Riots In France

[Saint_Michael 3]

Well i been keeping tabs with the riots going on in france, over 300 cities and towns rioting, 1 man has been killed from injuries sustained from being attacked, many people injured or wounded including police. Schools and churches being burned down, vehicles being destroyed. it's insane because the youth are being corrupted by people who want nothing but destruction and instill fear among the people. I have a feeling though someone will top it off if a form of terrorism hopefully that won't happen buts its been 11 days now so if force is needed do it.

[xJedix 0]

Wow, I never knew that they were having riots in France. I have been told that it has been on the media but I haven't seen any. I'm suprised it hasn't been more widely talked about. Do you know any specific reasons why they are rioting? Like government issues or something like that? Or is it just because they feel like it?I am also suprised that only one person has been killed so far. If 300+ cities/towns are rioting, then I would think that there would be more deaths. I can't image being there and having to live through all of that destruction and violence. Hopefully the government or someone steps in to stop this before it continues much farther.You got a point on terrorists. If they decided to do something in France right now, that would cause even more mayhem than there is right now because of the rioting. France could suffer a huge devistation if they did something now.So basically, hopefully someone will step in to stop the rioting before it esculates to something higher.xJedix

[Saint_Michael 3]

well the reason that i know of is that 2 boys of middle eastern descent were electricuted cause they thought the cops were after them or something like that, the other reason is that pretty much everyone in that riot was angry after this was mentioned

Much of the youths' anger has focused on law-and-order Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, whose reference to the troublemakers as "scum" appeared to inflame passions.

the third reason is pretty much all this

The growing violence is forcing France to confront long-simmering anger in its suburbs, where many Africans and their French-born children live on society's margins, struggling with high unemployment, racial discrimination and despair fertile terrain for crime of all sorts as well as for Muslim extremists offering frustrated youths a way out.

so that tells you something somone is got something brewing.
Edited November 7, 2005 by Saint_Michael (see edit history)

[floresid 0]

Front page of MSNBC had this article. It looks like people who felt the inequality of their living conditions have decided to use this incident as a reason to lash out. I mean come on, if these boys were hiding from the cop, there is no actual evidence of this right now, then they probably did something wrong. The fact that they died, from electricution, while hiding in a transformer yard, proves they weren't the quickest bunch.This has the fore runnings of another Rodney King affair, like L.A. in the 90's. So don't be surprised if looting follows and other inexecusible actions.

[Saint_Michael 3]

well with whats going on in the world today and big muslim population france has, a few people might have an opportunity to blow up a bus or a building, just to make everything worse to whats going on right now. Best thing for france to is to stop the fire before it spreads outside the european borders. Cause parts of germany are rioting along with belgium as well.

[Mezzano 0]

from what ive heard, the reasoning behind the destruction is from african's wanting to be traeated equally, they are rioting because they get payed less etc...that being said, if what i have heard is true, i think this is an extremely selish act, and what in fact they or ANY race for that matter is doing, is only tarnishing their race even more. Want to solve an issue within society? then act in accordence with society's laws, belief's and values... their are other ways of expression and protest that can be achieved peacefully, such as rally's, publications, poetry, arts...get your word out for change through the many forms of art to reach the people, in a civilized fasion. By resorting to means of destruction, your only destroying your chances of change, not getting change.

[brainless 0]

actually, what is surely known about those three youths in the transformator yard (yes, three ... one got away severly injured, the other two were killed) is that they attened a soccer match and at about the time they hid in the transformator yard, a blackout was registered in exactly this transformator's surrounding areas. Everything else are pure speculations at this time.
What, in my opionion comes closest to what probably happened is that they left the stadium together with a crowd of other adolescents when some began to run because they've spotted some cops doing identity checks [french cops are known to be racist, check the amnesty report on France: https://www.amnesty.org/en/] - that's not even stupid, running from the cops will probably save you some hours of waiting for nothing in the police station and sometimes from being violated if you're non-white in the Paris' suburbs. Climbing over a secured wall is just as smart: Most cops are too lazy to climb anything if they're not sure what they're going to catch. And if it's just a young guy or two who didn't do anything - why bother?

(the official account is that those 3 boys had broken into "private property" and tried to hide on the transformator yard; the third version is that the crowd who left the stadium began running - and noone knows exactly why they did that...)

In the night from thursday to friday, the first militant actions were performed in Clichy-sous-Bois (the suburb with the transformator yard);
in the following two nights the clashes spread to Montfermeil, a neighboring suburb.

On Sunday evening a a tear gas grenade detonated in a mosque filled with about 200 muslims - and once again this led to two different stories from the police:

In the first version, a police commission declared that the tear gas-grenade was fired from a gun and did not have a stable flight path but it did not detonate inside the mosque but in front of its door. This story was later [monday morning] updated and now contains the information that a cop from another part of Paris shot the grenade at a group of "highly mobile young people" and did not know that there was a mosque next to this group.
The other version is that the grenade was not a tear gas-grenade but a pepper spray-grenade, which are not being used by any police departments in and around Paris.
As the french police is not known to be friendly to foreigners, many people believe that the grenade was shot into the mosque on purpose.
I assume that it was in fact a tear gas-grenade (hey, the story got an update after another part of the police department claimed that there was no police involved in this incident) which detonated inside the mosque - but I'm not sure if it was on purpose or an accident.

well, whatever the real story is: This incident definitely did not help to stop the violence...

by the way, during the last couple of nights there were some burning cars in Berlin, Bremen and Frankfurt [all in Germany] as well.

