"Rebuild society around the social and cultural reality of everyday life." There it is. The politicians of the west have been trying to convince the middle and lower classes that we need to get used to an "everday" life that includes violence, job insecurity, housing insecurity, etc. The People do not accept.
Especially while the government pays to make sure tons of degrees are completely worthless and just plays the game of putting everyone in debt. People in debt are easiest to control. Especially if they must rely on the State.
Biden is doing his best to relieve the debt burden by canceling school debts, absorbing the losses at the taxpayers' expense...without having Congress agree to have Uncle Sam float the tab.
Not exactly...A fair number of them got hired by colleges and universities to enhance their pioneering program of Ethnic Studies of Lower Slobovia.
Here's a question for the intrepid Free Press staff to keep a lookout for: An explanation as to how Ibram Kendi of Boston University's Center for Antiracist Research managed to blow through millions of dollars in grants in such a short period of time.
A beautiful tribute to a beautiful country and its people. Never forget Charlie Hebdo, Bataclan, Lola Daviet, Samuel Paty, Thomas of Crepol, and many other innocent French people who have been sacrificed at the altar of mass migration. The elites will do everything they can to put down the peasant revolts across Europe and continue importing military aged men who seek to conquer instead of assimilate.
I see you are well informed about the shitty events happening in my country, Yuri. You can Dominique Bernard, a history professor who was recently murdered in his high school by a former student, an islamist of course.
"France desperately needs a new Charles Martel to arise and defend his nation"
I'm reminded of a line from one of my favorite movies, "Praise the country that produces heroes. Pity the country that needs them". If we've become a country that depends on heroes to defend us, we've become a country not worth defending.
Not necessarily. Sometimes people just need a hero to rally them. To let them know they're not alone and not crazy to think that how they do. And countries need heroes to remind them of who they are and the ideals they hold Why are so many things in America named Washington? Because he held us together and was a beacon. And as George III said of him, when Washington spurned the offer of third term that it "placed him [Washington] in a light the most distinguished of any man living, and that he thought him the greatest character of the age.”
You're old school Bruce. We now live in a country Washington would not recognize. He was fortunate to live among men and women willing to pick up a musket and fight for liberty and freedom. The country no doubt needs leaders such as Washington, but he would never have triumphed without the unsung heroes who died at Lexington and Concord, who braved the icy waters of the Delaware River on Christmas Eve to attack the Hessians and provide a desperately needed victory and the ultimate triumph of our forefather’s vision.
We now live in a country where their bravery is all but forgotten. We live in a country where anarchists can freely, and without penalty tear down the statues of men like Washington, and others that literally risked life and limb to provide the very freedoms they now seek to take away. Worse, there is a cohort of powerful people both inside and outside government who are determined that they succeed. I agree with the author’s prescription, what is needed “is a central, diverse, multiethnic coalition…one that “doesn’t have a class consciousness but is aware of having been deprived of its rights, of having been gradually pushed aside”. The question is, do we still have such men and women?
I believe we do still have that in us. Our problem is that we’ve had it too good for too long and those brave men and women who’ve worked their way up and made it to the middle and upper middle classes are just beginning to open their eyes. Most have been more concerned about fantasy football stats than world events until 2020 smacked them in face. In my circle at least, they are talking more about the state of the nation and more receptive to people like myself who have been sounding the alarm for years. Recently we started a Friday morning coffee discussion group in an upper room at a cafe in town. 3 guys at first and now we often have 15-20 show up. Cell phones left in cars. We each share things we’ve read and discuss the tyranny and lies all around us. We have no leader or no formal plan but each is preparing for 2024 in their own way and spreading the word. I imagine there are groups like this all across the nation. The founding fathers only had about a 17% participation rate in 1776. Even if we only have 10% that’s 30 million people and enough to force the political elites to their knees. I’m not quite White Pilled just yet but I do have some hope.
We live in a society that has lost sight of what our Constitution has to say about our federal government.
The Constitution proposes a government that is granted powers that act for the common good that are better exercised by one over the many. The Constitution limits the federal government only to those powers explicitly enumerated, and reserves all others to the States and The People themselves to exercise.
How far have we come from those days of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Monroe?
So far that our government, through the federal bureaucracy,
daily touches every man, woman, and child and places an estimated regulatory burden--a hidden tax--of more than $14,000 per year on each one. Gasoline taxes, surcharges on utility bills, emission standards for autos, ethanol subsidies, electric car rebates, etc., etc.
Our nation, with the cooperation of our (lazy) Congress, has granted the administrative state powers that would appall our founding fathers.
Like you, Kurt, I have been concerned for the state of our nation. And, were there to be a group such as yours in my area, I would attend, I might even try to start one.
I find it fascinating that so many people, interested in quality journalism, have found their way to The Free Press and who join in the discussions of the fine essays that our fine editors have enabled. I am somewhat astonished by the conservative/libertarian lean of us refugees from the destruction of objective journalism offered by the New York Times and the Washington Post.
Be careful, Kurt. The FBI will be sending in their informants soon, as open discussion cannot be tolerated by the elite. I'd vet new members carefully. Jeez, I'm only half joking.
You're old school, too, but I'd venture to guess many years younger than I am. So there's hope there, too. My youngest and many of his friends - mostly male, unfortunately - are very conservative and despise our current ruling class.
Reagan rallied this nation when we were under the malaise of Carter's stagflation and had lost our will to fight against the Soviet threat.
I was actually going to vote for Carter in '76, but we deployed to Norway and even though absentee ballots had been around since the 1864 election, they didn't make any effort to educate us about it. After a miserable and embarrassing four years under the peanut farmer, I gleefully voted for Ronnie.
In the 1980 debates, Ronnie asked, "Are you better off now than you were four years ago[?]" and he went on to win handily. Four years later, he asked the same question and won in the largest landslide since Washington's reelection.
My first Presidential vote went to Carter. Four years later, I had realized my mistake, but was working overseas. Got my absentee ballot, and because nobody on my team could believe a New York Jew would vote Republican, I marked it for Reagan, signed, and sealed it in public.
The Reagan transformation was thrilling. I was at the Statue of Liberty centennial celebration when President and Mrs. Reagan came in. What a great, magic moment for America.
Yet, Biden sat in his basement, peeking out occasionally, and won by 81 MILLION VOTES! THE MOST popular president ever elected in the history of our country!
We can only hope whoever runs against him will ask that same question, “Are you better off today than you were 4 years ago”?
Heroes emerge from the events within the social milieu. They stand proud because of notable acts of sacrifice of self for the sake of the many. They are the voices of sanity in the midst of mayhem. They are individuals for whom service for others is a way of life, not a cosplay to enhance one's fortunes. The hero is the one who acts because it is the right thing to do.
Perhaps that's the distinction between a hero and a leader - a leader has followers, a hero acts whether or not there are followers. In our rush to eradicate our history from our kids' education, we've also lost the concept of "quiet heroism." Doing the right thing even when no one's watching; doing the right thing even when the clarion cacophany blares that it's wrong.
I recently traveled to Paris and I have to say I will not be going back anytime soon. So much change in 40 years the unique culture of the city is becoming nonexistent.
Isn’t it SHOCKING? I’ve been visiting Paris since I was 12 years old, and summer 2022’s visit was like going to another city entirely...and I’m bilingual! Then we went to Bretagne, and -- apart from the bad neighborhoods of the biggest cities in the area -- we were back in La France d’antan.
In order to save France, the French have to have the resolve and to admit the reality of their situation. Instead Macron, while initially supporting Israel, has now come out demanding a ceasefire, which only benefits Hamas. France, like Europe, happily embraces amnesia. There was a ceasefire on October 6. It takes courage to stand up to the forces of Islamist genocidal hate. Don't bet the Jewish future (or the future of freedom) on France or any part of Europe.
France has a deep, visceral, multi-generational antisemitism strain evident throughout its entire history, from Dreyfus to the Paris Velodrome, to enforcing an arms embargo against Israel as it fought for its survival against 20x larger adversaries on every side in 1967, France has always been antisemitic. Macron simply recognized that to come out in support of Hamas immediately after Oct. 7 would have been bad manners, so he waited a bit until it became politically tenable, and then resorted back to form, his and France's. It would be unwise to expect anything other than ardent antisemitism from France.
Yes, except those German Jews didn’t have the benefit of hindsight . If French Jews stick to “but we’ve been good French citizens for hundreds of years - France won’t let us down,” then their demise is on them.
Their demise may be physically and emotionally on them, but the social contract with France puts a great deal of blame on France and its ruling elites.
Don't forget that they had literally nowhere to go. In the months before the start of World War II, Germany expelled thousands of Jews to Poland; but Poland refused to let them in. The poor families lived in a kind of refugee camp on the German-Polish border, until war rolled over them and the Germans found them a solution.
