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In a tongue-in-cheek bid to answer whether striking students should “return to class,” Quebec comedian Guy Nantel took a camera to an anti-austerity demonstration and captured protesters failing basic questions about math, politics and the definition of “austerity.”

“Austerity is when everything inflates,” answered one student, calling it a synonym for “inflation.”

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Another answered, “I don’t know, I’ll be honest, I couldn’t give you a definition in only a few words.”

“You don’t know what austerity is, but you’re protesting against it?” returned Nantel.

“Yes,” he said.

Several also misspelled the word, including a woman with a Université Laval

jacket and a man carrying a flag that—the video noted — happened to be emblazoned with the correct spelling of “austérité.”