Une observation sur la réalité

Question

I speak French daily with educated people including medical doctors and professors of French. I never ever EVER hear anyone actually use sentences with elaborate subordinate clauses and tricky coordinated futures - especially not these dances of the futures. In fact, the French, based on my observations, will do anything they can to avoid subordinate clauses and the more treacherous irregular verbs. And as often as not they screw it up. I've heard some real botched sentences on France 2, where a brave C2 tries to deal with the ne expletive. If a French politician can't navigate this stuff.......... Sometimes I throw in a fancy sentence like the ones in this lesson: And as often as not my interlocuteur will ask if I read that in Balzac. Not that the budding francophone ought therefore ignore this stuff. You do see this in some written material but in my opinion ever more so rarely. I'd be interested in the comments of older C2s....max

Céline Pickard · Accepted Answer

Bonjour Max,
After discussing this question within the language team, we (French native speakers) find that the examples in this particular lesson are very common and not in the least 'Balzac-ian' ;-). It is true though that there is a difference between spoken French and written French, i.e. dropping 'ne' in a negative sentence etc. 
I hope this is helpful.
Bonne journée !