French Jews have where to go if they wish. From what I understand Israeli bureaucrats are no worse than French ones.
Yes that’s part of my point - French Jews today aren’t in the same position as 1930s German Jews because they have options and have hindsight of the Vichy regime’s crimes, so staying is foolish.
We spent 32 years in our quaint New England town some distance (not too far) from the bustling streets of Boston. Two years ago, we moved to another quaint town near the New Hampshire line...Two months later, we came to the conclusion that we missed, terribly, the quaintness and quietness of where we lived before, bought ourselves out of the lease we had signed, and moved back.
There actually has been significant movement since 2015. The Jewish population in France has declined from 750,000 to 500,000 with most of them moving to Israel which has about 200,000 French Jews living there.
Not sure what you are alluding to. My comment was about the antisemitism prevalent in French society. I don't see that changing regardless of their feelings about DEI, intersectionalism, or whatever else.
I understand Susan's remarks as seeing Macron recognizing that the progressivism and "equity" policies as attacking the Western traditions of inalienable rights.
Macron also recognized that the French pension system was untenable and needed reform. He had to use Article 49.3 of the French Constitution to ram through raising the retirement age from 62 to 64 because they couldn’t afford to keep paying pension benefits under the existing age limits. What did the French do? Raise holy hell, that’s what.
When Macron wanted to stop some of the mandatory job benefits that kept employers from hiring young people (and thus reduce unemployment in the under-30 group), what did the French do? Raise holy hell, that’s what. People were actually quoted as saying they would rather their kids have no job at all than a job with less benefits than the parents had. Even the kids protested in favor of keeping the benefits even if it meant they remained unemployed.
So this essay is a bunch of complete nonsense. The French have a terrible economy because their social benefits system discourages full employment, hurts business, keeps multinationals from locating in France, and is bankrupting them. But “the people” refuse to give it up, and then blame Macron for being “out of touch”.
That's one view…. But there are Jews who survived Vichy and its antisemitism. And each of the survivors owe their life to a French person who helped. I am part of what became to be called:”Les enfants cachés “. And we survived because many French people, although not in love with Jews, did not see why they should be killed.
The EU has been lost from the first day of its founding! The push to de-emphasize national identity was the first marker to their downfall. National identity was, and IS, a flag that many look toward as a guidepost for prospering.
I’m looking forward to the day the WHO attempts to use its new Global Pandemic powers and attempt to bully and the world into compliance for the next phony pandemic likely to be sprung on us next year. All hell is going to break loose. I don’t think they planned to do it so soon but they know the clock is ticking and we are waking up. When Martial Law is declared how many soldiers will step over the line and join the resistance? Hard to say but be ready for chaos and upheavals the likes of which, on a global scale, have never been seen before.
You would think that thousands of years of human history would be enough to teach them we are all individuals, made in the image of our Creator, not some amorphous crowd.
The EU and its founding politicians were looking to form an economic and social community across Europe. Unlike in America, where new states formed and were accepted into the Union, the EU was collectivizing already existing states. There was no shake-down period to internalize the mechanics of federalization, and there was no recognition of the acceptance of national identity.
The EU had no training wheels and ran headlong into the realities of national identity.
It was a fine idea in the post-war context, but it failed to create a United Europe of Sovereign States. The French will always be French. The Germans will always be Germans. And the Italians? They'll always be up for a fine family meal with pasta and wine for all.
No surprise that, when you spend decades allowing a fifth column to infiltrate your country, that you now need to temporize with and assuage these savages.
People are already taking things into their own hands. In the past few weeks ,"toughs" or "rowdies" in England and Ireland have taken to the streets-- in Ireland it was violent-- to protest what they see as losing their country - or having it taken from them. Instead of heeding the warning, politicians clamp down on the rowdies-- even as swarms of "protesters" hostile to the West plant their own flags and deface and trample Britain's war memorials to its fallen soldiers with impunity. One threatened to kill someone's dogs as a
policeman simply nodded. There is a sense of primacy. That is what happens when a hubristic establishment forces unwanted and extreme cultural and demographic changes against its own people, society, and ways of life.
I've said this before and will reiterate - cops need to choose and need to choose wisely and with care. If they choose to be the tools of oppression they had better understand that they are few in numbers and that they - and their families - live amongst us and cannot hide.
The desecration of Britain's memorials to their honored and sacred war dead should be huge wake up call of the dangers within. These ghouls need to be excised from decent society and be sent packing back to the vermin's nests from which they came.
This comment disturbs me more than anything else I've read in this thread. On the issues I probably agree 90% with Mr Miller. But the threat of vigilante violence is as great as anything the current establishment does, and the radicals (left and right) in every country embrace it. We need solutions, but we also need to remember that a crucial legacy of Western democracy is the capacity for ordered freedom through the ballot box. We should be thinking about the legislation and budget reforms we want elected politicians to enact, not adding to policemen's (and their wives' and children's) worry about where the next bullet is going to come from.
Recently there were some killings in Ireland and the suspect is being withheld from the public by the government. I suspect the reason is because the people on the street would take matters into their own hands and terminate the suspect.
Yes but it's everything. When and where I grew up, it was unheard of for people's cars to be stolen in their own driveways. Or to be followed home from the store and robbed. My dad left his convertible in the driveway with the keys in it. Forget about car jackings - there wasn't a word for it. Once upon a time, passengers just boarded airplanes -imagine that -- no security and no need for it. No burms in front of buildings. You walked into the Capitol like you owned it, because you did. We've lost a lot.
Theft by apparently everyone is completely out of control. Six years ago I had a $12000 shipment stolen while in custody of the shipper. Theft of shipped phones and other merchandise is through the roof -- some people are getting three and four replacement phones sent to them by Apple. Maybe the third time is the trick, hoped one. Newt Gingrich- I was not a fan but now wish he were younger, warns about what he calls "the forces of crime" destablizing society. It needs to be controlled because homes are next. What's stopping it? Again, if a
prosecutor refused to enforce the law there would have been hell to pay. The police are eunuchs, standing by in the face of mayhem, being spat upon, forbidden to enforce the law or destroyed and ruined for doing so. This is untenable. Organized rings from outside the UK are sending bands of thieves into England to rob stores and homes. I guess this is what sacking looks like. I read about the sacking of Rome but never thought I'd live through it.
And in a similar vein, I haven’t seen any updates about the shooting of the three Palestinian men in Burlington VT... I wonder what is going on with that.
The attack was reported Tuesday night on NBC with Lester Holt @ 6:30. They proudly showed the victims standing arm in arm wearing their keffiyeh. But did not report on a suspect. My daughter goes to school @ UVM in Burlington. The place is a ghost town. I am very suspicious.
They arrested a White man, Jason Eaton, 48, about a day later, and the police chief has been very squirrely about the circumstances. That’s the part that seems odd.
Of course MSM has been gnashing their teeth and rendering their garments over the three victims (which is more than they do for anyone shot on an average weekend in Chicago, but shooting people without a darned good reason is never ok). The other odd thing is that MSM keeps “reporting” whatever the Arab lobby groups tell them, with absolutely no effort to verify it. So, the lobbyists say it’s a hate crime, but the police seem very reluctant to confirm that. Something just isn’t sitting right.
Have they arrested anyone? I'm sure they're looking. I thought the Irish police had someone in detention for the stabbings who they won't identify, but I could be wrong.
Less than 14 days ago, a young rugbyman named Thomas was murdered by a horde of people in rural central France, at the end of a village party.
It was clearly heard that the culprits said they were here to "kill white people".
Later on, after 7 suspects were arrested, the procureur (= district attorney) said he refused to release the first names of the suspects, several of them being minors.
At this point, everybody knew what the names would be like, and the attitude of the procureur was revealing of his political leaning : you don't want the good hillbillies of France to know it's the Arabs, "again", as it is most of the time in this kind of "fait divers".
Because it was, and the primary suspect of the stabbing was named Chaid.
> Instead Macron, while initially supporting Israel, has now come out demanding a ceasefire, which only benefits Hamas.
Worth adding that Crepol is a town of under 600 people. The thugs who came and stabbed him (and 16 others, 2 others in critical condition) traveled from Romans-sur-Isrene, which is quite far away. These were not local lads having a brawl, or mentally ill people -- this was a terrorist attack that targeted the dance party.
And soon enough there will be real hell to pay. And all the cops in all the world won't be able to do a thing to stop it. Because, by standing by and doing nothing, they were complicit in releasing this whirlwind.
Canada never WAS great, and never will be! They are the equivalent of an appendix in the body of the former British Empire. Useless and with some undefined function.
