France General Discussion IV: Yellow Fever

[Antonio the Sixth]

You know, I feel the real victim here is still the woman who had a whole article fantasizing about her being sold into slavery in a major national magazine. Some debate about whether or not to punish the author just detracts from the fact that we’re right to be horrified by how much of a dark place the French mainstream media has gone to these days

See the latest installment where there has been collective outrage on the part of the usual pseudo républicain bien-pensants over the idea that someone could appear in parliament while veiled. Or worse, cook on instagram while veiled.

Some convoluted free speech thing just lets valeurs actuelles pretend that they’re the victims. When they’re not, they’re the aggressors

This.

To answer NYE's question though, judicially speaking, shutting it down seems beyond the pale, but charges of libel and incitement to racial hatred against the people involved in this article might be warranted. That would carry a fine.

[Zinneke]

Making a fuss about someone who is veiled on TV hosting a cooking show (and remember by veiled we mean face visible, might be confusing for non francophones) is really crass.

I do understand the argument of public servants having to take off any religious or cultural symbol though. It's a much more complex debate that is also happening here in Belgium.

[CumbrianLefty]

Making a fuss about someone who is veiled on TV hosting a cooking show (and remember by veiled we mean face visible, might be confusing for non francophones) is really crass.

I do understand the argument of public servants having to take off any religious or cultural symbol though. It's a much more complex debate that is also happening here in Belgium.

Not just for them, lots of people elsewhere hear "veils" and think of the burqa.

[NewYorkExpress]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/25/europe/paris-knife-attack-charlie-hebdo-intl/index.html

Two people were seriously injured in a knife attack Friday near the former offices of French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, the site of a 2015 terrorist attack, the Paris police told CNN.

The two victims are in a serious condition but their lives are not in danger, according to the police spokesperson. Police had previously said there were four people wounded in the attack
Not long after the attack, a suspect was arrested near Place de la Bastille, in Paris's 11th district, but the person was not immediately identified by police. French prosecutors have opened up a terror investigation.

"The main perpetrator has been arrested and is currently in police custody. The second individual was placed in custody for his relations with the main perpetrator," Jean-François Ricard, the national anti-terror prosecutor, said on Friday afternoon.

Seven people in total have been arrested in connection to the attack, a judicial source told CNN on Friday. That number includes the two suspects Ricard discussed.

The other five people were arrested at an apartment linked to the attack.

[Antonio the Sixth]

The trial for the Charlie Hebdo and connected attack is taking place now, btw. Lots of painful memories here. RIP.

[NewYorkExpress]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-54277235

French police have opened an investigation after a woman in Strasbourg said she was attacked in broad daylight for wearing a skirt.

The student, identified only as Elisabeth, 22, said she was punched in the face "by three individuals who complained about me wearing a skirt".

....

On Wednesday, junior interior minister Marlene Schiappa - who is in charge of citizenship and was previously in charge of equality issues - visited the eastern city to discuss the safety of women in public.

She told France Bleu Alsace that "the skirt is not responsible for the attack and the woman even less".

"A woman is never hit because she wears a skirt. A woman is hit because there are people who are misogynistic, sexist, violent, and who free themselves from any law and any rule of civility by striking them.

"When you're a student and you have to think about the outfit you have to wear and the message it sends, it's an overwhelming mental load," Ms Schiappa said.

[NewYorkExpress]

https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/france-ban-wild-animals-circuses-marine-parks-73307384

France's environment minister has announced a gradual ban on using wild animals in traveling circuses, on keeping dolphins and killer whales in captivity in marine parks and on raising mink on fur farms.

Barbara Pompili, France's minister of ecological transition, said in a news conference Tuesday that bears, tigers, lions, elephants and other wild animals won't be allowed any more in travelling circuses “in the coming years.”


In addition, starting immediately, France’s three marine parks won’t be able to bring in nor breed dolphins and killer whales any more, she said.

“It is time to open a new era in our relationship with these (wild) animals,” she said, arguing that animal welfare is a priority.

Pompili said the measures will also bring an end to mink farming, where animals are raised for their fur, within the next five years.

The ban does not apply to wild animals in other permanent shows and in zoos.

[NewYorkExpress]

https://ca.reuters.com/article/us-france-macron-separatism/macron-launches-crackdown-on-islamist-separatism-in-muslim-communities-idUSKBN26N213

French President Emmanuel Macron pledged on Friday to fight “Islamist separatism”, which he said was threatening to take control in some Muslim communities around France.


France has struggled with homegrown Islamist militancy for years, but Macron’s government is increasingly worried by broader signs of radicalisation - often non-violent - within Muslim communities, French officials say.

They cite the refusal of some Muslim men to shake women’s hands, swimming pools that impose alternate time slots for men and women, girls of as young as four being told to wear full-face veils, and a proliferation of ‘madrassa’ religious schools.

Macron said a bill tackling Islamist separatism would be sent to parliament early next year. Under the new law, home-schooling would be severely restricted to avoid children being “indoctrinated” in unregistered schools that deviate from the national curriculum, he said.

“What we need to fight is Islamist separatism,” Macron said during a visit to the impoverished Paris suburb of Les Mureaux. “The problem is an ideology which claims its own laws should be superior to those of the Republic.”




Among other measures, the teaching of Arabic in France would be encouraged and an Institute of Islamology created, Macron said. But foreign imams would no longer be able to train clerics in France.

Prefects - local representatives of the central government - would be given powers to annul decisions by mayors to restrict school cafeterias or swimming pools to women or men only.

[parochial boy]

https://twitter.com/MVCDLM/status/1311955167550595074

I suppose it's a relief that he didn't come up with anything too overtly designed at inflaming tensions. But it's pretty much exactly the kind of moral panic you'd expect in a country whose media discourse is set entirely by CNews, Sud Radio, Zemmour, Charlotte D'Ornellas and all their fascist friends.

