In the following video from TV Libertés, a criminologist named Xavier Raufer explains the “Yellow Vest” phenomenon in the context of the French national character as manifested during violent uprisings that have erupted from time to time throughout the country’s history.
Many thanks to Oz-Rita for the translation and subtitling:
Video transcript:
| 00:05 | TV Libertés we are you | |
| 00:17 | The Political Saturday presented by Elise Blaise | |
| 00:21 | Hello everyone, welcome to this new issue of Political Saturday, dedicated today | |
| 00:25 | to the drowning of executives in the wave of Yellow Vests. | |
| 00:33 | The Political Saturday presented by Elise Blaise | |
| 00:37 | Police officers overwhelmed and exhausted, desperate demonstrators | |
| 00:41 | and ultra-violent thugs: welcome to the France | |
| 00:45 | of Emmanuel Macron. 412 arrests, | |
| 00:49 | 378 police custody cases recorded in Paris alone last week, the auction is open | |
| 00:53 | for Act IV of the mobilisation of the Yellow Vests. | |
| 00:57 | 89,000 members of the security forces are expected on the territory, | |
| 01:01 | of which 8,000 are for the capital alone, and the team in charge of the country | |
| 01:05 | seems to fear the worst. Can Macron still regain control of France? | |
| 01:09 | Can [Interior Minister Christophe] Castaner restore order? Well, that’s what we’re going to see with | |
| 01:13 | Xavier Raufer. Thank you for being with us. You are well-known; | |
| 01:17 | you are a criminologist. We have seen that the situation | |
| 01:21 | has been relatively explosive recently in France. What’s going on? | |
| 01:25 | I believe that it will be a service to everyone, | |
| 01:29 | to all listeners: we must start with the fundamentals, | |
| 01:33 | these fundamentals whose neglect, whose forgetting | |
| 01:37 | is at the origin of everything that is happening now. | |
| 01:41 | The origin of everything is that nations and peoples | |
| 01:45 | do exist. Surprise! And so, since they exist, | |
| 01:49 | they have certain characteristics. I have always been | |
| 01:53 | doubtful about the stories of the | |
| 01:57 | “great replacement” etc. Certainly there is a mongrelisation in the suburbs | |
| 02:01 | of the metropolises, but everywhere else, the Original France | |
| 02:05 | is there; she is still there, and this France | |
| 02:09 | is ferocious. Voltaire said: | |
| 02:13 | “The French, this tough and light people.” They are able | |
| 02:17 | to have fun, to joke, | |
| 02:21 | they are capable of intellectual juggling, but when the time comes | |
| 02:25 | if necessary, they can be very nasty. | |
| 02:29 | And so when one takes one’s information from the notes of conjuncture | |
| 02:33 | of Goldman Sachs or whatever, or when one moves only | |
| 02:37 | in a small circle of friends and those who come out of the same school | |
| 02:41 | and those who live in the beautiful neighbourhoods with you, naturally — | |
| 02:45 | either one forgets it, or one ignores it: The French as a people are | |
| 02:49 | ferocious. And so, everyone knew it | |
| 02:53 | at the Elysée, until Mr. Macron got there. | |
| 02:57 | General de Gaulle was oh-so-aware of it; so were [François] Mitterrand, Giscard [d’Estaing], | |
| 03:01 | and even [Nicolas] Sarkozy. Sarkozy was driven | |
| 03:05 | by the idea that one should not treat a regicidal people like any other… | |
| 03:09 | I do not mean peoples | |
| 03:13 | where there has been an attack or the president/king has been killed, but a people who deliberately | |
| 03:17 | took the sovereign and cut off his head, or put a bullet in his neck. | |
| 03:21 | There are three in the world. At the UN there are 200 countries, | |
| 03:25 | 100 of which are a bit fake, where it’s just a national anthem, | |
| 03:29 | a flag, and not much behind it. There are about 100 | |
| 03:33 | real nation states. Of the 100 or so true nations, | |
| 03:37 | Three are regicidal peoples: the first | |
| 03:41 | are the English, with Charles I, the second are we French, with Louis XVI | |
| 03:45 | and the third of course the Tsar’s family, Russia in July 1918. | |
| 03:49 | These are peoples of whom we must be | |
| 03:53 | very careful. One must handle them like | |
| 03:57 | explosives, knowing that they have the characteristic of | |
| 04:01 | accepting, enduring and enduring | |
| 04:05 | and enduring and, suddenly, they violently knock over the table. | |
| 04:09 | That’s it, they have knocked over the table. In case some of you have not noticed | |
| 04:13 | the thing yet, have you seen the English? | |
| 04:17 | the European Union is bothering them with this | |
| 04:21 | and that… the color of leeks, etc., | |
| 04:25 | and much worse, two times, three times, ten times, and BOOM: Brexit. | |
