I'm neither French nor American, so I should step carefully here. That said, I think we can probably find some kind of middle ground here. Surely, racism exists in France, and should be addressed,...
Exemplary
I'm neither French nor American, so I should step carefully here. That said, I think we can probably find some kind of middle ground here. Surely, racism exists in France, and should be addressed, but just as surely, an American framework of race should not be indiscriminately applied because the situation is different. France needs to understand its own racism in terms of French racism, not American race relations which may or may not apply to France.
In a context I'm more familiar with personally, I've been frustrated by people trying to interpret ethnic conflicts between peoples that would all be coded as "white" by North Americans in terms of North American race theories. It just doesn't work. America's racism is not everyone's racism. That is not an attempt to deny that racism exists in other countries, merely a plea to respond to ethnic and racial tensions in terms of the actual factors involved, not based on some kind of idealized theory that is clearly rooted in the history of one specific foreign country.
I don't know enough about French racism to say how well it accords with North American race theories. And denying that an entirely American perspective is appropriate to interrogate racism in different countries with different kinds of racism and a different history is certainly not a valid excuse to deny that racism exists at all or that something should be done about it. That said, I can sympathize with the general notion that one cannot wholesale and uncritically import a foreign discourse into a different society. I suspect many of those who are railing against American woke culture are not genuinely concerned about lack of nuance and simply oppose any attempt, however nuanced, to talk about racism. That shouldn't prevent us from finding something better, though.
This reminds me of when Trevor Noah made an unfortunate remark about the French football team a while ago, and the reaction of the French Ambassador to the US offers a succinct primer on what it...
This reminds me of when Trevor Noah made an unfortunate remark about the French football team a while ago, and the reaction of the French Ambassador to the US offers a succinct primer on what it means to be French:
France is indeed a cosmopolitan country, but every citizen is part of the French identity and together they belong to the nation of France. Unlike in the United State of America, France does not refer to its citizen based on their race, religion or origin. To us, there is no hyphenated identity, roots are an individual reality.
To my knowledge, this opinion is shared in neighboring countries (Willensnation, constitutional patriotism).
France has a lot of racism. The attitude in that quote is certainly a nice state of being, but it ignores the reality that not all French people are actually treated the same. It is taking the...
France has a lot of racism. The attitude in that quote is certainly a nice state of being, but it ignores the reality that not all French people are actually treated the same. It is taking the ideals of France and conflating them with the reality of France, to sweep issues under the rug.
This very much reminds me of the erasure tactic conservatives employ to avoid social issues and disenfranchise minorities. "Quit it with all of these labels, we are all American/Humans/People and...
This very much reminds me of the erasure tactic conservatives employ to avoid social issues and disenfranchise minorities. "Quit it with all of these labels, we are all American/Humans/People and we should forget about the ginormous societal problems directly connected to those labels."
Speaking as a (non-black) person of color, I have mixed feelings on this. Of course there are enormous societal problems unique to each group of people that need to be addressed, but there seems...
Speaking as a (non-black) person of color, I have mixed feelings on this. Of course there are enormous societal problems unique to each group of people that need to be addressed, but there seems to be an almost uniquely American obsession with dividing people up into separate boxes that encourages the sort of tribalism we see there today. My other issue with this is that I've seen race and gender issues used as a way to pull the conversation away from economic/class issues which disproportionately affect the very minority groups that people claim to support.
I haven't lived back in the US for a few years now, but I can't imagine this sort of disunity is good for a society either.
The nation must then be willing to tackle those issues. The tribalism is a symptom. If systemic issues face some groups, then society must be willing to improve. Steadfastly refusing, as some...
The nation must then be willing to tackle those issues. The tribalism is a symptom.
If systemic issues face some groups, then society must be willing to improve. Steadfastly refusing, as some people do, leaves the disenfranchised no choice but to push back. If those refusing change have power, and control, then the pushing back will be against power in the nation, and eventually the nation itself.
The disenfranchised and otherwise systemically harmed in France see social progress happening in America, filled with strife. But left no other option, that may seem an attractive alternative when all other options have been exhausted.
Given the relative suffering between the worst off in the US and the worst off in literally any other democratic first world nation I gotta say I'm kind of sceptical of this thesis. The poor in...
Given the relative suffering between the worst off in the US and the worst off in literally any other democratic first world nation I gotta say I'm kind of sceptical of this thesis.
The poor in Europe almost always have free health care and assistance with housing costs. Many countries even still have free university tuition. This is before you look at legally mandated holiday allowances, protections from spurious firings, maternity leave...
And these are all nominally available regardless of race or religion. There certainly are issues with discrimination everywhere. But to me it seems that the USA is a very poor model of how to fix this.
It depends a lot on which issues you look at. Europe is really great generally at some stuff, like general healthcare and free education, but that doesn't mean that people are not oppressed or...
It depends a lot on which issues you look at. Europe is really great generally at some stuff, like general healthcare and free education, but that doesn't mean that people are not oppressed or fucked over in other areas.
I'm a swede, I've lived in Sweden my entire life.
