Marc explains the news from France...Quick is a fast food burger chain, the product of a long-ago merger of various European chains (ah, Freetime!). Apparently it is now owned indirectly by the French government (nobody really knew that until the latest scandal).
Anyhow, one of their outlets in Roubaix near Lille in northern France decided to serve its potential clientele of Muslim diners by going hallal. This included replacing bacon by smoked turkey.
In Islamopsychotic (I think it's beyond Islamophobic) France, this is an unholy provocation. What?!!! A restaurant that dares NOT serve pork! Time for a constitutional amendment requiring all citizens to eat Schweinfleisch. That would be a great way to begin deporting Jews and Muslims. I'm sure there are still plenty of people around with experience from the 1940s. The SNCF still has plenty of train cars...
Info on the current ownership HERE; http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-01-22/cdc-said-to-consider-sale-of-european-hamburger-chain-quick.html
A story (in French) about the "polemic": http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5ikQoe-NSy-CPIWyOsxq6EZfC0nYQ
7 comments:
Mark,the parallel between the US and France is quite interesting. Here we had a scandal when it was found out that McDonalds used beef fat to fry their frittes.
There was an uproar from vegetarians as well as all the people who thought that beef fat was bad for their cholesterol (as if the macs were ok!).
France has what it deserves. Among other crimes, it destroyed the Algerian economy during its bloody conquest. There was never a thought of European settlers in any of their colonies that they themselves should follow local practices and culture, including local languages...
I came of age during the Algerian war of independance, which as you know almost ended up destroying French democracy (remember, the revolt of the colonels, etc?). I also have deep roots in the Mediterranean area, where everyone has mixed with everyone else for eons, including not only genes but cultures as well... So my perspective is probably quite different from yours...
Also, didn't you know, Jews don't eat pork either? It's a given in France, though, that people who hate those they take to be Arabs also hate Jews and Gays, unless they happen to be Jews and/or Gay themselves suffering from a severe case of historical memory loss.
Indeed it is quite absurd. It's as if a restaurant decided to go veggie and people were scandalized that they would not be able to order steak. Or organic. Or any particular cuisine. And here it is often those who are scandalized by the very notion of fast food, and American fast food in particular, who are upset about not being able to get their bacon burger that they would never have eaten anyway. (Of course, we've also learned that the chain was purchased by the Caisse des Dépôts under fishy circumstances... making each French person a part owner.)
You're quite right Marc! Nobody is forced to have bacon on their burger (and the burger wouldn't be hallal or kosher anyway!--and who has heard of hallal turkey!?) or frequent a given restaurant, etc.
I too did hear my share of rants against American food, though the rants were much milder than those against neologisms. I heard the linguist Andre Martinet some years ago talk about the French fear of neologisms which any language needs in order to deal with new circumstances. As a result, Martinet said, French has more borrowed words than any other language.... how ironical!
In the meanwhile American cuisine sure has changed: it's becoming more and more spicy, among other things... It's American cuisine that's the true melting pot (silly pun intended!)
re neologisms: I recall the Académie française (or the Délégation à la langue française or whatever) refusing "courriel" for "e-mail". Courriel was already in common use in Quebec, but the French authorities found it barbaric, and insisted we say "courrier électronique". Guess what: everyone says "e-mail" or "mail". And the French authorities finally consented to using "courriel", but by that time the English versions were so well established that "courriel" remains in the minority.
Wow! I didn't know these bozos objected to "couriel". I was wondering why "mail" seems to have been universally adopted in France ... ironic!
@Kati:
http://www.culture.gouv.fr/culture/dglf/cogeter/20-06-03-courriel.htm
That's the official rule replacing 1997's "courrier électronique" with "courriel".
The latest gem also comes from Quebec, apparently: "baladodiffusion" for "podcasting".
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