Except when we sacrificed so many of our Canadian young men in both of our world wars. I take exception of your categorization of Canada being useless. Our current leader definitely is. But not our people.
I thought that I'd arouse some latent patriotism among the citizens 😁. This does not mean that I disregard Canada's partnership in the (sort of) Free World, it is just that your southern neighbors have a superiority complex.
It doesn’t matter what Americans think, or who they are. One might argue they deserve to feel that way based on their past, and possible current position as defenders of the Free World. But your comment was about Canada. I wanted to set the record straight.
Canada, pre-Justin Trudeau, was a thriving as a united, multicultural society with all of the freedoms and an economy similar to that of their southern neighbor.
It should be noted that Canada's immigration laws are some of the strictest in the Western world. They are an ingenious application of Catch-22: You can't emigrate to Canada unless you have a job, and you can't a job unless you are a citizen of Canada. (Not quite that bad, but approaching it.)
Their bureaucracy is as inscrutable as that of the French..."Oh no no, monsieur, you do not have enough paperwork:"
Through restricting immigration based on a demonstrable ability to live without state assistance meant Canada was able to delay the development of foreign enclaves within their city structures that prevented the types of bifurcation being seen in Sweden, Belgium, France, Holland, and even the United States. The bifurcation leads to tensions between identities and an obfuscation of the moral bases on which the host society is founded. Those tensions lead to violence; avoidable violence, but not exactly unavoidable.
The word tribal was used in an above comment, and tribalism is what is truly driving events these days. It's as if the differences have exceeded critical mass, and the rest of us either hunker down or rise and say "no more". (Cue black bird on perch over in yonder corner)
We have had some good moments. We fought in Europe for two world wars. We fought in Korea to hold back communism. We had our moments. My grandparents participated in that. They were our heroes, but they are gone now and forgotten by a spoiled generation or two.
I was a very proud Canadian until a few years ago. Couldn’t imagine a country I’d rather live in through most of my life. I don’t think we should blame the younger generations - we formed them in our institutions and are continuing to do so. The institutional rot is deep. There is a greater tendency towards “rule following” in Canadians than Americans. That’s a problem when “the rules” are supporting what I’m inclined to call “anti-human” societal structures.
I experience “rule following” at lot at work. There are a few people who I know share my perspective on these issues, but we’re all silently being dragged along as everything is being changed by EDI. I try to push back, but I’m on my own.
Most of our politicians are terrible. But our people are generally the same kind of hardworking middle class kind of people you’d find in any western nation. There are a lot of Americans up here in our universities making a mess of things too! I’ve met a few American “EDI consultants” making a pretty penny off of us. Just saying.
Europeans don't do union well because they aren't one nation in the way the US or PRC are.
It's the uppity, over educated types who have been pushing for "union" since Rome fell. And of course, they are among the worst people history creates.
I generally agree with this, but I'm surprised that immigration is ignored. The grass roots movement the author describes is even referred to as multicultural. This doesn't square with most analyses of European discontent, which centers on immigration and asylum systems out of control.
People will insist that when English neighborhoods are torn apart by Hindu/Muslim violence, and the rest of us have to deal with the semites tribal wars spilling into our streets...it actually means we're stronger. Ha!
I am not convinced that this movement is different from the populist uprisings that have swept Europe time and again for centuries. People are--as the author said--determined to survive. They will strike out at anything they perceive as preventing their survival.
The fact that there is no utopian element to the current movement is the only thing that separates it from the French Revolution. Then, as now, people wanted to lash out at those they perceived as making their lives untenable.
Beside the fact that the author is clearly enthusiastic about something, it's not at all clear what the people he's writing about want and how they anticipate solving their problems. Is the problem mass migration? Is it globalization? Well, the immigrants have even fewer jobs than the natives. Is it the pension system? Well, is that problem going to go away if one just prints Euro? It is cultural? What is the culture that is being threatened, and who participates in it? A movement without an ideology or a leader is not much of a movement; it's simply unrest.
Yes, the article was very, very “French” in its thinking and expression ... very “philosophie abstrait”. For me, the best bit was about the zeitgeist that I picked up when I spent several weeks in France 18 months ago, “...the great repossession suffered by most ordinary people—one in which they are not just losing what they have, but, far worse, what they are.”
It’s the same feeling that so many of us in Bari’s comment section have, and express, about the contemporary US. It’s all of those things (mass immigration, the economy, globalization, culture) that have come to make us ALL feel like foreigners in our OWN country.
You're right, Yitzhak. The article was trying to articulate an incoherent 'yellow vest' movement existing in France and by doing so, became incoherent itself. From what I can glean the writer wants the France of his grand parents to miraculously reappear.
The entire article was incoherent. I’m more familiar than most with French politics since I spend a lot of time there and read Le Monde daily. The French very much want the France of their parents to return, and not just getting rid of the immigrants and the Muslims. When Macron used Article 49.3 of the French constitution to ram through raising the retirement age from 62 to 64, the people went berserk. Never mind that the pension system was going broke. When Macron tried to reduce mandatory employment benefits to encourage businesses to hire more young people (and thus reduce 25% unemployment in the under-30 group), parents complained that they would rather their kids have no job at all than one with less benefits than they had. The kids said they would rather be unemployed than have fewer benefits than their parents. The French economy is in trouble mainly from a social benefits system that cannot be sustained, and that discourages businesses from growing (the larger the company the more taxes they pay, thus incentivized to stay small), new businesses from starting up, and multinationals from moving to France. When Macron tries to fix these issues, the French march in the streets and say he’s “out of touch”.
My interpretation of what the author is getting at is a desire for things to remain as in the recent past. Before mass migration and changes therefrom were forced on common French citizens. The same thing that is happening in Ireland, the U.K., the Netherlands, etc….
When did politicians become royals, we fought a revolution to end that shit. The same thing is happening in America as in Europe. The elites jet around the world and lecture us on driving gasoline engines as a matter of necessity. They enter politics with nothing and come out multi-millionaires and worst of all tell us how to live our lives through social engineering!
If these liberal politicians have made such a hash of things - imperiling your nation's existence and people in the process - why do you keep voting for these imbeciles?
Too pat, Herr Forkenspoon. When the "other" refuses to assimilate and demands you turn your country into the trash heap from which he came, it isn't fear but true concern with a large dollop of loathing.
Either I wasn't clear enough or you misunderstood what I said. My comment was in relationship to why do people keep voting for the same imbeciles, and not about aliens taking over the country. If you're afraid of someone different, then you'll vote for the same imbeciles.
"“If there was hope, it must lie in the proles, because only there, in those swarming disregarded masses, eighty-five percent of the population of Oceania, could the force to destroy the Party ever be generated. The Party could not be overthrown from within. Its enemies, if it had any enemies, had no way of coming together or even of identifying one another. Even if the legendary Brotherhood existed, as just possibly it might, it was inconceivable that its members could ever assemble in larger numbers than twos and threes. Rebellion meant a look in the eyes, an inflection of the voice; at the most, an occasional whispered word. But the proles, if only they could somehow become conscious of their own strength, would have no need to conspire. They need only to rise up and shake themselves like a horse shaking off flies. If they chose they could blow the Party to pieces tomorrow morning. Surely sooner or later it must occur to them to do it.”
Reading the first article on my Country in TFP, I must say I'm a little disappointed. His analysis is underwhelming to say the least. Seeing everything through one lens and one lens only : the yellow vests riots (which had no project, no claims and eventually vanished out of thin air after having wrecked the country havoc).
I would suggest to Bari and Oliver to reach out to journalists like Caroline Fourest or Raphaël Enthoven (at Franc Tireur) , or Abnousse Shalmani and Anne Rosencher (who write at L'Express) for more insightful and brave reporting.
So is ES, who has given you several names of French journalists who can explain these things better than the guy TFP picked. Also, you could try reading Le Monde (there’s an English edition if you can’t read French) and get a good background on the issues. This TFP essay is awful.
I was about to look up the English site of Le Monde on your recommendation, but returned here to ask frankly: If I read le Monde, am I going to get as twisted a view of French society as I would of America reading the NYT and of Israel reading Haaretz? 'Cause in that case I beg to be excused.
Wow. Not sure how to respond to that. Assuming you actually want to know which French newspaper or journal you would like to read, as opposed to just being snarky and not the least bit truly interested, here’s a link to an expat site that offers some comparisons:
And for further context there’s this explanation that I found:
(1) Le Monde is the premier center-left newspaper in France. It was founded under Charles de Gaulle after WWII and is the most widely-read paper, especially outside of France.
(2) Le Figaro is considered center-right, somewhat more conservative compared to Libération. It was founded in 1846, making it the oldest newspaper in France that is still in print.
