Response to newspaper stupidity

Today's RNS discusses the unilingual nurses issue. For those living outside Montreal who haven't heard this story, a few weeks ago the Office de la Langue Francaise suspended from work two English nurses who were unable to pass French language tests (among the questions was how to say "bumper" in French). There has been a huge public outcry over this, people calling for the OLF to just sidestep the issue, for French nurses to be forced to take English tests, for the tests to be fairer, for the nurses to get on-the-job training, etc. In other words, much stupidity has already been spilled over this issue.

The Gazette, Jan. 24, 2005, letters to the editor (A18), letter by Athena-Sofia Delimanolis, "Stop coddling unilingual nurses."

( The article is behind this link. )

( See my rant )

My personal views on the subject are, give nurses some positive incentive to learn French, either financial or otherwise. Not everyone is willing to learn a new language, and for many people it is not as easy as Ms. Delimanolis claims. Do I think bilingual nurses are a good idea? Definitely! Do I think we should have mandated language standards to ensure they are able to function in both languages? Perhaps. Do I think we should impose these standards without providing a means or incentive for people who need to learn? Hell no!

Really cool meme

This is taken from ryss_rhiannon. It's the one with the "Chinese new years" horoscope, and strangely many of the answers make sense. It's only 11 short questions, and takes about 3 minutes.

( Click here to do the quiz / meme )

( Click here to see my results and my analysis of them )

So that's mine.
Care to share what you got?