One of the complaints is "ideas on gender". Some, most really, US states are pretty bad for trans people, but the best US states are frigging light years ahead of pretty much anywhere in Europe both in terms of access to trans healthcare and the quality of that care. Multi year bureaucratic hoops just to get basic help. Did you know that quite a few supposedly progressive European countries still mandate castration to change someone's legally recognized gender? Only been about ten years since we stopped in Sweden. Oppression is everywhere in Europe, but it is a lot less visible than in America if you are not affected yourself.
Many of my fellow Europeans will criticize America over racism against black people, then 5 minutes later go on long rants about Roma, calling them thieves and lazy abusers of the welfare state. You get similar stuff with Arabs and African immigrants and refugees.
I'm not saying that the US is a good model, but the better parts of the US seemingly manage to progress, so, as I said, left no other choice, those oppressed will turn to something which seems to at least force some results.
The solution is to acknowledge and tackle these and other problems on our own terms, as soon as possible. Sweeping them under the rug and patting ourselves on the back for being better than America will only make things worse.
Sorry if that was a bit rambly, I feel very strongly about this issue. Here in Sweden we are very smug about how much better we are than anyone else, which ends up being a justification for not really needing to improve.
Another issue, continuing to ramble here, is that in a sense, the importation of American ideas about progress is also a response to the importation of American bigotry. I have the misfortune to know quite a few neonazis, and they seem to get many of their ideas over the net from America. Likewise, I think a lot of mainstream conservatism here is starting to mimic American mainstream conservatism, which is not very nice.
I agree. I moved from the US to live in Amsterdam for four years. I visited the Bijlmer, which the Dutch somewhat avoid because of its reputation as a crime-ridden ghetto for working-class...
I agree. I moved from the US to live in Amsterdam for four years. I visited the Bijlmer, which the Dutch somewhat avoid because of its reputation as a crime-ridden ghetto for working-class minorities from Suriname, Morocco, and the like.
It would be... not at the top of my list of places I'd like to live, but it seemed very livable. About 15-30 mins away from the city center, with lots of big parks, interstitial green spaces, bike lanes, lots of public transit (and modes of transit), and decently maintained social apartments. It offered a better quality of life than many 'nice' American suburbs. The Dutch have done an excellent job of taking care of their poor and minorities. Granted it's imperfect, but given the track record of other countries, it's an incredibly difficult job.
Quite Germane considering how much American conservatives like to hand-wring about French intellectuals and movements such as Postmodernism, thought not always by mentioning the French in that...
Quite Germane considering how much American conservatives like to hand-wring about French intellectuals and movements such as Postmodernism, thought not always by mentioning the French in that conversation.
Also disappointing that president Macron would try and surf this wave of nationalistic conservative fervor, especially given how eager he had been years before to encourage American intellectuals to come over to France, but I suppose he will look to make allies wherever he can these days.
“The common agenda of these enemies of European civilization can be summed up in three words: decolonize, demasculate, de-Europeanize,’’ Mr. Taguieff said. “Straight white male — that’s the culprit to condemn and the enemy to eliminate.”
Ironically this seems to echo the same sentiments Far-Right commentators in the US have been repeating for years but I guess that will simply be swept under the rug in favor of maintaining the idea of America as some kind of hotbed of Progressiveness-gone-too-far.
I know very little about the history of race relations in France, so I won't defend or attack their use of blackface here. I do think historical context and cultural norms are an important factor....
I know very little about the history of race relations in France, so I won't defend or attack their use of blackface here.
I do think historical context and cultural norms are an important factor. Blackface may not be considered inappropriate in a hypothetical culture where black people were not historically marginalized, or blackface did not have a history of being used to make a mockery of an entire race of people). In America, we have had long standing recent problems with both of these, making it a highly sensitive topic.
So without knowing how this plays out with people of color in France, I can't say one way or the other how problematic it is. The article doesn't seem to address it directly.
I think you can look at the French colonial empire in Africa, the wars over algeria, and the modern day neocolonialism they exert in Africa and see maybe they shouldn't be doing blackface. Sure,...
I think you can look at the French colonial empire in Africa, the wars over algeria, and the modern day neocolonialism they exert in Africa and see maybe they shouldn't be doing blackface.
Sure, not all colonial subjects if France would've met the definition of "black", but still.
Edit: changed "come on" to "still" because I think it sounds less confrontational, and I didn't mean to sound confrontational
Yeah, I'm white and french, blackface grosses me out equally in a French or American context. Of course you always have to take the full context into account, for example I think it's awful that...
Yeah, I'm white and french, blackface grosses me out equally in a French or American context. Of course you always have to take the full context into account, for example I think it's awful that the IASIP blackface episode has been censored previously.
Black people were absolutely marginalized in France, perhaps moreso in it's colonies than in the mainland since that is where the bulk of slave labor was concentrated (as opposed to America, which...
Black people were absolutely marginalized in France, perhaps moreso in it's colonies than in the mainland since that is where the bulk of slave labor was concentrated (as opposed to America, which effectively went from colony to "mainland"). However the French were absolutely no strangers, domestically, to Race theory and caste systems based on ones ancestry.