(3) Libération is considered center-left but is more leftist than Le Monde. It was founded by Jean-Paul Sartre, the famous French philosopher, in 1968.
(4) Le Parisien is a continuation of Parisien Libéré, which was founded in 1942 as the newspaper of the French Resistance. It covers Paris primarily but has another edition that covers national news, Aujourd'hui France.
(5) L’Obs is currently the most popular magazine in France. Politically it is considered center-left and covers news and culture. It is a continuation of Le Nouvel Observateur which was often shortened to L'Obs by readership.
(6) L’Express is known to be more on the right side of the political spectrum. It focuses on news, world events, finance and economics.
Thank you. I was quite serious. I am a conservative and am looking for sources out of the usual conservative echo chamber for balance; but I find some of these supposed sources are simply unbearable, they pander to a progressive culture rather than actually covering news. I checked out the list at the site you recommend, but few have English editions.
Okay. It’s just that your use of the phrase “a twisted view of French society as…of America from the NYT” came across as snarky. I subscribe to both the NYT and the WSJ, and they have very different viewpoints for the most part, but imho, as an American, neither one gives you a complete picture of America. I don’t know anything about Haaretz, so I can’t comment on that.
If you want to get out of the conservative bubble, then you have to get out of the conservative bubble. My French friends tell me, and it’s what I have personally observed, that the French are more to the left in general than Americans are. So even their conservatives are more like our centrists. Figaro would be their most conservative paper, but it is considered center-right, and it stopped its English edition in 2012. Le Monde is center-left and has an English edition. In fact the Le Monde app can be switched to English from French at the click of a button. France 24 has an English version and is free with lots of ads, but it is much further left than Le Monde as far as I can tell. It seems to be pro-Palestine if that matters to you.
Since I read French, I have more choices, and I have chosen Le Monde. I’m definitely a centrist, and vary left or right depending on the issue. Le Monde just strikes me as the most balanced option for an English speaker. Some of their columnists are not to my taste, such as Thomas Piketty. He’s not a regular, but when he pops up, I just “swipe left”. Sylvie Kauffmann is the best, and she’s had an amazing career in journalism. She writes a weekly column. Read her Wikipedia page and see what you think. I’ve just ordered her most recent book on how the US, France and Germany were “blindsided” by Putin, and the history of the 3 countries relationships with him.
Perhaps you can get a short term subscription to try it out, and then just cancel if you don’t like it. I’ve had to cancel WaPo and The New Yorker, although I can read The New Yorker for free with my library card and the Libby app. That way I don’t give them any money.
Even MORE so! The amount of immigration in Ireland far outpaces that of any other country compared to the general population. Irish culture? Endangered.
Thanks for the article recommendation Henry! Hadn’t even heard about the Dublin riots in my part of the world and will be following Alison Pearson’s reporting from now on (since all the mainstream reporting promoted by Google seems to toe the line party line...).
“The masses never revolt of their own accord, and they never revolt merely because they are oppressed. Indeed, so long as they are not permitted to have standards of comparison, they never even become aware that they are oppressed.”
I'm the proud daughter of immigrants from Europe. My parents came to the States in the 1940's and 1950's. Both came for jobs. My mother from Scotland, my father from Italy. Most of their siblings came as well. My father actually was considered a US citizen through his mother and eventually learned English and promptly joined the US Army in 1953. My parents raised four kids in northern New Jersey and we enjoyed growing up in a town of Italian, Irish, Scottish, German, French, Russian families. There were Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Atheists, Episcopalian, etc. The United States truly was a melting pot and I had a front seat to many different cultures. What did all our parents have in common? A love for their adopted country and a desire to assimilate to the States. All the parents spoke English when out in public, but also spoke their native tongue at home. We learned about each others traditions and religious practices, but we understood that our religion or practices were just one of many. Not assuming that ours was the only way.
After reading this article, twice, because I thought I had missed something, I am still struggling to understand the author's title. What is the last best hope? It went around in circles....it reminded me of the first time I encountered roundabouts in Scotland and couldn't figure out how to get off at an exit and literally had to go around three times to make my way off!! The article was maddening. France will NEVER recover unless a beacon comes to the forefront and the French people who want to see ASSIMILATION and FRENCH CULTURE leads the way.
"Yes, there is still time to change direction, to rebuild a model of society that returns to some form of transcendence and humanity. There is only one way to reach this objective—a path that, for decades now, the dispossessed, the majority of ordinary people, have been pointing to. This path is our last way out of the chaos."
WHAT IS THE PATH?????? I appreciate that the author is a "thinker", however, he also needs to be a speaker. The France that most people want to visit is one of food, art, architecture and the French language. That does not mean that those from other countries who have immigrated to France can't be a part of that society, but ASSIMILATION is necessary. The same goes with Italy, Scotland, Germany, The Netherlands, Spain, Ireland, and the rest of the EU. If an immigrant chooses not to assimilate, the question becomes, WHY did you leave your home country where your customs and culture is what you love? If it is so wonderful, why not stay? Mass immigration does not work. Immigration only works if the migrant chooses to assimilate. The French people are waiting for their person to show up and lead the way.....who will it be?
You have trouble understanding this article because it’s incoherent and very poorly written. Or maybe it was very poorly translated. The author is a geographer. Not thinker. Not a political scientist. Not a social scientist. Just some French dude TFP scraped off a sidewalk somewhere. The so called “reporting” in TFP gets worse and worse by the hour. Time to cancel the subscription.
Until the people who espouse the globalist rhetoric are exposed to the actual effects of their theories, it will continue to degrade. Look at what bussing immigrants (illegal immigrates) to major cities is doing. They all drank the sanctuary city cool-aid and virtue signaled to the world what great people they are. That is until they got hit in the face with real illegal immigration and immigrates.
Now they see the costs of their university theories.
I think Obama had an opportunity with the 50 migrants in Martha’s Vineyard to say - hey I am going to lead the way - I have this ginormous empty house which I am going to turn into a shelter for all of you and I am going to fund this project n my own. He could have said he was going to live his life as he wants others to do. The fact that no one in far left Martha’s Vineyard would allow those people in that neighborhood is the problem right there. None of these people want to live in the world they advocate for. They want no consequences for what they do to others
"Rebuild society around the social and cultural reality of everyday life." There it is. The politicians of the west have been trying to convince the middle and lower classes that we need to get used to an "everday" life that includes violence, job insecurity, housing insecurity, etc. The People do not accept.
College education for ALL! That is the ticket to being propagandized into accepting what is happening.
Especially while the government pays to make sure tons of degrees are completely worthless and just plays the game of putting everyone in debt. People in debt are easiest to control. Especially if they must rely on the State.
Biden is doing his best to relieve the debt burden by canceling school debts, absorbing the losses at the taxpayers' expense...without having Congress agree to have Uncle Sam float the tab.
First propagandized on campus, then jobless with no useful skills.
Not exactly...A fair number of them got hired by colleges and universities to enhance their pioneering program of Ethnic Studies of Lower Slobovia.
Here's a question for the intrepid Free Press staff to keep a lookout for: An explanation as to how Ibram Kendi of Boston University's Center for Antiracist Research managed to blow through millions of dollars in grants in such a short period of time.
I too have been waiting for the low down on Kendi’s fall from the FP.
College education for all...FREE
Because they don’t have to deal with it.
A beautiful tribute to a beautiful country and its people. Never forget Charlie Hebdo, Bataclan, Lola Daviet, Samuel Paty, Thomas of Crepol, and many other innocent French people who have been sacrificed at the altar of mass migration. The elites will do everything they can to put down the peasant revolts across Europe and continue importing military aged men who seek to conquer instead of assimilate.
Will France rejuvenate, or crumble into Netflix's Athena? https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-speak-french-part-2
I see you are well informed about the shitty events happening in my country, Yuri. You can Dominique Bernard, a history professor who was recently murdered in his high school by a former student, an islamist of course.
France desperately needs a new Charles Martel to arise and defend his nation from the Islamist hordes.
"France desperately needs a new Charles Martel to arise and defend his nation"
I'm reminded of a line from one of my favorite movies, "Praise the country that produces heroes. Pity the country that needs them". If we've become a country that depends on heroes to defend us, we've become a country not worth defending.
Not necessarily. Sometimes people just need a hero to rally them. To let them know they're not alone and not crazy to think that how they do. And countries need heroes to remind them of who they are and the ideals they hold Why are so many things in America named Washington? Because he held us together and was a beacon. And as George III said of him, when Washington spurned the offer of third term that it "placed him [Washington] in a light the most distinguished of any man living, and that he thought him the greatest character of the age.”