| 04:29 | The Russians, no need to tell you “October ‘17”, | |
| 04:33 | and France, regularly, | |
| 04:37 | they knock over the table when they’ve had enough. It is always | |
| 04:41 | extremely brutal, it’s always very violent, | |
| 04:45 | and, for the most part, it’s always unpredictable. | |
| 04:49 | So now, the second fundamental point that must be kept in mind | |
| 04:53 | on the eve of a somewhat impressive day, from what we | |
| 04:57 | hear from right and left, is that, in the history of France, | |
| 05:01 | there have never been any acts of violence | |
| 05:05 | like those we saw on Saturday last week | |
| 05:09 | since 1830. | |
| 05:13 | So, nothing to do with May ‘68 for example, nothing to do with May ‘68, nothing to do with | |
| 05:17 | February 6, 1934; of course the Commune was something else, it was the army | |
| 05:21 | it was troops, it was a military insurrection, | |
| 05:25 | but in the style of riots… urban riots… | |
| 05:29 | it is the first time since “the glorious thirty years”, since 1830. |
“The French can become very nasty?”
We thought this on the eve of WWII and were largely disappointed.
I hope that famous French Revolutionary spirit returns this time, sans another Robespierre….
Enough us enough wake up France, wake up Europe..
As a French Canadian I can say that French patriotism is unique in the Western World.
It is more individualistic and in a way selfish compared to say British or American patriotism. It generally requires a greater amount of personal loss to bring a man to actual physical opposition. Crimes against the nation is considered more of an abstract notion.
The French are brave. In the US things can end very badly. Most US citizens are cowed.
In the US ranchers grazing cattle on public land with disputed fees can bring out hundreds of trigger happy, often federal/feral cops. They often charge such people with a massive number of federal crimes and shoot to kill on the slightest pretext. Such ranchers occupied an unused (out of season) building on federal land. The cops pulled over a rancher, and, when he stumbled in the snow, shot him dead, claiming he was reaching for a gun.
When a black woman dental hygienist (Miriam Carey) made a wrong turn into a federal driveway the Wash DC cops swarmed her car and started shooting at her when she backed out. When she kept going in fear they shot her 5 times in her back through her rear car window, narrowly missing her child in the back seat, and killing her. The feds then refused to turn over the videos of this killing and lost or destroyed evidence. The media published misleading stories then refused to pursue the story, except for WND.
The there was Milton Hall, a 50 year old mentally ill black man. He was waving a pen knife around. He was executed on film.
At 2:15 below
https://youtu.be/akAhjq83n8M?t=131
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2wEKjl9LEw
Who knows? I once had a Cajun friend who told of a relative in Louisiana who was confronted by an intruder in her house who was much bigger and stronger than she was. She grabbed one of the chairs from around the kitchen table, and drove him out of the house. Then she called the police. They found him bleeding in a ditch near by and he begged them to protect him from “that crazy woman”.
The Cajun friend, who was very politically correct, did think her relative was crazy to take such a risk. “He could have retaliated and harmed her.” Obviously. My question was: what would he have done if she had offered no resistance?
The Cajuns are an off-shoot of New France French folk that have a lot of fight left in them.
That’s the main reason the British shipped them out of Acadia (Canada).
My best friend in school was from the Cajun area – Ville Platte in Evangeline parish. Through her family, I was introduced to Cajun food and traditions. Later I lived in the New Orleans area briefly. Louisiana is diverse, being a Creole mixture of Spanish, French, Native American and blacks.
Without the cruelty of the English in Canada, who drove them out, we wouldn’t have Cajun music or food or culture. Here’s L’Angelus…not sure if they’re still performing together since they began to marry and have children:
https://youtu.be/p6pJDPf294s
The mother of the group appears in this video. A lively Cajun bunch.
Love that video.
You’ve rekindled my long dormant love for Cajun music.
It’s too bad the British kicked them out of Canada. Our loss.
No claim to Luzianne; going, coming, sitting down or standing up.
But do have a fondness for Cajun music. KLEB – “The Rajun Cajun” in Golden Meadow is a preset on ‘Net radio for access as the spirit moves me. Following Mass in French, they begin their broadcast day with our national anthem in French.