(I tried to report what is known about the events triggering the riots as factual as possible; as long as there's no "I believe" or something like that in a sentence this is based on several german newspapers and the "racist police" is not an assumption but based on information gathered by amnesty international throughout many years)

-----
here's my opinion which is mostly not based on anything but my own interpretations - be more careful with the following statements than with the statements above:

These riots are nothing which has been organised on a long-term basis but a somewhat sudden explosion of anger and frustration since most of the people participating in the riots are pretty young - but somewhat backed by their older neighbors, there have been reports about people cheering for them through open windows and several newspapers quoted people who think that violence is not the way they'd have handled things but they know exactly how "they" feel.

I fear that european right wing parties can use these riots during the next election campaigns as a reason why aliens should be kicked out of Europe [or, when they don't accept the European Union, the countries they're in]. Those riots did not occur due to the violent nature of african people/muslims; those riots are the result of a racist policy and a racist police in France. There are two ways of preventing things like this from happening again:
a) Deport all foreigners. Welcome racism.
Change the police. Integrate foreigners, give them the same rights and treatments as everyone else gets.

Michael: Whatever your source is, this isn't about muslim extremists - this is about european racism. The rest of Europe isn't much better when it comes to granting foreigners any rights at all, the french systematic racism is simply the most obvious.
There's no reason why someone outraged about having to get a permission by german bureaucracy to see a doctor should be called a muslim extremist (yes, about 20,000 people in Germany have to do get a freakin' permission to see a doctor or, coem to that, be taken into hospital)...

[Saint_Michael 3]

that i can get by but problem is though alot of people abuse these rights thus government cracks down on those who abuse them. But im just saying that anyone has a big opportunity to do some real damage and instead of the 3 people dead already thousands can be killed and with whats been going on and how easy it is to get into europe and then disappear until someone conducts a terrorist act thus making more things difficult for progress to be made.Of course you know how news is being reported they only tell you whats being told. Been reading it from yahoo so that how I'm getting my information.

[ameribass 0]

The riots in France are really starting to get out of control and need to be put to a stop at once, not just for the people's sake, but also for the reputation of the country. Many a times, countries complain and criticize how other countries handle business, but it's easier said than done.

[brainless 0]

Here's the indymedia coerage: https://indymedia.org/en/2005/11/827280.shtml

Some indymedia portals are somewhat low-quality but the main indymedia sites have kept a high level; it's still a good if not necessary addition to your corporate media. But don't forget to check corporate news just to make sure that there's another version of the story

of course, our somewhat open borders [last month, about 10 people got shot when they tried to enter european exclaves in Morocco] might allow an "muslim extremist" to enter - but we've got several pro-violence right-wing groups in Germany alone, we've got the ETA in Spain (though I think I remember that they accepted to join a plan to disarm), we've got the IRA in Ireland (they've disarmed under british supervision a few years ago), we had the RAF in Germany (they weren't active anymore since the late 80's and announced that they do not exist as militant or non-militant group anymore in 1998) ... the IRA were catholic extremists, the RAF left-wing extremists; how could they have been stopped by oppressing muslims?

but whatever impression I've made: I totally understand why the riots broke out but I do believe that this problem will not be solved by the use of force - from either side. Neither will a strict repression by the french police solve it nor aggression against public or private property. Burning Kindergartens, heck, there's no way destroying a kindergarten helps anyone; a better way would have been an occupation with a clear message to authorities why you're doing it and what needs to happen before you leave...

[update -- 08-Nov-2005]
I suppose I should get used to the university's keyboards, don't be offended by the many missing letters

Here's another short but interesting (and very important if found to be true) article on the backgrounds of these riots: http://www.heise.de/tp/artikel/21/21296/1.html (although telepolis-articles are usually in german, this one is in english)

an excerpt:

[...]The conditions in France which bred such violence is very much the same as elsewhere in the world; the grievances of an underclass are held in check until an event unleashes the anger and frustration which has been bottled up for many years, even decades. Along these lines, the situation in France is not that much different to what happened in New Orleans in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina. In both cases, even the media reaction was the same: shock and surprise. Yet, when looking behind the scenes, what happened in both cases should not have come as much of a shock nor a surprise.
[...]

Notice from saint-michael:

merge posts as requested.

[shaneroche 0]

but whatever impression I've made: I totally understand why the riots broke out but I do believe that this problem will not be solved by the use of force - from either side. Neither will a strict repression by the french police solve it nor aggression against public or private property. Burning Kindergartens, heck, there's no way destroying a kindergarten helps anyone; a better way would have been an occupation with a clear message to authorities why you're doing it and what needs to happen before you leave...

