Translating the printemps érable
If you would like to volunteer and join the effort, please contact us at the above email before embarking on any translation work, in order to avoid any redundancies. We cannot accept translations that have not been cleared with us first.
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For more useful English-language sources on the conflict, see:
CUTV - broadcasting live from the protests nightly
Rouge Squad - Tactical Translation Team
Rabble.ca's Maple Spring Coverage
Photo from Nous Sommes Tous Art
Don’t take it personally. We all were swept away by a great, intoxicating wave of novel (for many) awareness of the devalorizing and repressive potential of our government’s actions a year ago. We paid reverent attention to political notions, the words of which were exchanged between neighbors, colleagues, friends, family and strangers, all while a great number of us likely thought to ourselves “hey, how did we ever not take the time to examine, dissect, learn, live like this?” With every systematic abuse of power comes the opportunity to join the side engaging against the abuse, to lend support. But momentum changes, our energy disperses, time goes by, and the urgency viscerally felt after holding this object together, this shared value that requires the hands and intentions of many to keep lifted dissipates.
Don’t take it personally. Yes, others were there doing the lifting too, and there they have remained since. It’s just how it goes. We can count on there always being those in whom the mobilizing conviction of engagement remains steadfast. We trade responsibilities. You let your flame of social justice burn for education, and maybe I, for the environment. We might also think that some have more at stake than others because they are more at ease in public forums – the street being one of the most public – and because it’s their cause that they are demonstrating for, perhaps not yours. But this is where it gets taken personally.
We take it personally when we draw lines between the cause of a so-called minority of students, revelers celebrating a Stanley Cup, an abidingly reasonable teacher in a panda suit, the First Nations, the police, the government, minority interest groups (the list goes on) and ourselves. We react against being asked to participate in what has indeed proven to be a dangerous alternative to the status quo. We hesitate, hold back, resist the responsibility we could be embracing that would implicate us in the cultivation of alternatives to the current abuses of rule: ones that remove more and more discretionary powers from citizens and allocate them to law enforcement. What we should be taking personally is this shift on the lever of power that renders everyone less visible and audible due to the discretionary (ie unpredictable, erratic) application of provenly biased power.
Don’t take it personally. We owe it to all struggles past and future to not have silence trump the efforts of all the good people who have been carrying the cause of freedom of assembly and of association. Take it outside of yourself, beyond the personal, and now, because the momentum is there. Here’s how:
Write a letter in support of collective responsibility and against discretionary and repressive law enforcement. Please refer to earlier instructions by the Association des Juristes Progressistes on which city councillors to contact and do so before Monday, when the vote at city council takes place. http://www.quebecprotest.com/post/47550577535/request-of-public-support-of-municipal-officials-to
Please join us on Monday at Montreal’s City Hall in support of the motion to repeal bylaw P-6: https://www.facebook.com/events/465596273510943/
And also, do consider helping those who have been penalized over the course of this bylaw’s enforcement by contributing to Pandaction Against P-6: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/pandacti0n-contre-p-6
Please continue to share these links widely.
And we send our gratitude to those who have been devoting their precious time to this fundamental cause.
In solidarity,
Translating the printemps érable
& several students from l’École de français pour artistes et révolutionnaires ;)
Association des juristes progressistes April 15, 2013
Original French Text: https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=465806536823888&id=120609411343604
IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT
Today, the AJP is launching the Coalition Against P-6. Several organizations and associations have joined the campaign initiated by the AJP to win the repeal of of bylaw P-6 which, in our opinion, has no place in Montreal or anywhere else in the country. A press conference will take place on April 22 at 10am Friday April 19th at 12pm at the Comité Social Centre Sud, 1710 Beaudry, room 2.7, to ask elected officials to repeal this bylaw which, like law 12, is clearly “liberticidal”.
