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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| chelovek Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6085 days ago 413 posts - 461 votes  5 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Russian | Message 17 of 28 17 April 2008 at 8:53pm | IP Logged | |||||
The good news is that even though there are lots of extreme liberal morons, there's an equivalent amount of extreme conservative morons. The end result is that things tend to get resolved in the reasonable middle ground. (Though to be honest, most of the far-right things actually aren't too moronic or extreme.) Edited by chelovek on 17 April 2008 at 8:58pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| guilon Pentaglot Senior Member Spain Joined 6190 days ago 226 posts - 229 votes Speaks: Spanish*, PortugueseC2, FrenchC2, Italian, English | Message 18 of 28 17 April 2008 at 9:56pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I wonder who really is taking this surreal contest too seriously, whether the French purists or Fox news.
How can a lousy song for a clunky contest represent the soul of a country? They all should take Eurovision for what it is and send a turkey puppet singing gibberish in whatever language they want, Ireland will this year. What does this have to do with cultural hegemony or uniformity? Is really imposing French to that Sebastien Tellier freak (you should listen to his songs or to his interviews) how they fight for their language? As ipanema said this is only comical. It is funny how the French authorities find new paths to defend their “threatened” language but it is also funny how Fox news (or AP, or whoever admires this article for that matter) don’t miss a chance to undermine those chauvinist Frenchmen. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Walshy Triglot Senior Member Australia Joined 6940 days ago 335 posts - 365 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, German | Message 19 of 28 17 April 2008 at 11:00pm | IP Logged | |||||
Why is this illogic so popular in the US? The Golden-Mean Fallacy. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| frenkeld Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6941 days ago 2042 posts - 2719 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German | Message 20 of 28 17 April 2008 at 11:32pm | IP Logged | |||||
Not only in the US - it's the same in every democracy, even if the actual political spectrum varies from one to another. If you think about it, accepting as some sort of popular will the outcome of elections when the difference in the number of votes may be less than two percent, as it often is these days, is more of a societal agreement on how to avoid bloodshed than a meaningful decision-making process. So, middle ground it is, reasonable or not. Edited by frenkeld on 18 April 2008 at 2:24pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Marc Frisch Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6663 days ago 1001 posts - 1169 votes Speaks: German*, French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Persian, Tamil | Message 21 of 28 18 April 2008 at 4:43am | IP Logged | |||||
I completely agree. I live in France and the first and only time I read about protest against the song being in English was on this forum. In reality, I think that the contest has lost a lot of its popularity and people just don't care anymore. Even if they had by far the best song, it would be hard for countries like France or Germany to win, the voting system clearly favors the countries from South-Eastern Europe and Russia. So it's not surprising that serious artists don't participate and 80% of the songs are stupid shallow pop songs. I do find it sad that most countries sing in English and that the songs are becoming more and more alike. Before, the Eurovision was an event where you could get a glimpse at a lot of different cultures and hear many different languages. Today, the songs are all the same. Personally, I prefer the French to sing in French; look at the songs presented by Sweden, Denmark and Norway: each year silly pop songs in English with no trace of anything Scandinavian.. Is that better? Edited by Marc Frisch on 18 April 2008 at 4:44am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| fsc Senior Member United States Joined 6327 days ago 100 posts - 117 votes Studies: French | Message 22 of 28 18 April 2008 at 5:01am | IP Logged | |||||
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I heard that so many people in Paris speak English. Here I am struggling to learn French yet so many people in Paris speak English. What course or method are they using to learn English in a country where they are so protective of French? That's what I want to know.
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| chelovek Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6085 days ago 413 posts - 461 votes 5 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Russian | Message 23 of 28 18 April 2008 at 5:27am | IP Logged | |||||
Are you saying that a compromise between two extremes can never be correct? We (and most other Western countries) tend to come to reasonable solutions that don't particularly cater to either extreme, ie. the middle ground. In cases of extreme Right versus extreme Left, the middle ground often does end up being a reasonable solution, but don't confuse that with me having a false notion that the middle ground HAS to be reasonable. Edited by chelovek on 18 April 2008 at 5:37am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Walshy Triglot Senior Member Australia Joined 6940 days ago 335 posts - 365 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, German | Message 24 of 28 18 April 2008 at 6:41am | IP Logged | |||||
I never said that the middle ground is inherently false, but if it is correct, it is merely a coincidence. My point is that you can't judge the validity of something by finding where the middle ground is. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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