Defend the public character of Hydro-Québec
Strengthen institutions
Totally agree. We must strengthen our public institutions and not privatize them. Neoliberalism has only made our people poorer and more vulnerable and has increased inequality for the past 40 years, in addition to destroying the planet. It does shed this destructive ideology if our people are to survive.
Danielle Cormier, Saint-Hubert
Master of Green Energy
Let us never forget that the main value of the private sector, in all spheres of our society, is the pursuit of profit and the financial satisfaction of shareholders. We are Hydro-Québec’s shareholders and the message to the government must be clear: “Masters at home for all clean energy sources”. There is no question of dismantling Hydro-Québec for private interests. On the contrary, it is time for Hydro-Québec to create a monopoly on the ownership of green energies.
Andre Clermont, Austin
Citizen referendums: don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater
It was the citizen struggles that prevented Old Montreal from being razed to become a highway, that ensured that the Old Port was our window on the river rather than a forest of towers and that so many aberrations were blocked which we are so happy to have escaped.
On the other hand, the current rules on zoning changes produce nonsense with regularity. People living within walking distance of a project cannot comment on their immediate environment. On the other hand, others living at a safe distance have a right of life or death over projects that do not concern them. The most aberrant thing is to see some citizens living in the Gruyère holes not having the same rights as those around them.
The rules should no longer be the same for changes affecting a few people as for major projects that would despoil the landscape for miles around.
The rules must change. It’s clear. However, the public authorities seem inclined to want to reproduce the recipe followed for the REM, that of creating a state within a state endowed with superpowers which ends up creating architectural horrors like those seen around the Lachine Canal and elsewhere, as well as generating noises not only very loud, but particularly unpleasant.
The current government must not wipe out the achievements of the past to unduly favor certain economic players. Let’s be wise, don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater!
Daniel Chartier, landscape architect, Mercier
When a “genius” leaves the stage
place of criticism
I respect the work of Xavier Dolan and he is entitled to all of his decisions regarding his art and his life. On the other hand, I wonder about the tendency that columnists or other critics often have to qualify certain artists who are still young as geniuses without thinking of the weight they impose on their shoulders.
Claude Jean
About the “sense of productivity”
Prioritize and Accomplish
Thanks for talking about productivity in those terms. I’ve always had 50,000 projects in mind. I’m better able to prioritize them now, and especially to accomplish those that are most important to me and that are “achievable”. I don’t think I’m more productive, but I have greater personal satisfaction. And at the end of the day, the week, the month and the year, that’s what matters most to me.
Line Roundel
Why do you want to be so productive?
My question is very simple: why do you want to be so productive? Who are we trying to impress? Why this choice which looks more like an obsession rather than the search for balance? Questions among many others.
Jean-Pierre Beauchesne
Get rid of guilt
This is the first time that I have been told clearly that the problem is what I believe. I had never thought of it from that angle. I give myself the right not to be efficient and to procrastinate, I talk to myself to forgive myself for these deviations, but I still have the feeling of guilt. Thank you for this new reflection.
Sophie Mailhot