The following organizations and associations have now joined the coalition [updated April 18th]:
Anarchopanda
Assemblée Populaire Autonome de Hochelaga-Maisonneuve (APA-HM)
Assemblée Populaire Autonome de Montréal (APAM)
Association canadienne des libertés civiles (ACLC)
Association des juristes progressistes (AJP)
Association pour une solidarité syndicale étudiante (ASSÉ)
Centrale des syndicats du Québec (CSQ)
Centre de recherche et d’information en consommation Port Cartier (CRIC Port Cartier)
Concertation des luttes contre l’exploitation sexuelle (CLES)
Confédération des syndicats nationaux (CSN)
Conseil central du Montréal métropolitaine CSN (CSN-CCMM)
Fédération des femmes du Québec (FFQ)
Fédération étudiante universitaire du Québec (FEUQ)
Fédération interprofessionnelle de la santé du Québec (FIQ)
Fédération nationale des enseignants et enseignantes du Québec (FNEEQ)
Front d’action populaire en réaménagement urbain (FRAPRU)
Jeunesse ouvrière catholique nationale du Québec (JOC nationale du Québec)
Juripop
Law Union of Ontario
Ligue des droits et libertés du Québec
L’R des centres de femmes
Mouvement Action Chômage de Montréal
Mouvement autonome et solidaire des sans-emploi (MASSE)
Regroupement des comités logement et associations de locataires du Québec (RCLALQ)
Regroupement des maisons pour femmes victimes de violence conjugale (RMFVVC)
Réseau québécois des groupes écologistes (RQGE)
Syndicat de la fonction publique du Québec (SFPQ)
99%Media
Têtes blanches carré rouge
Follow us this week for news of other associations and organizations that will join the coalition.
Lets reestablish the right to protest in Montreal. Now.
The Coalition Against P-6.
Translated from the original French by Translating the printemps érable.
*Translating the printemps érable is a volunteer collective attempting to balance the English media’s extremely poor coverage of the student conflict in Québec by translating media that has been published in French into English. These are amateur translations; we have done our best to translate these pieces fairly and coherently, but the final texts may still leave something to be desired. If you find any important errors in any of these texts, we would be very grateful if you would share them with us at translatingtheprintempsderable@gmail.com. Please read and distribute these texts in the spirit in which they were intended; that of solidarity and the sharing of information.
Anarchopanda September 12, 2012
Original French text: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RGLbK7VAusvl8ZzXIkJXTmUi8eF_ymXKrqYWAyWR1ao/edit?pli=1
Dear students and their allies,
The panda outings were above all an intervention tactic against police brutality, and the context of these interventions, despite the welcome return of cooler weather, are becoming very limited following the end of the strike. It is time for Anarchopanda to tell you, without much hope, “Until next time.” (Because he doesn’t really hope the brutality will continue, right? :D)
Thank you for having been there at the moment when history needed you, and for having risen to the occasion when many remained seated. It was a real honour for me to have been able to stand beside you, in my own way (a bit strange indeed), to suffer (a bit) with you, and to have very much enjoyed a frankly undeserved level of attention and affection from you.
Julien Villeneuve, member of Profs contre la hausse, presented at CLASSE event at Cabaret Olympia
August 10 2012
Original French Text: https://www.facebook.com/Anarchopanda/posts/259944277450788
Dear students fighting alongside the CLASSE,
My name is Julien, I teach Philosophy and I am in favor of free education. I am part of the Profs contre la hausse [Teachers Against the Hike], which, despite the title, brings together many teachers who are also in favor of free education. I’ve been asked to tell you what exactly Profs contre la hausse is, and why we support you. Seeing that I only have a few minutes, I will try to do both at the same time.
If I had to explain to you what Profs contre la hausse is in one sentence in the most scientifically precise way possible, I would say, “Profs contre la hausse is like you guys, but less cool and with teachers.” I’ll explain myself.
Profs contre la hausse sprung from the teachers’ need to meet right away, all together, inter-syndically if not para-syndically if not almost extra-syndically (meaning the larger central unions, of course), in order to reflect (not too much) and to act (as much as possible) in support of your struggle. I know that I should say our struggle. I’ll come back to that later.
Catherine Lalonde June 5, 2012
Original French Text: http://www.ledevoir.com/societe/justice/351679/anarchopanda-s-attaque-au-reglement-antimasque
Anarchopanda, the philosophy professor become, in a panda costume, a symbolic figure of the student protests is contesting the constitutional validity of the city of Montreal’s new anti-mask regulation. His challenge will be deposited in the Supreme Court (Cour supérieure) in the next few hours, the Devoir learned.
