In a nutshell, the guy was not able to get service in French from Air Canada. He sued and he won. Is he a language vigilante, out to protect French? Is he a whiner who has nothing better to do? Is he simply a man who was tired of not having his rights met? I don't know and personally, I don't really care. What matters here is that in this case, he was in the right.
Canada has two official languages, French and English. As such, Canadians have the right to receive services from the federal government in either language. (As a side note, there is no official language in the United States. Yes, that's right, there is no law saying I have a right to get government services in English.)
In Canada, this right extends to "crown corporations," which as I understand it are organizations that were created by and partly (or moreso) funded by the Canadian government. They aren't departments of the government, but they are bound by the same rules and regulations.
Air Canada is a crown corporation. As such, it has to adhere to the Official Languages Act which governs the whole "French / English" thing. Does this mean that every employee of Air Canada has to be bilingual? No. It just means that the services need to be available. And is this really so hard? It doesn't have to be. So much on an airplane is either prerecorded or scripted. And as for the rest, it doesn't take any real proficiency in French to understand "Une Spirt, si vous plait."
Plenty of comments are there make it sound like this ruling is shoving French down people's throats. Honestly, how so? It doesn't say that every shop/restaurant/business has to provide bilingual service. It doesn't affect private organizations at all; it simply enforces the law that already exists. And the guy in question asked for a much larger settlement than he was awarded, so it's not like he's being treated with kid gloves. It protects BOTH official languages: if I fly Air Canada in Quebec or the Maritimes or wherever and I don't get service in English, I have the same right to sue.
So really, why all that hate?
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