You're old school Bruce. We now live in a country Washington would not recognize. He was fortunate to live among men and women willing to pick up a musket and fight for liberty and freedom. The country no doubt needs leaders such as Washington, but he would never have triumphed without the unsung heroes who died at Lexington and Concord, who braved the icy waters of the Delaware River on Christmas Eve to attack the Hessians and provide a desperately needed victory and the ultimate triumph of our forefather’s vision.
We now live in a country where their bravery is all but forgotten. We live in a country where anarchists can freely, and without penalty tear down the statues of men like Washington, and others that literally risked life and limb to provide the very freedoms they now seek to take away. Worse, there is a cohort of powerful people both inside and outside government who are determined that they succeed. I agree with the author’s prescription, what is needed “is a central, diverse, multiethnic coalition…one that “doesn’t have a class consciousness but is aware of having been deprived of its rights, of having been gradually pushed aside”. The question is, do we still have such men and women?
I believe we do still have that in us. Our problem is that we’ve had it too good for too long and those brave men and women who’ve worked their way up and made it to the middle and upper middle classes are just beginning to open their eyes. Most have been more concerned about fantasy football stats than world events until 2020 smacked them in face. In my circle at least, they are talking more about the state of the nation and more receptive to people like myself who have been sounding the alarm for years. Recently we started a Friday morning coffee discussion group in an upper room at a cafe in town. 3 guys at first and now we often have 15-20 show up. Cell phones left in cars. We each share things we’ve read and discuss the tyranny and lies all around us. We have no leader or no formal plan but each is preparing for 2024 in their own way and spreading the word. I imagine there are groups like this all across the nation. The founding fathers only had about a 17% participation rate in 1776. Even if we only have 10% that’s 30 million people and enough to force the political elites to their knees. I’m not quite White Pilled just yet but I do have some hope.
We live in a society that has lost sight of what our Constitution has to say about our federal government.
The Constitution proposes a government that is granted powers that act for the common good that are better exercised by one over the many. The Constitution limits the federal government only to those powers explicitly enumerated, and reserves all others to the States and The People themselves to exercise.
How far have we come from those days of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Monroe?
So far that our government, through the federal bureaucracy,
daily touches every man, woman, and child and places an estimated regulatory burden--a hidden tax--of more than $14,000 per year on each one. Gasoline taxes, surcharges on utility bills, emission standards for autos, ethanol subsidies, electric car rebates, etc., etc.
Our nation, with the cooperation of our (lazy) Congress, has granted the administrative state powers that would appall our founding fathers.
Like you, Kurt, I have been concerned for the state of our nation. And, were there to be a group such as yours in my area, I would attend, I might even try to start one.
I find it fascinating that so many people, interested in quality journalism, have found their way to The Free Press and who join in the discussions of the fine essays that our fine editors have enabled. I am somewhat astonished by the conservative/libertarian lean of us refugees from the destruction of objective journalism offered by the New York Times and the Washington Post.
God speed to you and others like you.
Be careful, Kurt. The FBI will be sending in their informants soon, as open discussion cannot be tolerated by the elite. I'd vet new members carefully. Jeez, I'm only half joking.
Brilliantly and cogently stated.
I think there are. Look at our fellow commenters.
You're old school, too, but I'd venture to guess many years younger than I am. So there's hope there, too. My youngest and many of his friends - mostly male, unfortunately - are very conservative and despise our current ruling class.
Timothy & Bruce, I pray we do have such heroes who will step forward to inspire the silent majority!
True. Heartbreaking, but true.
Reagan rallied this nation when we were under the malaise of Carter's stagflation and had lost our will to fight against the Soviet threat.
I was actually going to vote for Carter in '76, but we deployed to Norway and even though absentee ballots had been around since the 1864 election, they didn't make any effort to educate us about it. After a miserable and embarrassing four years under the peanut farmer, I gleefully voted for Ronnie.
In the 1980 debates, Ronnie asked, "Are you better off now than you were four years ago[?]" and he went on to win handily. Four years later, he asked the same question and won in the largest landslide since Washington's reelection.
My first Presidential vote went to Carter. Four years later, I had realized my mistake, but was working overseas. Got my absentee ballot, and because nobody on my team could believe a New York Jew would vote Republican, I marked it for Reagan, signed, and sealed it in public.
The Reagan transformation was thrilling. I was at the Statue of Liberty centennial celebration when President and Mrs. Reagan came in. What a great, magic moment for America.
Yet, Biden sat in his basement, peeking out occasionally, and won by 81 MILLION VOTES! THE MOST popular president ever elected in the history of our country!
We can only hope whoever runs against him will ask that same question, “Are you better off today than you were 4 years ago”?
Heroes are not a priori figures.
Heroes emerge from the events within the social milieu. They stand proud because of notable acts of sacrifice of self for the sake of the many. They are the voices of sanity in the midst of mayhem. They are individuals for whom service for others is a way of life, not a cosplay to enhance one's fortunes. The hero is the one who acts because it is the right thing to do.
Heroes lead...a following is not essential.
Perhaps that's the distinction between a hero and a leader - a leader has followers, a hero acts whether or not there are followers. In our rush to eradicate our history from our kids' education, we've also lost the concept of "quiet heroism." Doing the right thing even when no one's watching; doing the right thing even when the clarion cacophany blares that it's wrong.
"Doing the right thing even when no one's watching; doing the right thing even when the clarion cacophany (sic) blares that it's wrong."
The American political scene is wanting for politicians with this sort of dedication.
Yes. Agree. Thank you.
Enter the 21st century version of Joan of Arc (Marine Le Pen). A bit of a stretch but maybe a good start.
I recently traveled to Paris and I have to say I will not be going back anytime soon. So much change in 40 years the unique culture of the city is becoming nonexistent.
Isn’t it SHOCKING? I’ve been visiting Paris since I was 12 years old, and summer 2022’s visit was like going to another city entirely...and I’m bilingual! Then we went to Bretagne, and -- apart from the bad neighborhoods of the biggest cities in the area -- we were back in La France d’antan.
Yes, they WILL crumble! It takes a prophetic voice to still the masses, and France is too concerned with being nice to entertain such a voice.
In order to save France, the French have to have the resolve and to admit the reality of their situation. Instead Macron, while initially supporting Israel, has now come out demanding a ceasefire, which only benefits Hamas. France, like Europe, happily embraces amnesia. There was a ceasefire on October 6. It takes courage to stand up to the forces of Islamist genocidal hate. Don't bet the Jewish future (or the future of freedom) on France or any part of Europe.
France has a deep, visceral, multi-generational antisemitism strain evident throughout its entire history, from Dreyfus to the Paris Velodrome, to enforcing an arms embargo against Israel as it fought for its survival against 20x larger adversaries on every side in 1967, France has always been antisemitic. Macron simply recognized that to come out in support of Hamas immediately after Oct. 7 would have been bad manners, so he waited a bit until it became politically tenable, and then resorted back to form, his and France's. It would be unwise to expect anything other than ardent antisemitism from France.
Agreed
A proctological view, but still accurate.
And the yellow-vests and LePen won’t help either. I don’t understand why any Jews still live in France.
I keep asking myself the same question... and the only response I can conjure up, is: for the same reason Jews stayed in Germany post 1938.
Yes, except those German Jews didn’t have the benefit of hindsight . If French Jews stick to “but we’ve been good French citizens for hundreds of years - France won’t let us down,” then their demise is on them.
Their demise may be physically and emotionally on them, but the social contract with France puts a great deal of blame on France and its ruling elites.
It does, but Jews know better than to rely on social contracts in the diaspora. Or they should know better.
Don't forget that they had literally nowhere to go. In the months before the start of World War II, Germany expelled thousands of Jews to Poland; but Poland refused to let them in. The poor families lived in a kind of refugee camp on the German-Polish border, until war rolled over them and the Germans found them a solution.
French Jews have where to go if they wish. From what I understand Israeli bureaucrats are no worse than French ones.
Yes that’s part of my point - French Jews today aren’t in the same position as 1930s German Jews because they have options and have hindsight of the Vichy regime’s crimes, so staying is foolish.
You miss the importance of home.
We spent 32 years in our quaint New England town some distance (not too far) from the bustling streets of Boston. Two years ago, we moved to another quaint town near the New Hampshire line...Two months later, we came to the conclusion that we missed, terribly, the quaintness and quietness of where we lived before, bought ourselves out of the lease we had signed, and moved back.
The lure of the familiar is hard to overcome.
There actually has been significant movement since 2015. The Jewish population in France has declined from 750,000 to 500,000 with most of them moving to Israel which has about 200,000 French Jews living there.
Macron was the first Western leader to declare DEI- intersectionalism a threat to the West. He had the support of many French intellectuals and
celebrities primarily because of French belief in their culture. Surely that is a beginning?
