nations.

WTF? Is this some new sport they've introduced I haven't heard about yet - languages? Bet that draws in the television crowds in huge numbers.

Personally, I think the decline in the international use of French is more to do with their annoying way of pretending they don't understand you when you use "le" instead of "la" than anything else.

Me: Ou est le station?
Frenchie: le station?????
Me: oui - (makes "choo choo" noises and gesticulates wildly)
Frenchie Oh LA station!!!!

 

[nath]

Inanimate objects having a gender is just rediculous anyhoo.

 

[Furr]

Well France is in the shitter.

What it needs is Thatcherite reforms, and that is what the French goverment is trying to get through. However, Thatcher took a no hostage approach, that ended up with huge UK unemployment as people in jobs that were no longer viable were made redundant. Yes its was a bad bad time, and the new economics of the time weren't understood resulting in the Boom/Bust economy. Buts thats now understood, but we are much healthier for it. Problem is that "new labour" has used the windfall from that era to fund all in social engineering projects believing that the state knows how to spend public money best. Resulting in the UK being in alot of debt and Gordon Brown having taxed everyone he can as much as possible to raise more cash. This had resulted in our shores being regarded as hostile for new buisness and investement. (Bad thing)

France is just going through the same process (we had huge riots also) but the problem could be that the goverment backs down the the protestors and unions like Heath did and the country continues its slow decline. To be honest im not fussed, if France won't get with it more jobs for us. Im now more worried that the goverment in power here isn't retooling the UK economy fast enough to cope with the massive economic shifts that are going to happen from the two new asian powehouses China & India. We need to give business a break so that it can grow.

 

[DaGaffer]

The whole "workers under 26 can be more easily binned off" thing is a bit fekkin wierd though. I can't say I'm surprised they're rioting in the streets. Young people eh? Don't know they're born...

 

[Ardas Nails]

forklift driver at a US brewery.

rofl wtf

 

[Moo]

saw a good quote about french somewhere, something along the lines of the french nation being so insecure it had to give gender defintions inanimate objects.

 

[Ch3tan]

and president brown will hand it all over (we'll be running under his dictatorship in 20years)

fixed!

 

[Ypnos]

saw a good quote about french somewhere, something along the lines of the french nation being so insecure it had to give gender defintions inanimate objects.

English is in the minority of languages which [doesn't] give inanimate objects a gender.

 

[ECA]

English is in the minority of languages which [doesn't] give inanimate objects a gender.

Number of languages doesn't represent volume spoken.
Do the chinese languages give inanimate objects gender?
If not, who gives a fuck.

 

[Will]

Well France is in the shitter.

What it needs is Thatcherite reforms, and that is what the French goverment is trying to get through. However, Thatcher took a no hostage approach, that ended up with huge UK unemployment as people in jobs that were no longer viable were made redundant. Yes its was a bad bad time, and the new economics of the time weren't understood resulting in the Boom/Bust economy. Buts thats now understood, but we are much healthier for it. Problem is that "new labour" has used the windfall from that era to fund all in social engineering projects believing that the state knows how to spend public money best. Resulting in the UK being in alot of debt and Gordon Brown having taxed everyone he can as much as possible to raise more cash. This had resulted in our shores being regarded as hostile for new buisness and investement. (Bad thing)

You don't think the fact that Thatcherite reforms happened at about the same time as North Sea oil was discovered had any influence on their success?

 

[ECA]

This is a fun article.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/4842854.stm

 

[MYstIC G]

This is much better tbfh..... http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/gloucestershire/4839336.stm

 

[Ypnos]

Number of languages doesn't represent volume spoken.
Do the chinese languages give inanimate objects gender?

No it doesn't. Japanese is statistically the most common spoken language in the world and they have no gender at all in their every day language. (political correctness gone mad, some might say)

If not, who gives a fuck.

Eloquent. I'm studying for a psychology and linguistics degree, so I suppose I do. HTH.