Response from Bob Sirois to Mr. Andrew Podnieks and the IIHF
There is no anti-French bias (your
Mr. Podnieks and the IIHF, The problem I have in dealing with your analysis of my book, Le Québec mis en échec, is that you haven't even read it. You make assumptions about almost everything in the book and you critique your own impressions of what you think is in it, but your views and insinuations show nothing but contempt for the intelligence of the entire Canadian population. You ask the question, "Where's the proof of racism here?" Well, in the 278 pages of my book, I did not once mention the word "racism". You also write that my biggest accusation is that "the NHL is not admitting as many French-Canadians as players from other provinces". I'm sorry to say that again I did not write this. You write that my "biggest statistical error is to consider NHLers in terms of ratio to the entire population of the country". Obviously you haven't read a single page of the book, because I did not use this ratio. So let's stop playing around. Here's what I said and wrote in my book: "... the NHL is the league of English Canadians; when it comes to equal talent, most of the teams in the NHL will take an English-Canadian hockey player over players from any other country, including hockey players from the US". You also suggest in your article that we should "consider ratio in terms of hockey players across the country", i.e. Canada. I did exactly that, but in terms of all North American hockey players, because the NHL is also American. I did not include this ratio in my book because the book focusses on Quebec. But now that you say - and the rest of Canada also believes - that ratio in terms of hockey players is the only way to prove there is no favoritism, how are you going to explain to American hockey fans and to young American hockey players that although for the last 10 years the number of young hockey players in the US (400,000+) has been almost the same as in Canada (400,000+), this year, just like in all previous years, the NHL has almost 200 more Canadian hockey players than American hockey players? What are you going to say about this to the younger generation of American hockey players and to American hockey fans? Certainly not the same things you mention in your article regarding the 'style of play of Quebeckers'. On the other hand, maybe American hockey players are not Canadian enough for you. If you'd read my book, you'd know that I'm half Quebecker and half French-American - my father was born in Saint David, Maine, in 1927. I'm the only member of the Sirois family living in the province of Quebec. All of my uncles, aunts and cousins, as well as my brother and nieces, are Americans and live in the States. So what are you going to call me this time? A French-American separatist? Bob Sirois
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