If you are interested you can look into the colonial regimes of Haiti/Saint Dominique and the slave revolts that resulted of it, or the question of race during the French revolution, the Revolutions podcast has a very succinct series on it.
The bottom line is that the French and American contexts are very comparable, it is not at all problematic to view this history through a similar lens.
If my grandmother is any indication the French are kinda racist. Or maybe it’s just my extended family, they were all pretty upset to learn of my second cousin having a kid with and later marrying...
If my grandmother is any indication the French are kinda racist. Or maybe it’s just my extended family, they were all pretty upset to learn of my second cousin having a kid with and later marrying a black man. They don’t seem to really consider black people to be French, they’re just “the colonials” that have seeped into their country. It’s pretty bad, and don’t get my grandmother started on the “orientals”.
With regards to religion, I'm surprised the article didn't delve too much into the controversy that comes up every so often about France banning hijabs and similar in public schools. It seems like...
With regards to religion, I'm surprised the article didn't delve too much into the controversy that comes up every so often about France banning hijabs and similar in public schools. It seems like a classic example of American values being broadly applied to a more nuanced situation.
I thought this was an interesting piece with the potential to generate some deep, good discussion. I’d be especially interested to hear a French/Francophone/French immigrant perspective. Side...
I thought this was an interesting piece with the potential to generate some deep, good discussion. I’d be especially interested to hear a French/Francophone/French immigrant perspective.
Side note: I know a topic like this can get heated, so let’s all try to have a good time.
Thanks for posting it! It's a bit all over the place. I'm going to give it another read with a clearer head. I will say this though: this sentiment is common in france, and it worries me that the...
Thanks for posting it! It's a bit all over the place. I'm going to give it another read with a clearer head.
I will say this though: this sentiment is common in france, and it worries me that the outspoken ones are people like Marine Le Pen -- far right extremists jumping on the opportunity to ring the bell of identity politics.
When these things are not addressed in time, people find reason with extremists. This is reminiscent of what's happening here in Belgium (and many other countries) with COVID: absurd rules are pushing people to be anti-lockdown, and end up flirting with anti-science and antivax circles because this is where they find the voice of reason for an issue that affects them or they Identify with.
@kfwyre just want to make sure you read the article since we were just discussing this sort of thing in another thread. :)
Thanks for the ping, Adys. I'm completely unqualified to speak about France, but I will say that my thought upon reading this article is that I feel like America's worst cultural export isn't any...
Thanks for the ping, Adys.
I'm completely unqualified to speak about France, but I will say that my thought upon reading this article is that I feel like America's worst cultural export isn't any particular ideology at all but instead a framework of bitter, partisan conflict.
I feel like American culture has gotten increasingly divided and outrage-based in recent years, and I feel like we're normalizing that for the rest of the world through the internet. Americans don't know what it's like to not be pissed off anymore. We don't know what it's like to not have enemies in our sights or feed ourselves anything but an informational diet focused on the hypocrisy of the "other side". Everything is hate-based, fear-based, and aimed at activating a sense of smug, team-based superiority.
I see this eroding America, and I see it embedding in the rest of the world as our dominant culture mixes with others online. I'm less worried about any "woke ideas" in particular and more at the idea, identified by French leaders and in the article itself, that seemingly the only potential response to those ideas is to tear apart the fabric of society. America is unfortunately deeply committed to its division, and I feel like we're modeling that to the rest of the world as if it's a normal or even desired way of being.
Yourself and @EgoEimi put this into words better than I ever could. I fully agree with you that the framework of partisanship is indeed my biggest problem with america - not its ideologies. I was...
Exemplary
Yourself and @EgoEimi put this into words better than I ever could. I fully agree with you that the framework of partisanship is indeed my biggest problem with america - not its ideologies.
I was talking to a French friend of mine about how in France, having dinner and a laugh at christmas with your far-right-voting uncle isn't actually a problem because we know to put politics aside. And if they do come up during dinner there may be some mockery and mild jabs thrown about, but all in good spirits.
Because in the end, although these issues affect us, we've always felt that politicians do not and usually cannot represent us. They're all disconnected from the day to day life. And that's okay because they're here to deal with things we don't want to deal with. Politics are boring and anyone who enjoys them is probably sociopathic anyway.
Was like that for a while… it's changed. For me at any rate; Macron is the first time I've personally felt represented by my president. I'm definitely more interested in politics (even if French ones are still pretty boring). And indeed I'm seeing more and more that the guy or gal voting differently isn't merely of a different opinion, but an "enemy".
… and I get it. Even here on Tildes I've seen it: "When your life is endangered by the political views of your fellow citizen, how can you not consider them an enemy?"
It's gotta hard being a minority that is actually used as a persecution pawn in the political game of the demagogue du jour. But to me, most Trump voters aren't oppressors, they're victims.
It's hard to see them as victims because they are (or can appear to be) so devoid of empathy. But that is empathy as well: Being able to put yourself in the shoes of what you perceive to be your worst enemy, and understand why they feel the way they do. Just saying "they're racist" is a cheap out to the question of "why do they hate me".