Not sure what you are alluding to. My comment was about the antisemitism prevalent in French society. I don't see that changing regardless of their feelings about DEI, intersectionalism, or whatever else.
I understand Susan's remarks as seeing Macron recognizing that the progressivism and "equity" policies as attacking the Western traditions of inalienable rights.
Macron also recognized that the French pension system was untenable and needed reform. He had to use Article 49.3 of the French Constitution to ram through raising the retirement age from 62 to 64 because they couldn’t afford to keep paying pension benefits under the existing age limits. What did the French do? Raise holy hell, that’s what.
When Macron wanted to stop some of the mandatory job benefits that kept employers from hiring young people (and thus reduce unemployment in the under-30 group), what did the French do? Raise holy hell, that’s what. People were actually quoted as saying they would rather their kids have no job at all than a job with less benefits than the parents had. Even the kids protested in favor of keeping the benefits even if it meant they remained unemployed.
So this essay is a bunch of complete nonsense. The French have a terrible economy because their social benefits system discourages full employment, hurts business, keeps multinationals from locating in France, and is bankrupting them. But “the people” refuse to give it up, and then blame Macron for being “out of touch”.
That's one view…. But there are Jews who survived Vichy and its antisemitism. And each of the survivors owe their life to a French person who helped. I am part of what became to be called:”Les enfants cachés “. And we survived because many French people, although not in love with Jews, did not see why they should be killed.
The EU has been lost from the first day of its founding! The push to de-emphasize national identity was the first marker to their downfall. National identity was, and IS, a flag that many look toward as a guidepost for prospering.
At the root we are all Tribal. We like borders. "Good fences make good neighbors"
I’m looking forward to the day the WHO attempts to use its new Global Pandemic powers and attempt to bully and the world into compliance for the next phony pandemic likely to be sprung on us next year. All hell is going to break loose. I don’t think they planned to do it so soon but they know the clock is ticking and we are waking up. When Martial Law is declared how many soldiers will step over the line and join the resistance? Hard to say but be ready for chaos and upheavals the likes of which, on a global scale, have never been seen before.
How true. And the sooner our elites understand that the sooner we can get back to working to make our nation a better place for all.
You would think that thousands of years of human history would be enough to teach them we are all individuals, made in the image of our Creator, not some amorphous crowd.
The EU and its founding politicians were looking to form an economic and social community across Europe. Unlike in America, where new states formed and were accepted into the Union, the EU was collectivizing already existing states. There was no shake-down period to internalize the mechanics of federalization, and there was no recognition of the acceptance of national identity.
The EU had no training wheels and ran headlong into the realities of national identity.
It was a fine idea in the post-war context, but it failed to create a United Europe of Sovereign States. The French will always be French. The Germans will always be Germans. And the Italians? They'll always be up for a fine family meal with pasta and wine for all.
No surprise that, when you spend decades allowing a fifth column to infiltrate your country, that you now need to temporize with and assuage these savages.
People are already taking things into their own hands. In the past few weeks ,"toughs" or "rowdies" in England and Ireland have taken to the streets-- in Ireland it was violent-- to protest what they see as losing their country - or having it taken from them. Instead of heeding the warning, politicians clamp down on the rowdies-- even as swarms of "protesters" hostile to the West plant their own flags and deface and trample Britain's war memorials to its fallen soldiers with impunity. One threatened to kill someone's dogs as a
policeman simply nodded. There is a sense of primacy. That is what happens when a hubristic establishment forces unwanted and extreme cultural and demographic changes against its own people, society, and ways of life.
I've said this before and will reiterate - cops need to choose and need to choose wisely and with care. If they choose to be the tools of oppression they had better understand that they are few in numbers and that they - and their families - live amongst us and cannot hide.
The desecration of Britain's memorials to their honored and sacred war dead should be huge wake up call of the dangers within. These ghouls need to be excised from decent society and be sent packing back to the vermin's nests from which they came.
This comment disturbs me more than anything else I've read in this thread. On the issues I probably agree 90% with Mr Miller. But the threat of vigilante violence is as great as anything the current establishment does, and the radicals (left and right) in every country embrace it. We need solutions, but we also need to remember that a crucial legacy of Western democracy is the capacity for ordered freedom through the ballot box. We should be thinking about the legislation and budget reforms we want elected politicians to enact, not adding to policemen's (and their wives' and children's) worry about where the next bullet is going to come from.
How to accomplish that is the problem, Bruce. And, it is a thorny one.
Recently there were some killings in Ireland and the suspect is being withheld from the public by the government. I suspect the reason is because the people on the street would take matters into their own hands and terminate the suspect.
They haven't even identified him, last I read. What does that tell you?
Yes but it's everything. When and where I grew up, it was unheard of for people's cars to be stolen in their own driveways. Or to be followed home from the store and robbed. My dad left his convertible in the driveway with the keys in it. Forget about car jackings - there wasn't a word for it. Once upon a time, passengers just boarded airplanes -imagine that -- no security and no need for it. No burms in front of buildings. You walked into the Capitol like you owned it, because you did. We've lost a lot.
Theft by apparently everyone is completely out of control. Six years ago I had a $12000 shipment stolen while in custody of the shipper. Theft of shipped phones and other merchandise is through the roof -- some people are getting three and four replacement phones sent to them by Apple. Maybe the third time is the trick, hoped one. Newt Gingrich- I was not a fan but now wish he were younger, warns about what he calls "the forces of crime" destablizing society. It needs to be controlled because homes are next. What's stopping it? Again, if a
prosecutor refused to enforce the law there would have been hell to pay. The police are eunuchs, standing by in the face of mayhem, being spat upon, forbidden to enforce the law or destroyed and ruined for doing so. This is untenable. Organized rings from outside the UK are sending bands of thieves into England to rob stores and homes. I guess this is what sacking looks like. I read about the sacking of Rome but never thought I'd live through it.
As you eloquently say, we've lost a lot. It's a sacking in slow motion, now well-underway.
See attached.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/columnists/2023/11/28/politicians-have-created-a-multicultural-monster/
It's behind a pay wall...
Could you write a precis for us?
Thanks.
Would love to read, but behind a pay wall....
And in a similar vein, I haven’t seen any updates about the shooting of the three Palestinian men in Burlington VT... I wonder what is going on with that.
The attack was reported Tuesday night on NBC with Lester Holt @ 6:30. They proudly showed the victims standing arm in arm wearing their keffiyeh. But did not report on a suspect. My daughter goes to school @ UVM in Burlington. The place is a ghost town. I am very suspicious.
They arrested a White man, Jason Eaton, 48, about a day later, and the police chief has been very squirrely about the circumstances. That’s the part that seems odd.
Of course MSM has been gnashing their teeth and rendering their garments over the three victims (which is more than they do for anyone shot on an average weekend in Chicago, but shooting people without a darned good reason is never ok). The other odd thing is that MSM keeps “reporting” whatever the Arab lobby groups tell them, with absolutely no effort to verify it. So, the lobbyists say it’s a hate crime, but the police seem very reluctant to confirm that. Something just isn’t sitting right.
Have they arrested anyone? I'm sure they're looking. I thought the Irish police had someone in detention for the stabbings who they won't identify, but I could be wrong.
The Irish police arrested an Algerian born man with Irish citizenship, who apparently has been in the country for over 20 years.
Less than 14 days ago, a young rugbyman named Thomas was murdered by a horde of people in rural central France, at the end of a village party.
It was clearly heard that the culprits said they were here to "kill white people".
Later on, after 7 suspects were arrested, the procureur (= district attorney) said he refused to release the first names of the suspects, several of them being minors.
At this point, everybody knew what the names would be like, and the attitude of the procureur was revealing of his political leaning : you don't want the good hillbillies of France to know it's the Arabs, "again", as it is most of the time in this kind of "fait divers".
Because it was, and the primary suspect of the stabbing was named Chaid.
The anger is growing and growing... 😡😡😡
> Instead Macron, while initially supporting Israel, has now come out demanding a ceasefire, which only benefits Hamas.
Worth adding that Crepol is a town of under 600 people. The thugs who came and stabbed him (and 16 others, 2 others in critical condition) traveled from Romans-sur-Isrene, which is quite far away. These were not local lads having a brawl, or mentally ill people -- this was a terrorist attack that targeted the dance party.
And soon enough there will be real hell to pay. And all the cops in all the world won't be able to do a thing to stop it. Because, by standing by and doing nothing, they were complicit in releasing this whirlwind.
Make France Great Again
Make The Netherlands Great Again
Make Italy Great Again
Make Hungary Great Again
Make Ireland Great Again
Make Canada Great Again
Make America Great Again--Again
Canada never WAS great, and never will be! They are the equivalent of an appendix in the body of the former British Empire. Useless and with some undefined function.
