Paris Burning: PC Media Blackout?

The rioting in France should be an eye opener for us in the USA as we are fast getting all the ingredients by failing to secure out borders (not only the southern)WAKE UP AMERICA.

 

They will riot in San Fransisco, or Chicago, where folks are denied their right to arm themselves, but if they start burning cars & other property in other cities, they will die. Call it a hunch.

 

A few things to add at this stage:

- to my mind these riots are about the failure of the French policy on integration, which is one of attempted assimilation (as in the famous example of West Indian "département d'outre mer" children being taught, in Guadeloupe, to learn about "nos ancêtres les Gaulois" (our ancestors the Gauls)).

- pointing the finger at the failure of this policy is to run the risk of ignoring the shortcomings of other policies. The French just can't understand the melting-pot philosophy of the UK which allows (so far) extremism to flourish uncontrolled in the name of diversity. (This morning's "Ouest-France" carries a cheeky news article (not an editorial) on the "failure of the anglo-saxon integration model", witness the rise of racially-motivated attacks in the UK).

- while ethnic Muslims are undoubtedly at the centre of much of the unrest, I don't think they see themselves first and foremost as Muslim but as excluded. There is no way they represent the rise of Islam as things stand, but further repression (and the "send-them-all-home" comments by Sarkozy) might well make for some future radical recruits.

- some posters to be worrying about principalities and powers. At this point, I'm far more worried about the actions of the latter via government, as states seize on unrest as a means of rushing through legislation nibbling away at civil and religious freedom of expression and movement.

- Finally, the headscarves. Ostentatious religious symbols are important historically in France because they were used by the Catholic church to impose their hegemony, for example via crucifixes in schools. The removal of these in the 19th century was a bloody and violent episode which has left the French nervous about such things.

 

So, Matt, does this mean you are starting to change your point of view from your original opinion?

 

No, just expanding it; note my use of the word 'excluded' in my third paragraph above. It's partly about poverty and partly about a wider sense of exclusion.

In a multi-ethnic society, two extremes have to be avoided. One is imposed uniformity eg: we're all Frenchmen and all the same, we all look and speak the same, and are all secular humanists. The trouble is with that model is that anyone who does not conform is automatically excluded, whether you be a devout Jew, an evangelical (and I know quite a few who have been 'excluded' eg: from their jobs or their families for being open about their faith), or a practising Muslim (if you're a practising or devout Catholic, you can just about get away with it as it was the majority religion, but even that's pushing it nowadays); or indeed a British ex-pat who insists on not learning French and just hanging out with other ex-pat Brits. That's the French model (also the Swiss to an extent) and it doesn't work.

The other extreme is the idea that everyone is free to express their identity as superior to the exclusion, denigration or plain ignorance of everyone else's. That is multi-culturalism gone mad and results equally in ghettoisation. That is the danger that the British model has always to be wary of (hence Trevor Phillips' warning to which I have earlier alluded), and indeed we see this most clearly in Northern Ireland with its tradition of sectarian violence.

Between the two lies the happy medium - unity in diversity with tolerance and mutual respect for each others' identities.

 

I enjoyed reading that Matt. LE, I don't think he is changing his mind, but I can tell the hard reality is hitting home.