And sure, some of them are legitimately awful people. A scary amount, no doubt. But it's horribly sad that so many are ready to believe that anywhere between 1/3rd to half of america is "like that". That it's fine to give up on them because they're all racist/sexist/homophobic assholes who deserve no empathy.
If you dare defend them (like I do now), you'll be crucified. Which means if you find yourself to agree with the group on one particular issue, you'll be lumped in with the rest. And by being lumped in, you'll find yourself on the other side of the partisan news diet/propaganda and just entrench yourself there. So it's a bad system that fosters more and more recruits for what was once a vocal minority.
Sorry… my comment is all over the place. I have a lot of regret when I look at american partisanship and I have myself been lumped in with that group for a variety of reasons (and I think you know me well enough by now to know that was probably unwarranted). It's frustrating. It's especially frustrating when I see members of such minority groups claim a whole community is toxic because they found one opinion they disagreed with, equated it to the person having more opinions they disagreed with, equated that with the whole community agreeing with those, and thus left to find a narrower echo chamber.
And if it sounds like that happened on Tildes before… it has. I could spend a lot of time writing about how that is self-defeating, but hopefully it's obvious enough by now.
I find myself of two minds on this topic. I'm someone who tries to center myself in empathy and believes group-based guilt-by-association is a poison for our society. I think if you ask someone on...
Exemplary
I find myself of two minds on this topic.
I'm someone who tries to center myself in empathy and believes group-based guilt-by-association is a poison for our society. I think if you ask someone on the left to envision a prototypical conservative, they envision a monster; and I think the same thing happens if you ask someone on the right to envision a prototypical liberal. I think this is a distortion; I think this is wrong; and I think we have to see and value the humanity even in people we don't like.
If I were to say something like this anywhere but Tildes, I would hear the distant sounds of thousands of keyboards angrily clacking, because it looks like it contributes to a both-sides-ism that's part and parcel of the partisan divide, and the easiest way to make enemies in a partisan divide is to not ally yourself with either side and thus identify yourself as fair target for everyone. We are so primed for conflict and categorization of advocacy that to cut through any of these responses you have to spend a ton of effort articulating not what you're actually saying, but what you're not saying as well. It's exhausting, and I (and I'm assuming many others) sometimes don't even bother to say anything, which just cedes ground to the more divisive voices.
That's one part of me.
But there's another part of me that is watching what is happening to people I know and getting where the frustration and bitterness is coming from. Quiet patience and appealing to someone's better nature only works if the person respects that process and has a better nature. America's current brand of politics seems designed entirely around activating toxic individualism and entitlement, which causes people to view quiet patience as weak and experience their better nature only as an acute, inward-focused, narrow-minded selfishness.
I believe this is a distortion that exists on both sides but is much more heavily perpetuated on the right. Reasonable reform simply isn't possible because even the most reasonable people and viewpoints on the left get regularly escalated to the positions of monsters. Quiet patience does nothing to fix this. Better natures can't be appealed to if others even refuse to look for the good in the first place. I can feel my heart hardening: if all I'm seen as is a monster, then why bother being good? Why not hit back, relish in my enemies' pain, and lean into all the things I'm already being falsely accused of?
Again, this cuts both ways too, as I'm sure some conservatives are tired of being characterized as, say, racist and are tempted to lean into it too out of spite, but I'm also honestly tired of trying to maintain comfort for people who have never offered me the same courtesy and, in a post-Trump era, now openly relish my discomfort.
I think part of what is fueling the partisan divide is that the left finally caught on to a lot of the below-the-belt tactics the right has been using for decades now and is finally using them in retaliation. This is why so many conservatives feel "under attack" right now, which is exactly how I've felt being on the left for my entire life. I also think that means that the right has had to escalate its tactics in response, which is why much of modern right-wing news media is composed of outright falsehoods.
Millions of Americans believe that the election was stolen from Trump. It is worth questioning how so many people can come to believe this despite it being fully unsupported by evidence, but it is also worth questioning what kind of moral judgments they will make because they believe it to be true. The people who believe the election were stolen were already primed to hate Democrats, and now they believe us to have unethically taken their country from them. Do you think they're primed to value quiet patience from my side in the slightest? Do you think they will see any good in us? Not a chance. So why not break some dishes, fuck shit up, and damn the torpedoes? They already think we're doing that anyway, so what's the harm?
I don't believe that to be the right course of action, but I do believe it to be a widely felt one. It's why America's divide is escalating with seemingly no exit strategy. We've lost sight of everything but conflict, but, more importantly, we feel so thoroughly justified in engaging in that conflict.
I hate it. I cannot express in words how much I hate it. I hate what it's doing to my country, to people I know, and to society at large. I hate how it has ruined discourse. I hate that it's spilling over to seemingly everything.
And I don't know what to do about it. I feel like I'm fighting the tide and losing, all while half my country openly cheers at my loss and relishes the idea that it brings me pain.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg gave advice for a good marriage: "it helps to be a little deaf." The world is filled with injustices to settle. Enough for many, many lifetimes. I think that there are times...
