Problems in France.

quote:

Are you willing to pay more for your fruit and veg?

Yes.

Cheers

Don

Do you feel no responsibility for our lesser than "whiter than white" behaviour worldwide in the past? We planted our flags then used the population as slaves to grow rich beyond our wildest dreams by stealing their natural wealth.

Now you refuse to let out former colonists enjoy a litle fruit from their forefathers labours (and suffering)? Many of their modern problems are directly due to our endless meddling in their politics.

Are we really so indifferent to our collective history?

quote:

Do you feel no responsibility for our lesser than "whiter than white" behaviour worldwide in the past?

I am not responsible for what previous generations did.

Totally unrelated, I do feel that man has a duty to help others.

This does not extend to allowing uncontrolled immigration, tollerating illegal immigration or putting up with the unacceptable behaviour seen in France recently.

Cheers

Don

This thread only took a couple of posts to get off topic, impressive.

FWIW, the announcement made by the interior minister to deport any "rioters" who were not french citizens was only made to attract far right positive opinion. It was also, arguably, made to incite further riots. M. Sarkozy is fighting a popularity battle with M. de Villepin. I believe he doesn't give a shit about what is happening and the causes of it, he is only concerned with winning the 2007 presidential elections. For M. Sarkozy the more chaos there is in the suburbs the better it is for him.

Also, fwiw, there are many residents born in France who do not automatically have french nationality and can be expulsed to the country from which their parents came.

Lastly, the whole amalgam of rioters = immigrants = illegal residents = criminals is typical smoke screening of the real problems of the effected suburbs.

quote:

Originally posted by Peter Stockwell:
the announcement made by the interior minister to deport any "rioters" who were not french citizens was only made to attract far right positive opinion. It was also, arguably, made to incite further riots. M. Sarkozy is fighting a popularity battle with M. de Villepin. I believe he doesn't give a shit about what is happening and the causes of it, he is only concerned with winning the 2007 presidential elections. For M. Sarkozy the more chaos there is in the suburbs the better it is for him.
Lastly, the whole amalgam of rioters = immigrants = illegal residents = criminals is typical smoke screening of the real problems of the effected suburbs.

_________________________________________________

At last, an informed commentary on the whole debate which doesn't mimic a Sun editorial.

quote:

Originally posted by Peter Stockwell:
Lastly, the whole amalgam of rioters = immigrants = illegal residents = criminals is typical smoke screening of the real problems of the effected suburbs.

Well they're all north African/Arabs and they are exhibiting destructive criminal behaviour so it's not THAT much of a smoke-screen is it?

EW

quote:

Originally posted by Peter Stockwell:
This thread only took a couple of posts to get off topic, impressive.

There's more!

The most powerful weapon against racism is working alongside somebody who is "foreign". For both you and "the foreigner". "We" and "they" are all real people. "They" are no more generalisations than "we" are. They are not "just immigrants". "They" usually just want a chance to share in "our" wealth. By contributing to their new society in the normal way. By working to afford the things we usually take for granted. Resistance to that contribution comes from "us". Label them, isolate them in a ghetto and a reaction is inevitable. Particularly if you deprive them of useful work and hem them in with endless rules to achieve compliance with the host society's rules. They simply cannot win except by exceptional luck.

The torching of vehicles is remarkably clear thinking on "their" behalf. It attacks that which we hold most dear and that which "they" usually feel most deprived of in our viciously car-based society. It also (largely) avoids direct violence against other people. Which would much more seriously alienate the society which they still hope to join on equal terms.

quote:

Originally posted by Earwicker:

quote:

Originally posted by Peter Stockwell:
Lastly, the whole amalgam of rioters = immigrants = illegal residents = criminals is typical smoke screening of the real problems of the effected suburbs.

Well they're all north African/Arabs and they are exhibiting destructive criminal behaviour so it's not THAT much of a smoke-screen is it?