The city of Montreal’s commission on public security (La Commission de la sécurité publique de la Ville de Montréal) adopted a rule on May 18th obliging protesters to show their faces and produce their itinerary to the police. Montrealers now can’t have their faces covered without “reasonable motive” and, if they want to protest, must inform the SPVM (Service de police de la Ville de Montréal) of their route in advance, under penalty of heavy fines. It’s up to the police officers to determine if the wearing of a mask in a public space is justified or not. This variable application is one of the points that raise the most criticism from jurists.
Original French Text: http://www.lecouac.org/
[Photo: Anarchopanda has already disobeyed many times and will continue to disobey your dirty fascist law. Charest come out of your hole and come fight me. At chess. You will lose, mon estie (profanity).]
Dear Flik,
I allow myself to write to you today even if, fortunately or unfortunately, we have never met. Everything I know about you, including the fact that you exist, comes from a sort of baseball card that an SPVM supervisor gave me during my second night protest. There I learned that you are my junior by about ten years, that you are a little bigger than me, that you like sardine sandwiches and blueberry jam (really?) and that you may still live with your father (Polinous), although the card seems to be a bit dated, or at least I hope – at your age, that wouldn’t be very glorious. More than anything, I learned that I teach at your old college, Maisonneuve. You almost could’ve been my student, imagine that? And it is thus much more as an almost former student than as an imitation cop (simili-flic) that I am sending you this letter, because time is of the essence.
Link: http://manif.aencre.org/
Translated Lyrics:
Anarchopanda against tyranny
Anarchopanda, you march with us
If everybody sees that we’re the nice guys
It’s a bit thanks to you and your kisses
Oooh, Anarchopanda!
Friend or foe, everyone has a right to your cuddles
They’ll see - Anarchy can be soft and sweet in your arms
*claps*
Anarchopanda against tyranny
Anarchopanda, you march with us
If everybody sees that we’re the good guys
It’s a bit thanks to you, and your kisses
Kisses!
Kisses!
Kisses!
Anarchopanda, you march with us!
Translated from the original French by Translating the printemps érable.
*Translating the printemps érable is a volunteer collective attempting to balance the English media’s extremely poor coverage of the student conflict in Québec by translating media that has been published in French into English. These are amateur translations; we have done our best to translate these pieces fairly and coherently, but the final texts may still leave something to be desired. If you find any important errors in any of these texts, we would be very grateful if you would share them with us at translatingtheprintempsderable@gmail.com. Please read and distribute these texts in the spirit in which they were intended; that of solidarity and the sharing of information.
From Dessine-moi un dimanche. SRC Première Chaîne (95,1 FM) Sunday May 27.
English Transcription:
Franco Nuovo: Me too, I want a hug! Everyone wants one! So, Anarchopanda, you’re doing well?
Anarchopanda: I’m well, thanks.
FN: So where did you get this idea? Because it’s quite brilliant, because it’s currently…all these protests, this whole social situation needed a little softness and a little relaxation, so between the casseroles and you, we seem to have truly found that. Something was defused upon your arrival.
A: Well, I hope. We never know what would have happened had I not done it. But the original idea, well, there were a few steps, let’s say, to the idea. When there started to be police violence at the beginning of the process with Francis Grenier and all that, I wanted to plan an intervention in relation to that. The original idea that concretized was a chain of teachers, who were identified as teachers who were going–
Jean-Félix Chénier May 27, 2012
Original French Text: http://voir.ca/jean-felix-chenier/2012/05/27/anarchopanda-et-casseroles/
Anarchopanda is probably an enigma to those not following the student strike closely. But he has become a powerful symbol against police violence over the course of this historic strike by offering affectionate hugs to police officers and protesters alike. In the global media coverage of protests that have raged here for over the past 100 days, the mascot is often seen intervening between protesters and police in an attempt to ease tensions. One could say that through his actions and images—highlighting the absurdity of the Charest government’s response to the students’ demands—Anarchopanda is contributing to an “aesthetics of political action.”