Pretty scary what's going on over the border to be honest.

[Zinneke]

When he started talking about separatists I was thinking Savoy, Bretagne, Occitanie, etc. I was like : Macron is actually going to give the marginal cranks inside those movements a political space by virtue of some insane Draconian law banning their flags and it's going to be a really really funny clash.

But nah it's just the Arabs again. The favourite whipping boys.

[Kingpoleon]

They cite the refusal of some Muslim men to shake women’s hands, swimming pools that impose alternate time slots for men and women, girls of as young as four being told to wear full-face veils, and a proliferation of ‘madrassa’ religious schools.

France is really showing off its proud secularist history of over the top attacks on religions if they’re “too foreign.”

[Intell]

France leading the way in liberal values and fighting Islamism. The good thing is the French left isn't controlled by the islamic/sjw lobby to oppose this.

[parochial boy]

I've got some bad news for you I'm afraid. That is an LFI affiliated channel, but is fairly representative of what most, let's say, non-establishment left coverage is like.

In the case where the above doesn't seem especially woke to you... well, I refer you to Zinneke's earlier post. We're not talking about burqas or full face covering or anything like that, we're talking about the level of hysteria that merely appearing in public wearing a hijab generates in France at the moment.

If there are people actively pushing for parallel societies and "separatism" in France right now, then it's Marlène Schiappa and Natacha Polony's fault, not Imane Bounes's.

[Zinneke]

France leading the way in liberal values and fighting Islamism. The good thing is the French left isn't controlled by the islamic/sjw lobby to oppose this.

You gotta read up on alienation man. You're falling into all the traps the right-wing cranks want you to. Nobody asks themselves why it is parallel societies fester in places like these in the first place, and of course not, because then they'd start to realise their discourses are what fed the temptation of such an ideology in the first place. These parallel societies have been subject to rejection, and indeed quasi-ghettoisation, for years. A deliberate segregation, actually even more deliberate than the standard white flight you get in other Western countries.

Not that wearing a headscarf is really something to get your knickers in a twist about. Are you also uncomfortable with kippas? Aaaaah...some religious groups are more equal than others.

[NewYorkExpress]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/11/europe/paris-police-station-attack-intl/index.html

Dozens of people attacked a police station in Paris on Saturday night, launching projectiles at the building and attempting to force their way in with metal bars.

French authorities decried the attack, which took place in Champigny-sur-Marne, a suburb located roughly 12.5 kilometers (7.8 miles) to the south east of the city center.

In a tweet on Saturday, authorities confirmed that the unknown attackers had launched a variety of projectiles in a "violent attack" against the the building, and tried to storm the building.

...

French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin has labeled the attackers as "little bullies" and offered his "complete support" to the police.

Darmanin said he would visit the investigating team in Champigny once they had completed their investigation, adding that he had demanded from them "the greatest firmness" in "identifying the troublemakers."

Laurent Jeanne, the Mayor of Champigny, told BFMTV Sunday that the "we are clearly talking about a very organized attack," adding that in recent days "there has been a certain tension between people who instil a certain desire to do battle with the police."

[parochial boy]

French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin has labeled the attackers as "little bullies"

This made me laugh out loud actually. Subject of expertise for Poison Dwarf Junior there or what?

[CumbrianLefty]

So much of modern political invective is simple projection.

[Hash]

I must say, as much as nearly all interior ministers in recent memory have been repulsive individuals - Poison Dwarf, Hortefeux, Guéant, Valls, Collomb, Castaner - Darmanin is such truly horrible scum that he manages to make them look better in comparison. So, congratulations, Macron.

[Silent Hunter]

"Poison Dwarf"?

[Kingpoleon]

In the case where the above doesn't seem especially woke to you... well, I refer you to Zinneke's earlier post. We're not talking about burqas or full face covering or anything like that, we're talking about the level of hysteria that merely appearing in public wearing a hijab generates in France at the moment.

It’s absolutely shocking that some of the most pro abortion people in the world don’t have an ounce of respect for what women do with their bodies.

[Zinneke]

"Poison Dwarf"?

Sarkozy.

[Zinneke]

9pm to 6am curfew announced in 9 cities including Paris.

Get ready to rumble.

[Silent Hunter]

It really says something that the most "advanced" societies have handled this pandemic the worst.

[NewYorkExpress]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-54571540

French investigating magistrates have issued a fourth charge against ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy for allegedly accepting Libyan cash to fund his 2007 presidential campaign.

He is accused of "membership in a criminal conspiracy", in the long-running investigation. The charges could lead to a trial.

[NewYorkExpress]

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/10/22/two-french-women-charged-over-racist-stabbing-of-veiled-muslim

Two women accused of stabbing two other women wearing Muslim headscarves near the Eiffel Tower in Paris and trying to rip off their veils have been charged with assault and racist slurs, legal sources told AFP news agency on Thursday.

The case comes amid heightened racial tensions following the killing last week of a French teacher who had shown his pupils caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed.


The women accused over the assault were drunk when they came across a group of Muslim women and children in the Champ de Mars park at the foot of the Eiffel Tower.

The Muslim family complained about the other women’s dog, saying they felt threatened by it.

In the ensuing argument, one of the women with the dog pulled a knife and stabbed two of the veiled women, aged 19 and 40.

The 40-year-old woman sustained six stab wounds and is being treated in hospital for a perforated lung. The younger victim was stabbed three times and was also treated in hospital but has since been discharged.





Both victims claimed their attackers called them “dirty Arabs” and told them: “This is not your home.”