Ruth Bader Ginsburg gave advice for a good marriage: "it helps to be a little deaf." The world is filled with injustices to settle. Enough for many, many lifetimes. I think that there are times for battle, and times for rest. The new American way of always being on, on, on to fight — with the implication that not being on means not caring — overwhelms the human capacity for empathy and leads to burnout.
And I think that that such a framework rewards short-term symbolic actions in people's social networks and sucks the oxygen and energy out of political discourse for addressing substantive issues that aren't sexy, like developing more housing, developing public transit, creating a better business environment, and so on — for everyone. Bad housing mechanisms (like zoning, hostile building permit process, Prop 13 deincentivising new constructions, and others) make housing difficult for poor whites and minorities alike.
Ezra Klein wrote an interesting op-ed criticizing the shortcomings of progressivism in California. Despite being a liberal and fantastically wealthy state, California has the highest poverty rate, crumbling infrastructure, a massive housing crisis, an education crisis, among multiple other public crises. One particular paragraph struck me because of how much it corroborated my own personal experience:
In much of San Francisco, you can’t walk 20 feet without seeing a multicolored sign declaring that Black lives matter, kindness is everything and no human being is illegal. Those signs sit in yards zoned for single families, in communities that organize against efforts to add the new homes that would bring those values closer to reality. Poorer families — disproportionately nonwhite and immigrant — are pushed into long commutes, overcrowded housing and homelessness.
Yup! The only participation is conflict, and abstaining from conflict is capitulation. It’s a draining and destructive paradigm, but it’s great for social media engagement metrics! Your post is...
The new American way of always being on, on, on to fight — with the implication that not being on means not caring — overwhelms the human capacity for empathy and leads to burnout.
Yup! The only participation is conflict, and abstaining from conflict is capitulation. It’s a draining and destructive paradigm, but it’s great for social media engagement metrics!
Your post is insightful, wonderfully worded, and hits on many of my frustrations with the current political zeitgeist. Thank you.
I'm neither French nor American, so I should step carefully here. That said, I think we can probably find some kind of middle ground here. Surely, racism exists in France, and should be addressed, but just as surely, an American framework of race should not be indiscriminately applied because the situation is different. France needs to understand its own racism in terms of French racism, not American race relations which may or may not apply to France.
In a context I'm more familiar with personally, I've been frustrated by people trying to interpret ethnic conflicts between peoples that would all be coded as "white" by North Americans in terms of North American race theories. It just doesn't work. America's racism is not everyone's racism. That is not an attempt to deny that racism exists in other countries, merely a plea to respond to ethnic and racial tensions in terms of the actual factors involved, not based on some kind of idealized theory that is clearly rooted in the history of one specific foreign country.
I don't know enough about French racism to say how well it accords with North American race theories. And denying that an entirely American perspective is appropriate to interrogate racism in different countries with different kinds of racism and a different history is certainly not a valid excuse to deny that racism exists at all or that something should be done about it. That said, I can sympathize with the general notion that one cannot wholesale and uncritically import a foreign discourse into a different society. I suspect many of those who are railing against American woke culture are not genuinely concerned about lack of nuance and simply oppose any attempt, however nuanced, to talk about racism. That shouldn't prevent us from finding something better, though.
This reminds me of when Trevor Noah made an unfortunate remark about the French football team a while ago, and the reaction of the French Ambassador to the US offers a succinct primer on what it means to be French:
To my knowledge, this opinion is shared in neighboring countries (Willensnation, constitutional patriotism).
France has a lot of racism. The attitude in that quote is certainly a nice state of being, but it ignores the reality that not all French people are actually treated the same. It is taking the ideals of France and conflating them with the reality of France, to sweep issues under the rug.
This very much reminds me of the erasure tactic conservatives employ to avoid social issues and disenfranchise minorities. "Quit it with all of these labels, we are all American/Humans/People and we should forget about the ginormous societal problems directly connected to those labels."
Speaking as a (non-black) person of color, I have mixed feelings on this. Of course there are enormous societal problems unique to each group of people that need to be addressed, but there seems to be an almost uniquely American obsession with dividing people up into separate boxes that encourages the sort of tribalism we see there today. My other issue with this is that I've seen race and gender issues used as a way to pull the conversation away from economic/class issues which disproportionately affect the very minority groups that people claim to support.
I haven't lived back in the US for a few years now, but I can't imagine this sort of disunity is good for a society either.
The nation must then be willing to tackle those issues. The tribalism is a symptom.
If systemic issues face some groups, then society must be willing to improve. Steadfastly refusing, as some people do, leaves the disenfranchised no choice but to push back. If those refusing change have power, and control, then the pushing back will be against power in the nation, and eventually the nation itself.
The disenfranchised and otherwise systemically harmed in France see social progress happening in America, filled with strife. But left no other option, that may seem an attractive alternative when all other options have been exhausted.
Given the relative suffering between the worst off in the US and the worst off in literally any other democratic first world nation I gotta say I'm kind of sceptical of this thesis.
The poor in Europe almost always have free health care and assistance with housing costs. Many countries even still have free university tuition. This is before you look at legally mandated holiday allowances, protections from spurious firings, maternity leave...
