what’s happening in France?

this morning I had the (in hindsight unfortunate) idea to check the french news, since I am traveling for the shortest ever w/e break to Paris.

After reading the headlines, I feel a bit worried about France, what’s going on there and my short trip (now I see the shortness of my trip as a good thing, at least).

These are 14 selected headlines out of 18 on France 24:

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I don’t think they need much in terms of comment, however I feel compelled to say something.

It looks like France is under a racist spell. That is not unusual in other countries: in italy too, for example, the vast majority of people harbour strong racist feeling, often hidden below a very thin layer of  “keeping the appearances” but always ready to explode in any situation. In the UK too there is a lot of racism. Racism is a natural state for the vast majority of people on the earth, because we are animals.

however in reading those 18 headlines, in seeing the hatred spew out like pus out of a wound, that is not nice. especially when you think you are diving into the pus.

And if you flip through the 14 selected headlines, you will see there is more than just racism.

It’s also interesting to see the usual example of media manipulating the perception of people. The muslim population in France is, according to this headline about halal ads, “huge”. According to this article it’s 10% of the overall population; ok it’s high but then again, it’s got to do, just considering the most recent history, with the colonialist era; it’s got to do with the need that all european countries have always had and still have to import cheap labour especially from ex colonies (similar to the influx of caribbeans and indians/pakistanis in the UK in the 50′s and 60′s).

Other interestingly worrying headlines are the ones on jews buying an ex nazi hangout and the one on france having actually increased its emissions in the past 7  years.