Strictly speaking everything you say is true. But the youths of north African descent (because VERY few are immigrants, rather they are FRENCH citizens BORN in France), are not likely to reason in your manner. They are angry frustrated alienated individuals. Does that excuse their actions? NO. But don't confuse (as is often done in these forums), a lack of moral justification, with IRRATIONALITY. If the French had, long ago, made a genuine effort to make their society truly egalitarian (as they are so fond of claiming it is), then the problem of chronic unemployment and societal exclusion that exists for French Muslims would have been FIXED (and not just talked about) and we would not be seeing these images nightly. In other words, if these people had been treated the way you or I expect to be treated, then they would be a work, or on the computer, or playing sports after school, or at the mall. But they have NONE of these things.

I have travelled a lot in France, and have been to Paris MANY times. The train from Paris to Versailles goes right through one of these neighborhoods, and I can guarantee you that you would not want to live there.

I do not condone what is happening, but I understand it. And the simple fact is that now French politicians are going to DO something about these problems, something they have never done before, because to do nothing now, would clearly invite lasting and profound civil disorder.

[Saint_Michael 3]

i don't think frace as a whole ever really recovered from when the french revolution happen. But people need to make an effort to discourage the racism (religious, race, way of life) and have people understand. But hte problem is though people are looking for the easy way and thats caue problems well.instead of Fighting with each they should work together but that has never happen since the days of WWI and WWII on how conflicts should be solved. But people are so coruppted when it comes to power and money they make sure peace never happens or they will not have that power and money.

[T100 0]

Please allow me to be politically incorrect in this matter. I am living in one the most socially unequal society where you can find slums, public housing and beautifully built private buildings at three exits of an underground rail station. Despite the income gap and the grievance of the low income class, there has never been such a scale of riot as those in France. The secret I think is simple. Over 959% of the people of my country are of the same race, speak the same language and have the same culture. The social inequality brings social problems, but not a racial one. There is jealousy, but no hatred. The riots in France can only attributed to poor immigration policy and unsatisfactory social engineering. Any government should have in mind that certain immigrants have the tendency to procreate more than the norm, having the effect of diluting the original population. It is the process of dilution that creates problem, not the immigrants themselves. The government has the obligation to maintain the social structure. If the social structure is severely damaged, social unrest will result.

[shaneroche 0]

Please allow me to be politically incorrect in this matter.

By all means.

I am living in one the most socially unequal society where you can find slums, public housing and beautifully built private buildings at three exits of an underground rail station. Despite the income gap and the grievance of the low income class, there has never been such a scale of riot as those in France. The secret I think is simple. Over 959% of the people of my country are of the same race, speak the same language and have the same culture. The social inequality brings social problems, but not a racial one. There is jealousy, but no hatred.

Since we don't know where you live we have to just take your word for it that a) a repressive regime is not part of reason that there are never riots, that the lowest social classes merely feel jealousy. As a matter of historical fact, even when France was a racially and cultural homogenous society, there was plenty of civil strife due to social injustice and inequality. They even went so far as to cut of the heads of their monarchs. The lower classes of French society of the 18th Century were more than just "jealous." If you require other examples, please don't ask me, the historical record is replete with them.

 

The riots in France can only attributed to poor immigration policy and unsatisfactory social engineering. Any government should have in mind that certain immigrants have the tendency to procreate more than the norm, having the effect of diluting the original population. It is the process of dilution that creates problem, not the immigrants themselves. The government has the obligation to maintain the social structure. If the social structure is severely damaged, social unrest will result.

202989[/snapback]

You come very close to saying what you really mean: some racial groups (in this case, North Africans and sub-Saharan Africans) just breed like rabbits ("procreate more than the norm" I think you said), they get out of control, and then you just can't control them? Do I have it more or less? And France failed to prevent them from "procreating" and disturbing the correct racial balance...?

 

I don't even know where to begin. It is, for example, a fact that ALL racial groups, in poverty, have higher growth rates. Rich communities of ALL racial groups, have LOWER growth rates. This phenomenon hold true between nations as well - those with the highest per capita incomes have the lowest growth rates, and vice versa. This income/population growth function has been attributed (by everyone who has seriously studied it to education about, and access to, family planning resources (basically, contraception). Even between similar income levels, better educated groups defer child bearing later, and have few children. And of course MONEY (Wealth) provides greater access to education. Every immigrant group that has come to the U.S., after a period of integration, has seen it's population growth rates stabilize. The stabilization ALWAYS coincided with greater prosperity within those groups. The exception are blacks and hispanics, who, for many of the same issues seen in France, continue to suffer from institutionalized discrimination and a lack of true integration and acceptance by the larger (white) population.

 

Before making arguments that you yourself concede are politically incorrect, perhaps you should stop and consider WHY they are politically incorrect. I will tell you why - because these arguments are not only sophmoric and intellectually lazy, but they double the insult by blaming the group that has actually been victimized.

[disguise 0]

Yeah. It's big news over here (belgium). The belgians are actually scared that it might come to belgium. It's just horrible. Something's got to be done. What? i have no idea.