And these are all nominally available regardless of race or religion. There certainly are issues with discrimination everywhere. But to me it seems that the USA is a very poor model of how to fix this.
It depends a lot on which issues you look at. Europe is really great generally at some stuff, like general healthcare and free education, but that doesn't mean that people are not oppressed or fucked over in other areas.
I'm a swede, I've lived in Sweden my entire life.
One of the complaints is "ideas on gender". Some, most really, US states are pretty bad for trans people, but the best US states are frigging light years ahead of pretty much anywhere in Europe both in terms of access to trans healthcare and the quality of that care. Multi year bureaucratic hoops just to get basic help. Did you know that quite a few supposedly progressive European countries still mandate castration to change someone's legally recognized gender? Only been about ten years since we stopped in Sweden. Oppression is everywhere in Europe, but it is a lot less visible than in America if you are not affected yourself.
Many of my fellow Europeans will criticize America over racism against black people, then 5 minutes later go on long rants about Roma, calling them thieves and lazy abusers of the welfare state. You get similar stuff with Arabs and African immigrants and refugees.
I'm not saying that the US is a good model, but the better parts of the US seemingly manage to progress, so, as I said, left no other choice, those oppressed will turn to something which seems to at least force some results.
The solution is to acknowledge and tackle these and other problems on our own terms, as soon as possible. Sweeping them under the rug and patting ourselves on the back for being better than America will only make things worse.
Sorry if that was a bit rambly, I feel very strongly about this issue. Here in Sweden we are very smug about how much better we are than anyone else, which ends up being a justification for not really needing to improve.
Another issue, continuing to ramble here, is that in a sense, the importation of American ideas about progress is also a response to the importation of American bigotry. I have the misfortune to know quite a few neonazis, and they seem to get many of their ideas over the net from America. Likewise, I think a lot of mainstream conservatism here is starting to mimic American mainstream conservatism, which is not very nice.
Don't be sorry! It was good to get your perspective, thanks.
I agree. I moved from the US to live in Amsterdam for four years. I visited the Bijlmer, which the Dutch somewhat avoid because of its reputation as a crime-ridden ghetto for working-class minorities from Suriname, Morocco, and the like.
It would be... not at the top of my list of places I'd like to live, but it seemed very livable. About 15-30 mins away from the city center, with lots of big parks, interstitial green spaces, bike lanes, lots of public transit (and modes of transit), and decently maintained social apartments. It offered a better quality of life than many 'nice' American suburbs. The Dutch have done an excellent job of taking care of their poor and minorities. Granted it's imperfect, but given the track record of other countries, it's an incredibly difficult job.
Quite Germane considering how much American conservatives like to hand-wring about French intellectuals and movements such as Postmodernism, thought not always by mentioning the French in that conversation.
Also disappointing that president Macron would try and surf this wave of nationalistic conservative fervor, especially given how eager he had been years before to encourage American intellectuals to come over to France, but I suppose he will look to make allies wherever he can these days.
Ironically this seems to echo the same sentiments Far-Right commentators in the US have been repeating for years but I guess that will simply be swept under the rug in favor of maintaining the idea of America as some kind of hotbed of Progressiveness-gone-too-far.
And France has fairly low English proficiency and a decent domestic media industry. Think how bad it is in countries without that.
I was unaware they still allowed blackface in french operas. Shows what I know of European cultures.
Off-topic but regarding blackface, there is also the character Zwarte Piet
I know very little about the history of race relations in France, so I won't defend or attack their use of blackface here.
I do think historical context and cultural norms are an important factor. Blackface may not be considered inappropriate in a hypothetical culture where black people were not historically marginalized, or blackface did not have a history of being used to make a mockery of an entire race of people). In America, we have had long standing recent problems with both of these, making it a highly sensitive topic.
So without knowing how this plays out with people of color in France, I can't say one way or the other how problematic it is. The article doesn't seem to address it directly.
I think you can look at the French colonial empire in Africa, the wars over algeria, and the modern day neocolonialism they exert in Africa and see maybe they shouldn't be doing blackface.
Sure, not all colonial subjects if France would've met the definition of "black", but still.
Edit: changed "come on" to "still" because I think it sounds less confrontational, and I didn't mean to sound confrontational
Yeah, I'm white and french, blackface grosses me out equally in a French or American context. Of course you always have to take the full context into account, for example I think it's awful that the IASIP blackface episode has been censored previously.
Black people were absolutely marginalized in France, perhaps moreso in it's colonies than in the mainland since that is where the bulk of slave labor was concentrated (as opposed to America, which effectively went from colony to "mainland"). However the French were absolutely no strangers, domestically, to Race theory and caste systems based on ones ancestry.
If you are interested you can look into the colonial regimes of Haiti/Saint Dominique and the slave revolts that resulted of it, or the question of race during the French revolution, the Revolutions podcast has a very succinct series on it.
The bottom line is that the French and American contexts are very comparable, it is not at all problematic to view this history through a similar lens.