Except when we sacrificed so many of our Canadian young men in both of our world wars. I take exception of your categorization of Canada being useless. Our current leader definitely is. But not our people.
Ypres. Juno Beach. Just to name a couple...
I thought that I'd arouse some latent patriotism among the citizens 😁. This does not mean that I disregard Canada's partnership in the (sort of) Free World, it is just that your southern neighbors have a superiority complex.
It doesn’t matter what Americans think, or who they are. One might argue they deserve to feel that way based on their past, and possible current position as defenders of the Free World. But your comment was about Canada. I wanted to set the record straight.
I disagree.
Canada, pre-Justin Trudeau, was a thriving as a united, multicultural society with all of the freedoms and an economy similar to that of their southern neighbor.
It should be noted that Canada's immigration laws are some of the strictest in the Western world. They are an ingenious application of Catch-22: You can't emigrate to Canada unless you have a job, and you can't a job unless you are a citizen of Canada. (Not quite that bad, but approaching it.)
Their bureaucracy is as inscrutable as that of the French..."Oh no no, monsieur, you do not have enough paperwork:"
Through restricting immigration based on a demonstrable ability to live without state assistance meant Canada was able to delay the development of foreign enclaves within their city structures that prevented the types of bifurcation being seen in Sweden, Belgium, France, Holland, and even the United States. The bifurcation leads to tensions between identities and an obfuscation of the moral bases on which the host society is founded. Those tensions lead to violence; avoidable violence, but not exactly unavoidable.
The word tribal was used in an above comment, and tribalism is what is truly driving events these days. It's as if the differences have exceeded critical mass, and the rest of us either hunker down or rise and say "no more". (Cue black bird on perch over in yonder corner)
I'm in the "no more" group.
We have had some good moments. We fought in Europe for two world wars. We fought in Korea to hold back communism. We had our moments. My grandparents participated in that. They were our heroes, but they are gone now and forgotten by a spoiled generation or two.
I was a very proud Canadian until a few years ago. Couldn’t imagine a country I’d rather live in through most of my life. I don’t think we should blame the younger generations - we formed them in our institutions and are continuing to do so. The institutional rot is deep. There is a greater tendency towards “rule following” in Canadians than Americans. That’s a problem when “the rules” are supporting what I’m inclined to call “anti-human” societal structures.
I experience “rule following” at lot at work. There are a few people who I know share my perspective on these issues, but we’re all silently being dragged along as everything is being changed by EDI. I try to push back, but I’m on my own.
And part of that generation is Prime Minister! I didn't care for his father, and the son is actually worse, if that could be possible. And I mean "worse" in the view of most U.S. denizens. https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2FJustin-Trudeau-Rolling-Magazine-Prodigy%2Fdp%2FB07XMDG5DS&psig=AOvVaw1Obr1a9z2Ed9G09m88syCn&ust=1701368984379000&source=images&cd=vfe&opi=89978449&ved=0CBIQjRxqFwoTCOjD4MHr6YIDFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE
Most of our politicians are terrible. But our people are generally the same kind of hardworking middle class kind of people you’d find in any western nation. There are a lot of Americans up here in our universities making a mess of things too! I’ve met a few American “EDI consultants” making a pretty penny off of us. Just saying.
Charlatans come in ALL nationalities! The DEI (I call it DIE) is a recent US invention, formulated to separate money from gullible people.
"Son?" lol
and cold
Montreal’s “entertainment district” is unrivaled this side of Patpong, though… 😂
To accomplish all of the above the Euro-morons need to recognize that their idiotic European Union is as valuable to the world as the Soviet Union...
Europeans can't "do" union very well... they're too smug, too poorly educated and too lazy to work on something that difficult.
They can just play host to Chinese and American tourists...
Europeans don't do union well because they aren't one nation in the way the US or PRC are.
It's the uppity, over educated types who have been pushing for "union" since Rome fell. And of course, they are among the worst people history creates.
I've said it before. We should all stop saying MAGA and say it this way instead.
I generally agree with this, but I'm surprised that immigration is ignored. The grass roots movement the author describes is even referred to as multicultural. This doesn't square with most analyses of European discontent, which centers on immigration and asylum systems out of control.
"Diversity is out strength". BULLSHIT! Unity is our strength! But those we elect want more inclusiveness...and VOTES!
People will insist that when English neighborhoods are torn apart by Hindu/Muslim violence, and the rest of us have to deal with the semites tribal wars spilling into our streets...it actually means we're stronger. Ha!
Not that I disagree totally with this article but here comes WWIII
I am not convinced that this movement is different from the populist uprisings that have swept Europe time and again for centuries. People are--as the author said--determined to survive. They will strike out at anything they perceive as preventing their survival.
The fact that there is no utopian element to the current movement is the only thing that separates it from the French Revolution. Then, as now, people wanted to lash out at those they perceived as making their lives untenable.
Beside the fact that the author is clearly enthusiastic about something, it's not at all clear what the people he's writing about want and how they anticipate solving their problems. Is the problem mass migration? Is it globalization? Well, the immigrants have even fewer jobs than the natives. Is it the pension system? Well, is that problem going to go away if one just prints Euro? It is cultural? What is the culture that is being threatened, and who participates in it? A movement without an ideology or a leader is not much of a movement; it's simply unrest.
Yes, the article was very, very “French” in its thinking and expression ... very “philosophie abstrait”. For me, the best bit was about the zeitgeist that I picked up when I spent several weeks in France 18 months ago, “...the great repossession suffered by most ordinary people—one in which they are not just losing what they have, but, far worse, what they are.”
It’s the same feeling that so many of us in Bari’s comment section have, and express, about the contemporary US. It’s all of those things (mass immigration, the economy, globalization, culture) that have come to make us ALL feel like foreigners in our OWN country.
Let's start with not feeling safe in your own country for being who you are.
You're right, Yitzhak. The article was trying to articulate an incoherent 'yellow vest' movement existing in France and by doing so, became incoherent itself. From what I can glean the writer wants the France of his grand parents to miraculously reappear.
The entire article was incoherent. I’m more familiar than most with French politics since I spend a lot of time there and read Le Monde daily. The French very much want the France of their parents to return, and not just getting rid of the immigrants and the Muslims. When Macron used Article 49.3 of the French constitution to ram through raising the retirement age from 62 to 64, the people went berserk. Never mind that the pension system was going broke. When Macron tried to reduce mandatory employment benefits to encourage businesses to hire more young people (and thus reduce 25% unemployment in the under-30 group), parents complained that they would rather their kids have no job at all than one with less benefits than they had. The kids said they would rather be unemployed than have fewer benefits than their parents. The French economy is in trouble mainly from a social benefits system that cannot be sustained, and that discourages businesses from growing (the larger the company the more taxes they pay, thus incentivized to stay small), new businesses from starting up, and multinationals from moving to France. When Macron tries to fix these issues, the French march in the streets and say he’s “out of touch”.
My interpretation of what the author is getting at is a desire for things to remain as in the recent past. Before mass migration and changes therefrom were forced on common French citizens. The same thing that is happening in Ireland, the U.K., the Netherlands, etc….
When did politicians become royals, we fought a revolution to end that shit. The same thing is happening in America as in Europe. The elites jet around the world and lecture us on driving gasoline engines as a matter of necessity. They enter politics with nothing and come out multi-millionaires and worst of all tell us how to live our lives through social engineering!
Simple question and - truth - simple answer.
If these liberal politicians have made such a hash of things - imperiling your nation's existence and people in the process - why do you keep voting for these imbeciles?
It’s a combination of virtue signaling and brainwashing.
And fear of the "other."
Too pat, Herr Forkenspoon. When the "other" refuses to assimilate and demands you turn your country into the trash heap from which he came, it isn't fear but true concern with a large dollop of loathing.
Either I wasn't clear enough or you misunderstood what I said. My comment was in relationship to why do people keep voting for the same imbeciles, and not about aliens taking over the country. If you're afraid of someone different, then you'll vote for the same imbeciles.
Because Marine Le Pen scares the hell out of them. But next time around? Maybe not.
"“If there was hope, it must lie in the proles, because only there, in those swarming disregarded masses, eighty-five percent of the population of Oceania, could the force to destroy the Party ever be generated. The Party could not be overthrown from within. Its enemies, if it had any enemies, had no way of coming together or even of identifying one another. Even if the legendary Brotherhood existed, as just possibly it might, it was inconceivable that its members could ever assemble in larger numbers than twos and threes. Rebellion meant a look in the eyes, an inflection of the voice; at the most, an occasional whispered word. But the proles, if only they could somehow become conscious of their own strength, would have no need to conspire. They need only to rise up and shake themselves like a horse shaking off flies. If they chose they could blow the Party to pieces tomorrow morning. Surely sooner or later it must occur to them to do it.”
