Intifada in France

[Rune]

@clairobscur

That’s an ovrall good articles, though I would dispute some side comments (for instance, the young kids breaking in a parking meter at the beginning of the article in all likehood didn’t come from “la zone” but were likely roma kids of central european origin from a significantly worst slum in the Paris area.

I think that goes not to the origin of the kids but to the general moral compass of everyday citizens. If average people are no longer outraged at crime and, to an extend, willing to stand up for the principles on which their society is build and share a certain sense of common destiny, then you already are in very deep trouble. Police can never be everywhere. Here’s another article I just stumbled over:France Facing ‘Horrendous’ Balance Sheet. What stroke me was this passage:

A map published in the afternoon by Le Monde showed that ethnic violence - the “French Intifada,” as it is being referred to by some journalists and political leaders - had spread almost all over the country, with the exception of Inner Brittany, western Normandy, and Burgundy, where North African and black communities are small, and Corsica, where a large North African community is held in check by a local nationalist movement that itself is prone to violence.

According to this, people in Corsica have avoided trouble, not because of fewer immigrants but because the average people, or at least a number of national minded people, of Corsica would never accept it and would shoot them down like mad dogs.

@clairobscur

As i wrote in another post in GQ, these riots might serve a purpose if they make the government try to handle seriously the issue (both from the “restore order” side and the the “solve the underlying issues” side) or even in some case simply to restore policies that were abandonned in order to spare some money as the prime minister genuinely admitted yesterday.

Some would say that would be the absolutely worst outcome. That France already for too long has nursed a culture where blackmailing with threats of destruction is paying off, wether it’s farmers blocking imports from Spain, truck drivers blocking highways all over France letting foodstuff rot in the trucks or shipyard employees highjacking ships - always met with concessions. And there’s nothing that breeds contempt in a bully as much as a pushover. And if the rioters find that not only is rioting and torching cars great fun (which it undoubtable is), it also is a great way to gain respect and recognition. And find that it pays. Then they might as well riot again and again and again.

[clairobscur]

@Rune

Some would say that would be the absolutely worst outcome. That France already for too long has nursed a culture where blackmailing with threats of destruction is paying off, wether it’s farmers blocking imports from Spain, truck drivers blocking highways all over France letting foodstuff rot in the trucks or shipyard employees highjacking ships - always met with concessions. And there’s nothing that breeds contempt in a bully as much as a pushover. And if the rioters find that not only is rioting and torching cars great fun (which it undoubtable is), it also is a great way to gain respect and recognition. And find that it pays. Then they might as well riot again and again and again.

It’s the same problem than in some debates about terrorism : some things should be done, not in order to give in the terrorist/thughs demands, but because they’re the right thing to do. And similarily, a country shouldn’t refrain from doing them just because that what’s the terrorists/thughs demand. It’s a sad state of affairs when obvious problems are ignored until things get completely out of hand.

I would note that the issues these youths face, other people, who aren’t burning cars, face too. Punishing the first is one thing, but stating that nothing should be done for the others just because their neighbors burned cars isn’t acceptable. Like fever, theese riots are a symptom that something is wrong within the social body. Just taking care of the symptom while letting the disease spread isn’t sufficient.

[DSeid]

So after the riots are quelled, and those individuals who are culpable are punished. How does France proceed? What would you prescribe for the “social body”?

My take:[ul]
[li]Admit that there is discrimination and that is ingrained. See it. To attempt a cure without looking at what is diseased is very difficult. [/li][li]Cease institutionalized intolerance masquerading as “secularism” and embrace the concept of a multicultural France in which seperation of Church and State includes that the State stays out of your personal belief matters.[/li][li]Make discrimination illegal.[/li][li]Learn from others mistakes. Concentrations of poor in warehouses is a failed concept. Scattered site housing is a much less uncsuccessful model.[/li][li]And of course economic revitalization! easy to say. How about some tax incentives to encourage investments in those suburban poor areas?[/li][/ul]

Thoughts? Especially yours, Clair. And Clair, you mentioned the Romani. The Romani are also excluded from “real” French society. Could you compare and contrast their situation with the Muslim/African one please? Thank you.

[Lochdale]

France should also work to limit or severly curb immigration. There needs to be generational integration and that will not happen with sustained immigration. Moreover, Islamic authorities/leaders need to recognize that they are as devisive as the French. That they have not made an effort to integrate and that their isolationist point of view is prohibiting integration.

Most of all though, limit or end mass-immigration.