If my grandmother is any indication the French are kinda racist. Or maybe it’s just my extended family, they were all pretty upset to learn of my second cousin having a kid with and later marrying a black man. They don’t seem to really consider black people to be French, they’re just “the colonials” that have seeped into their country. It’s pretty bad, and don’t get my grandmother started on the “orientals”.
I am not surprised to hear any of this, because humans seem to be jerks just about everywhere you go.
With regards to religion, I'm surprised the article didn't delve too much into the controversy that comes up every so often about France banning hijabs and similar in public schools. It seems like a classic example of American values being broadly applied to a more nuanced situation.
I thought this was an interesting piece with the potential to generate some deep, good discussion. I’d be especially interested to hear a French/Francophone/French immigrant perspective.
Side note: I know a topic like this can get heated, so let’s all try to have a good time.
Thanks for posting it! It's a bit all over the place. I'm going to give it another read with a clearer head.
I will say this though: this sentiment is common in france, and it worries me that the outspoken ones are people like Marine Le Pen -- far right extremists jumping on the opportunity to ring the bell of identity politics.
When these things are not addressed in time, people find reason with extremists. This is reminiscent of what's happening here in Belgium (and many other countries) with COVID: absurd rules are pushing people to be anti-lockdown, and end up flirting with anti-science and antivax circles because this is where they find the voice of reason for an issue that affects them or they Identify with.
@kfwyre just want to make sure you read the article since we were just discussing this sort of thing in another thread. :)
Thanks for the ping, Adys.
I'm completely unqualified to speak about France, but I will say that my thought upon reading this article is that I feel like America's worst cultural export isn't any particular ideology at all but instead a framework of bitter, partisan conflict.
I feel like American culture has gotten increasingly divided and outrage-based in recent years, and I feel like we're normalizing that for the rest of the world through the internet. Americans don't know what it's like to not be pissed off anymore. We don't know what it's like to not have enemies in our sights or feed ourselves anything but an informational diet focused on the hypocrisy of the "other side". Everything is hate-based, fear-based, and aimed at activating a sense of smug, team-based superiority.
I see this eroding America, and I see it embedding in the rest of the world as our dominant culture mixes with others online. I'm less worried about any "woke ideas" in particular and more at the idea, identified by French leaders and in the article itself, that seemingly the only potential response to those ideas is to tear apart the fabric of society. America is unfortunately deeply committed to its division, and I feel like we're modeling that to the rest of the world as if it's a normal or even desired way of being.
Yourself and @EgoEimi put this into words better than I ever could. I fully agree with you that the framework of partisanship is indeed my biggest problem with america - not its ideologies.
I was talking to a French friend of mine about how in France, having dinner and a laugh at christmas with your far-right-voting uncle isn't actually a problem because we know to put politics aside. And if they do come up during dinner there may be some mockery and mild jabs thrown about, but all in good spirits.
Because in the end, although these issues affect us, we've always felt that politicians do not and usually cannot represent us. They're all disconnected from the day to day life. And that's okay because they're here to deal with things we don't want to deal with. Politics are boring and anyone who enjoys them is probably sociopathic anyway.
Was like that for a while… it's changed. For me at any rate; Macron is the first time I've personally felt represented by my president. I'm definitely more interested in politics (even if French ones are still pretty boring). And indeed I'm seeing more and more that the guy or gal voting differently isn't merely of a different opinion, but an "enemy".
… and I get it. Even here on Tildes I've seen it: "When your life is endangered by the political views of your fellow citizen, how can you not consider them an enemy?"
It's gotta hard being a minority that is actually used as a persecution pawn in the political game of the demagogue du jour. But to me, most Trump voters aren't oppressors, they're victims.
It's hard to see them as victims because they are (or can appear to be) so devoid of empathy. But that is empathy as well: Being able to put yourself in the shoes of what you perceive to be your worst enemy, and understand why they feel the way they do. Just saying "they're racist" is a cheap out to the question of "why do they hate me".
And sure, some of them are legitimately awful people. A scary amount, no doubt. But it's horribly sad that so many are ready to believe that anywhere between 1/3rd to half of america is "like that". That it's fine to give up on them because they're all racist/sexist/homophobic assholes who deserve no empathy.
If you dare defend them (like I do now), you'll be crucified. Which means if you find yourself to agree with the group on one particular issue, you'll be lumped in with the rest. And by being lumped in, you'll find yourself on the other side of the partisan news diet/propaganda and just entrench yourself there. So it's a bad system that fosters more and more recruits for what was once a vocal minority.
Sorry… my comment is all over the place. I have a lot of regret when I look at american partisanship and I have myself been lumped in with that group for a variety of reasons (and I think you know me well enough by now to know that was probably unwarranted). It's frustrating. It's especially frustrating when I see members of such minority groups claim a whole community is toxic because they found one opinion they disagreed with, equated it to the person having more opinions they disagreed with, equated that with the whole community agreeing with those, and thus left to find a narrower echo chamber.
And if it sounds like that happened on Tildes before… it has. I could spend a lot of time writing about how that is self-defeating, but hopefully it's obvious enough by now.