EW

The majority of people arrested so far are french. Some 150 or so, out of c. 2000, are expulsable. What would you think if you were arab or black that people automically thought you were a molotov cocktail throwing psychotic criminal ? The people in the suburbs are not torching cars because the are descended from africans or arabs. They are torching the cars because they are very pissed off, and/or they want to be on TV they want to be part of their own reality show, and they want to be noticed.

"Pourquoi je casse les voitures de mes voisins ? Parce que Sarkozy ne vient pas garer la sienne ici. C'est une connerie, je sais. Mais on fait ça pour se faire entendre. On pourrait s'en prendre à la mairie ou à des monuments au centre-ville. Mais j'en ai rien à branler de la mairie : c'est ici que je veux que les choses se passent. Pour qu'on parle du quartier"

taken from todays Liberation: http://www.liberation.com


There are so many aspects to the causes of these disturbances that I can't begin to understand them.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Earwicker:
Well they're all north African/Arabs and they are exhibiting destructive criminal behaviour
___________________________________________________
Really !!!, most of the more serious reports I've read/heard state significant numbers of white youth involved.
This is the typical sort of knee-jerk, ill-informed comment that you need to go beyond if you want any sort of understanding of why such things occur.

Malky

Why is it a cheap shot? You are welcome to your opinion, as I am mine.
Those who have very little to contribute of their own back are always the first to criticise, and the first thing they pick up on is a few mistakes, normally spelling and the use (or mis-use) of grammar.

Jim Lawson.
The reasoning behind my stated opinion, is that immegrants should behave by the rules of the host country, and should not attempt to change them, and certainly not by rioting. As to paranoia, it is rampant these days.

My experience of living in other countries is that foreigners are reviled. For example, in KSA, when stationary at a red light, if one has just had a large pick-up truck driven into the back of your vehicle the blame for the 'accident' will undoubtably fall upon the foreigner. Why? "If you were not in my country I would not have run into you, therefore it is your fault" or "Allah told me to do it" Try picking the bones out of that one.
By the way, I had seven very enjoyable years in KSA, simply because my wife and I obeyed the rules. I also enjoyed working in Germany in the 80's and in France in Toulouse last year.

So, to good old blighty. Hordes of immigrants, some no doubt illegal, burn books that they do not like, cafes are given court orders not to cook bacon as the neighbours object to the odour, and pigs are of course 'unclean'.
Individuals roam the street covered head to toe in black so no one knows whom the cover conceals, regardless of the apparrant need for the 'authorities' to know who is moving where (hence the considerable investment made in facial recognition techniques and the imaging capture mechanism sprouting up on all main highways).


I hold no grudge against any legal immigrant, or those that come to europe out of despair or persecution in their own land. Diversity is good for all.
What I will continue to object to is persons who deliberately despise my way of life and even the country that has taken them in because it does not reflect their (in some cases twisted) beliefs. I fail to understand how we can consider harbouring creatures such as these twisted relegeous maniacs,( I fail to remember the name but I believe some of the more populist media publications refer to him as 'hook')especially when the individuals who revile the country and beliefs of the people who host them are kept in relative luxury.
Try explaining that to an individual who served his country and now cannot gain access to a dentist, at all never mind on the NHS!

The prose may be a lttle more purple, or more prosaic if you prefer, but the tone of the tome remains the same.
If you don't appreciate the country that has given you shelter, my advice would be to go to another that is less tolerant of others - Iran anyone?
Do you think that these people rioting in Toulouse would prefer to live in a fundamentalist islamic country? Somehow I doubt it.

Do you want another example of what esteem you are held in another country. BBC statement regarding Pakistam this morning - Relegeous scholars (?) are calling for attacks on christians as rumours spread that soemone has set fire to the koran.
And this is after some of us have made fairly large donations to charity since last month's earthquake there.
It's nice to be appreciated.

quote:

Originally posted by marvin the paranoid android:
is that immegrants should behave by the rules of the host country, and should not attempt to change them, and certainly not by rioting.

In France, the rioters are overwhelmingly not immigrants. The assimilation of descendants of immigrants as immigrants is one of the problems.