French political discussion megathread: Yellow Vest Redux

[parochial boy]

Shall we start at the beginning. Éric Piolle, mayor of Grenoble, allows women to go to to public swimming pools wearing a burkini. The political-media class has a meltdown; the LR Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes president Laurent Wauquiez announced the suspension of all funding for the city of Grenoble.

But also, the French actually put signs like this up at their swimming pools


why are they like this??

[parochial boy]

The word "woke" has made it into the dictionary. Strangely, the usual crows who lose their nut at every single anglicism obtaining such validation don't seem to be worried this time. Especially when compared to "iel" which is a morphologically french word to begin with.

Wonder why this might be? Perhaps because it is a word our fervent defenders of the purity of the language have imported themselves? hmm

[parochial boy]

The word "woke" has made it into the dictionary. Strangely, the usual crows who lose their nut at every single anglicism obtaining such validation don't seem to be worried this time. Especially when compared to "iel" which is a morphologically french word to begin with.

Wonder why this might be? Perhaps because it is a word our fervent defenders of the purity of the language have imported themselves? hmm

I'm sad we never saw the Académie Française propose "éveillisme" as the proper French translation for "wokism". That would have been fun.

I think they realised that they could never beat suggesting "acolyte des illustres" for "follower" and decided to quit while on top.

[parochial boy]

Probably meaningless news to everyone, but I am an only relaying it because I actually liked his channel. But big #balancetonyoutubeur news today with Léo Grasset, of the Dirty Biology channel, and who gathered international attention last year when he revealed that he had been approached by a Russian backed agency to lie about the Covid vaccines, has been accused of serially abusing other pop science youtubers, including the rape of one, as yet, anonymous one. Big revelation by Mediapart that has caused a big storm.

In somewhat more amusing news - Éric Zemmour's bad week continues as he has apparently been banned from the Ritz hotel swimming pool. Allegedly for having a screaming fit at an American tourist. The poor man...

[parochial boy]

Everything that was posted here is “on topic” and removing posts you disagree with is overreach. This thread is leagues better than most French discourse going on in the current National Assembly.

It’s not, the main topics at the moment are the Tour de France, the heatwave and if you want politics, Macron’s bastille day speech that was mostly about his government programme and intentions. The burkini controversy is actually something people are not worrying about at the moment and the fact that it this theme so endlessly comes back here is a reflection of this forum’s obsessions as much it is of the average French person’s

[parochial boy]

Well it’s hot. Like all of Europe

Crazy how every one of the last five summers has either had record breaking heat or record breaking thunderstorms or both at the same time. Calls me crazy, but it almost feels like the climate is changing somehow…

[parochial boy]

Zinneke is of course refering to the recent outrage over PSG's recent private jet flight to Nantes. A city less than two hours from Paris by train. When asked by a journalist about this, Mbappé's response was a disdainful laugh and his coach commented that they were planning on travelling by "Land yacht", which shoes you just the level of contempt that those people have for us normal human beings.

Remember that Mbappé was already at Clairefontaine at the age of 13, like most footballing superstars he has lived an exceptionally cloistered life and has essentially no real understanding of the real world.

And more sarcastically, Jul is also a hero for les jeunes des cités. And is an exceptionally hard working and productuve auto-entrepreneur at that. But for some reason you don't often see people on the right acclaiming him as such.

[parochial boy]

And guess which moderate, progressive, centrists just abolished the TV licence fee?

Making the funding of public broadcasting contingent on the goodwill of the government, that won't means any loss of independence or capacity right?

Right?

[parochial boy]

Apparently we're not mentioning the strikes either.

Anyway, massive social movements going on in France. It was triggered by a strike by employees at Total's oil refineries, striking for higher their wages at a time the company's profits were going through the roof. This led to shortages at petrol stations, Elisabeth Borne announcing that she would requisition the striking workers.

This is now spiralling into a wholly bigger movement, hundreds of thousands of people out on the streets (alongside the trade unions and NUPES figures) to protest against the cost of living and low wages and strikes across the public and private sectors. Up to and including teachers, bin men, port workers, hospital employees and more.

Overall this seems to be moving towards being one of the most important social movements since the gilets jaunes. Far more important than, you know, this threads usual fare of Muslim bashing and associated culture war hysterics.