I find myself of two minds on this topic.
I'm someone who tries to center myself in empathy and believes group-based guilt-by-association is a poison for our society. I think if you ask someone on the left to envision a prototypical conservative, they envision a monster; and I think the same thing happens if you ask someone on the right to envision a prototypical liberal. I think this is a distortion; I think this is wrong; and I think we have to see and value the humanity even in people we don't like.
If I were to say something like this anywhere but Tildes, I would hear the distant sounds of thousands of keyboards angrily clacking, because it looks like it contributes to a both-sides-ism that's part and parcel of the partisan divide, and the easiest way to make enemies in a partisan divide is to not ally yourself with either side and thus identify yourself as fair target for everyone. We are so primed for conflict and categorization of advocacy that to cut through any of these responses you have to spend a ton of effort articulating not what you're actually saying, but what you're not saying as well. It's exhausting, and I (and I'm assuming many others) sometimes don't even bother to say anything, which just cedes ground to the more divisive voices.
That's one part of me.
But there's another part of me that is watching what is happening to people I know and getting where the frustration and bitterness is coming from. Quiet patience and appealing to someone's better nature only works if the person respects that process and has a better nature. America's current brand of politics seems designed entirely around activating toxic individualism and entitlement, which causes people to view quiet patience as weak and experience their better nature only as an acute, inward-focused, narrow-minded selfishness.
I believe this is a distortion that exists on both sides but is much more heavily perpetuated on the right. Reasonable reform simply isn't possible because even the most reasonable people and viewpoints on the left get regularly escalated to the positions of monsters. Quiet patience does nothing to fix this. Better natures can't be appealed to if others even refuse to look for the good in the first place. I can feel my heart hardening: if all I'm seen as is a monster, then why bother being good? Why not hit back, relish in my enemies' pain, and lean into all the things I'm already being falsely accused of?
Again, this cuts both ways too, as I'm sure some conservatives are tired of being characterized as, say, racist and are tempted to lean into it too out of spite, but I'm also honestly tired of trying to maintain comfort for people who have never offered me the same courtesy and, in a post-Trump era, now openly relish my discomfort.
I think part of what is fueling the partisan divide is that the left finally caught on to a lot of the below-the-belt tactics the right has been using for decades now and is finally using them in retaliation. This is why so many conservatives feel "under attack" right now, which is exactly how I've felt being on the left for my entire life. I also think that means that the right has had to escalate its tactics in response, which is why much of modern right-wing news media is composed of outright falsehoods.
Millions of Americans believe that the election was stolen from Trump. It is worth questioning how so many people can come to believe this despite it being fully unsupported by evidence, but it is also worth questioning what kind of moral judgments they will make because they believe it to be true. The people who believe the election were stolen were already primed to hate Democrats, and now they believe us to have unethically taken their country from them. Do you think they're primed to value quiet patience from my side in the slightest? Do you think they will see any good in us? Not a chance. So why not break some dishes, fuck shit up, and damn the torpedoes? They already think we're doing that anyway, so what's the harm?
I don't believe that to be the right course of action, but I do believe it to be a widely felt one. It's why America's divide is escalating with seemingly no exit strategy. We've lost sight of everything but conflict, but, more importantly, we feel so thoroughly justified in engaging in that conflict.
I hate it. I cannot express in words how much I hate it. I hate what it's doing to my country, to people I know, and to society at large. I hate how it has ruined discourse. I hate that it's spilling over to seemingly everything.
And I don't know what to do about it. I feel like I'm fighting the tide and losing, all while half my country openly cheers at my loss and relishes the idea that it brings me pain.
I have nothing to add to what you said but you have all my sympathy. I hope things will get better. I'm pretty positive they will. ❤️
Thanks, Adys. I appreciate your support, your perspective, your constant good faith, and your willingness to abide my diatribes. :)
Ruth Bader Ginsburg gave advice for a good marriage: "it helps to be a little deaf." The world is filled with injustices to settle. Enough for many, many lifetimes. I think that there are times for battle, and times for rest. The new American way of always being on, on, on to fight — with the implication that not being on means not caring — overwhelms the human capacity for empathy and leads to burnout.
And I think that that such a framework rewards short-term symbolic actions in people's social networks and sucks the oxygen and energy out of political discourse for addressing substantive issues that aren't sexy, like developing more housing, developing public transit, creating a better business environment, and so on — for everyone. Bad housing mechanisms (like zoning, hostile building permit process, Prop 13 deincentivising new constructions, and others) make housing difficult for poor whites and minorities alike.
Ezra Klein wrote an interesting op-ed criticizing the shortcomings of progressivism in California. Despite being a liberal and fantastically wealthy state, California has the highest poverty rate, crumbling infrastructure, a massive housing crisis, an education crisis, among multiple other public crises. One particular paragraph struck me because of how much it corroborated my own personal experience:
Yup! The only participation is conflict, and abstaining from conflict is capitulation. It’s a draining and destructive paradigm, but it’s great for social media engagement metrics!
Your post is insightful, wonderfully worded, and hits on many of my frustrations with the current political zeitgeist. Thank you.