George Orwell, 1984
Reading the first article on my Country in TFP, I must say I'm a little disappointed. His analysis is underwhelming to say the least. Seeing everything through one lens and one lens only : the yellow vests riots (which had no project, no claims and eventually vanished out of thin air after having wrecked the country havoc).
I would suggest to Bari and Oliver to reach out to journalists like Caroline Fourest or Raphaël Enthoven (at Franc Tireur) , or Abnousse Shalmani and Anne Rosencher (who write at L'Express) for more insightful and brave reporting.
Juste un peu déçu? Je lis Le Monde quotidiennement (en français) et cet article est nul.
Bien d’accord!
"I must say I'm a little disappointed. His analysis is underwhelming to say the least."
Well, the author is French, after all... so, there's that...
So is ES, who has given you several names of French journalists who can explain these things better than the guy TFP picked. Also, you could try reading Le Monde (there’s an English edition if you can’t read French) and get a good background on the issues. This TFP essay is awful.
I was about to look up the English site of Le Monde on your recommendation, but returned here to ask frankly: If I read le Monde, am I going to get as twisted a view of French society as I would of America reading the NYT and of Israel reading Haaretz? 'Cause in that case I beg to be excused.
Wow. Not sure how to respond to that. Assuming you actually want to know which French newspaper or journal you would like to read, as opposed to just being snarky and not the least bit truly interested, here’s a link to an expat site that offers some comparisons:
https://frenchly.us/french-news-context-7-french-newspapers-u-s-equivalents/
And for further context there’s this explanation that I found:
(1) Le Monde is the premier center-left newspaper in France. It was founded under Charles de Gaulle after WWII and is the most widely-read paper, especially outside of France.
(2) Le Figaro is considered center-right, somewhat more conservative compared to Libération. It was founded in 1846, making it the oldest newspaper in France that is still in print.
(3) Libération is considered center-left but is more leftist than Le Monde. It was founded by Jean-Paul Sartre, the famous French philosopher, in 1968.
(4) Le Parisien is a continuation of Parisien Libéré, which was founded in 1942 as the newspaper of the French Resistance. It covers Paris primarily but has another edition that covers national news, Aujourd'hui France.
(5) L’Obs is currently the most popular magazine in France. Politically it is considered center-left and covers news and culture. It is a continuation of Le Nouvel Observateur which was often shortened to L'Obs by readership.
(6) L’Express is known to be more on the right side of the political spectrum. It focuses on news, world events, finance and economics.
Thank you. I was quite serious. I am a conservative and am looking for sources out of the usual conservative echo chamber for balance; but I find some of these supposed sources are simply unbearable, they pander to a progressive culture rather than actually covering news. I checked out the list at the site you recommend, but few have English editions.
Okay. It’s just that your use of the phrase “a twisted view of French society as…of America from the NYT” came across as snarky. I subscribe to both the NYT and the WSJ, and they have very different viewpoints for the most part, but imho, as an American, neither one gives you a complete picture of America. I don’t know anything about Haaretz, so I can’t comment on that.
If you want to get out of the conservative bubble, then you have to get out of the conservative bubble. My French friends tell me, and it’s what I have personally observed, that the French are more to the left in general than Americans are. So even their conservatives are more like our centrists. Figaro would be their most conservative paper, but it is considered center-right, and it stopped its English edition in 2012. Le Monde is center-left and has an English edition. In fact the Le Monde app can be switched to English from French at the click of a button. France 24 has an English version and is free with lots of ads, but it is much further left than Le Monde as far as I can tell. It seems to be pro-Palestine if that matters to you.
Since I read French, I have more choices, and I have chosen Le Monde. I’m definitely a centrist, and vary left or right depending on the issue. Le Monde just strikes me as the most balanced option for an English speaker. Some of their columnists are not to my taste, such as Thomas Piketty. He’s not a regular, but when he pops up, I just “swipe left”. Sylvie Kauffmann is the best, and she’s had an amazing career in journalism. She writes a weekly column. Read her Wikipedia page and see what you think. I’ve just ordered her most recent book on how the US, France and Germany were “blindsided” by Putin, and the history of the 3 countries relationships with him.
Perhaps you can get a short term subscription to try it out, and then just cancel if you don’t like it. I’ve had to cancel WaPo and The New Yorker, although I can read The New Yorker for free with my library card and the Libby app. That way I don’t give them any money.
Good luck!
I don't come to the comments on Free Press for enlightenment or "European" values. I come to exorcise my demons...
Read Alison Pearson’s article in today’s Telegraph on the Dublin riots. Ireland is suffering the same immigration problems as France
Even MORE so! The amount of immigration in Ireland far outpaces that of any other country compared to the general population. Irish culture? Endangered.
So why do Irish politicians hate their country and their people.
And what are decent people going to do about it?
Thanks for the article recommendation Henry! Hadn’t even heard about the Dublin riots in my part of the world and will be following Alison Pearson’s reporting from now on (since all the mainstream reporting promoted by Google seems to toe the line party line...).
“The masses never revolt of their own accord, and they never revolt merely because they are oppressed. Indeed, so long as they are not permitted to have standards of comparison, they never even become aware that they are oppressed.”
George Orwell, 1984
I'm the proud daughter of immigrants from Europe. My parents came to the States in the 1940's and 1950's. Both came for jobs. My mother from Scotland, my father from Italy. Most of their siblings came as well. My father actually was considered a US citizen through his mother and eventually learned English and promptly joined the US Army in 1953. My parents raised four kids in northern New Jersey and we enjoyed growing up in a town of Italian, Irish, Scottish, German, French, Russian families. There were Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Atheists, Episcopalian, etc. The United States truly was a melting pot and I had a front seat to many different cultures. What did all our parents have in common? A love for their adopted country and a desire to assimilate to the States. All the parents spoke English when out in public, but also spoke their native tongue at home. We learned about each others traditions and religious practices, but we understood that our religion or practices were just one of many. Not assuming that ours was the only way.
After reading this article, twice, because I thought I had missed something, I am still struggling to understand the author's title. What is the last best hope? It went around in circles....it reminded me of the first time I encountered roundabouts in Scotland and couldn't figure out how to get off at an exit and literally had to go around three times to make my way off!! The article was maddening. France will NEVER recover unless a beacon comes to the forefront and the French people who want to see ASSIMILATION and FRENCH CULTURE leads the way.
"Yes, there is still time to change direction, to rebuild a model of society that returns to some form of transcendence and humanity. There is only one way to reach this objective—a path that, for decades now, the dispossessed, the majority of ordinary people, have been pointing to. This path is our last way out of the chaos."
WHAT IS THE PATH?????? I appreciate that the author is a "thinker", however, he also needs to be a speaker. The France that most people want to visit is one of food, art, architecture and the French language. That does not mean that those from other countries who have immigrated to France can't be a part of that society, but ASSIMILATION is necessary. The same goes with Italy, Scotland, Germany, The Netherlands, Spain, Ireland, and the rest of the EU. If an immigrant chooses not to assimilate, the question becomes, WHY did you leave your home country where your customs and culture is what you love? If it is so wonderful, why not stay? Mass immigration does not work. Immigration only works if the migrant chooses to assimilate. The French people are waiting for their person to show up and lead the way.....who will it be?
You have trouble understanding this article because it’s incoherent and very poorly written. Or maybe it was very poorly translated. The author is a geographer. Not thinker. Not a political scientist. Not a social scientist. Just some French dude TFP scraped off a sidewalk somewhere. The so called “reporting” in TFP gets worse and worse by the hour. Time to cancel the subscription.
Godot? (Or so it appears...)
Until the people who espouse the globalist rhetoric are exposed to the actual effects of their theories, it will continue to degrade. Look at what bussing immigrants (illegal immigrates) to major cities is doing. They all drank the sanctuary city cool-aid and virtue signaled to the world what great people they are. That is until they got hit in the face with real illegal immigration and immigrates.
Now they see the costs of their university theories.
I think Obama had an opportunity with the 50 migrants in Martha’s Vineyard to say - hey I am going to lead the way - I have this ginormous empty house which I am going to turn into a shelter for all of you and I am going to fund this project n my own. He could have said he was going to live his life as he wants others to do. The fact that no one in far left Martha’s Vineyard would allow those people in that neighborhood is the problem right there. None of these people want to live in the world they advocate for. They want no consequences for what they do to others
I SO wish that was the only -- or even the worst! -- of Mr Obama's blown opportunities.