[parochial boy]

Sure. If you are opposed to democratic principles such as editorial independence and media plurality and strong public media that is free from the influence and preferences of the media magnates. Never mind that France télévisions and France radio both produce stuff that is very popular and high quality stuff in the public interest that would all be threatened in a world where it’s budget is more dependent on ministerial decisions or advertising revenue and associated interests

Really funny how authentic progressives tend to look at this and conclude that an independent public service is actually more important

[parochial boy]

Did you really... just confuse the rather different issues that are the social movement and the TV licence?

In any case, never mind that you bought the BFMTV/Macroniste line about their salaries hook, line and sinker, despite this being a lie (disproved in 20 Minutes no less, not exactly Mediapart in its political outlook) with the reality for a qualified worker with "responsibilities" tending to earn around 2900 a month, compared to 2500 as an average in France. Which if anything, just shows that unions are effective in protecting workers' rights and that maybe the answer is for stronger unions that cover all workers rather than getting angry at the fact they are covering some people in difficult jobs who might demand some right to the immense profits being generated by their employer.

And in any case, who exactly has been leading outrage about Total using their massive profits to make huge disbursements to their shareholders? and leading demands for a windfall tax? with who being opposed exactly?

A bit of honesty about what the left are calling for here would be appreciated.

[parochial boy]

Did you really... just confuse the rather different issues that are the social movement and the TV licence?

Ummm...no? its just that you can't seriously preach left-wing unity under a NUPES banner and at the same time engage in exclusionary rhetoric because someone who considers themselves a progressive has a different policy opinion to you...one that doesn't involve defending Russia, PR China and Iran...which your favoured candidate (a genuine social fascist third positionist who called Germans naturally prone to re-arm and invade Europe) does.

Which if anything, just shows that unions are effective in protecting workers' rights and that maybe the answer is for stronger unions that cover all workers rather than getting angry at the fact they are covering some people in difficult jobs who might demand some right to the immense profits being generated by their employer.

You know full well this isn't just about union membership (I'm a member of a union btw), it is about one sectoral industry holding the rest of the country to ransom because they want to engage in the same behaviour their executives did in order to bid up their shareholders earnings : deliberately withholding and sabotaging supply of resources to cripple the country. They want to use their industry's position in the economy to hold the rest of the country to ransom and create a Mexican standoff of all other industries with zero solidarity.

Congratulates parochial boy, you are now a fully signed up member to "the market is always right" school of thought.

And in any case, who exactly has been leading outrage about Total using their massive profits to make huge disbursements to their shareholders? and leading demands for a windfall tax? with who being opposed exactly?

Because the French Left is led by a social fascist demagogue and the likes of Eric Piolle and Sandrine Rousseau (definitely people who focus on your social movements rather than culture wars issues...right!), they are not actually tackling the structural issues that have led to shareholder capitalism at companies like Total running riot : lack of proper regulation, overall lack of worker input at board level, countless other measures that don;t include witholding supply to bid up the prices and profit from this. Instead, they are engaging in their favorite hobby : artifice and outdated strike action designed to hold other sectors of the economy to ransom. Yay! Go Total Workers bidding up all our fuel prices in a major economic recession! That's sure gonna convince the masses that the dungarees wearers are on their side!

Well thank you for that series of strawmen and false representations. Where on earth did Russia or China become relevant here? What on earth has that got to do with how France 2 is funded?

It's getting tiring, once again to have you having to read your dishonest hysterics about which bogeymen you have been told to be angry about this week. Rousseau and Piolle? I don't think they are in power at the moment are they? And who exactly has spent all summer fuelling these hysterics about the woman? What was this year's electoral cycle entirely about until candidates from the left started actually talking about the standard of living?

Once again, your solutions, who exactly is proposing them? It's the left. Who exactly is responsible for the fact that they aren't in place? Oh, right, not the left.

Yes, strikes work, that is the form of power that unions are able to wield in able to defend their members. One of the few they have left actually, decades of neoliberalism have done to that. What is absurd is coming down entirely on the side of "oh what horrible disruption" as if this is entirely down to the workers themselves as opposed to a larger negotiation in which the unions, the employers and the political authorities are involved. This is old, old stuff - and in a case where people are seeing their living standards decline. Well guess what, going out on to the street and withdrawing their labour is how they demonstrate what their work achieves.

What you are arguing for, in practice, is to deny workers this power and make them entirely subodinate to the whims of their employers' goodwill and an ideologically liberal government. Or to back into the the same old liberal "oh the economy" arguments as if people should just shut up and put up with what they are given.

And weirdly, they do seem to have struck a cord, and generated solidarity, because they are no longer the only people out on the street.