Emmanuel Macron vs. the Yellow Vests

Below are two videos about the ongoing political crisis in France centered around the Yellow Vest movement and the presidency of Emmanuel “Toy Boy” Macron. Many thanks to Ava Lon for the translations, and to Vlad Tepes for the subtitling.

In the first video Mr. Macron lectures his fellow citizens on their duties to the state:

Later Mr. Macron descended on the town of Grand Bourgtheroulde in Normandy for what was billed as a “National Debate”. Hundreds of Yellow Vests converged on Bourgtheroulde, but the president was not willing to meet with them or debate them:

More on the National Debate in Grand Bourgtheroulde: France24

Video transcript #1:

00:00   The troubles that our society is going through are also,
00:04   sometimes, owed to and linked to the fact that
00:08   far too many of our compatriots think that you can obtain
00:12   [something] without putting out any effort. That sometimes
00:16   you, all too often, forget that besides the rights of everybody in the Republic —
00:20   and our Republic has nothing to envy about many other countries, I can tell you this —
00:24   [besides the rights] there are duties. And if there’s no engagement, this steering
00:28   of effort, the fact that every citizen brings his stone to the [construction of] the building
00:32   by his work, by his engagement at work, our country won’t ever completely retrieve its power,
00:41   its cohesion.
 

Video transcript #2:

00:00   [chant] “Hey, Macron, Macron, you c**tface, we come
[banners]: “Revaluation of revenues, lower taxes”, “Is this France?”
00:04   to look for you in our town.” —[He] came to launch the Great National Debate in Bourgtheroulde,
00:08   yet for now Emmanuel Macron hasn’t faced the Yellow Vests present,
00:12   even though there were four hundred who wanted to participate in the debate.
[banners] “The system is obsolete, we are the update.”, “ I am neither hateful, nor xenophobic, nor violent, nor homophobic.”
00:16   Today I would like you to understand that we aren’t
00:20   Just citizens who, justly, would like to be heard,
00:24   not to sow discord or to scare the inhabitants of the township:
00:29   it’s not our goal at all. We aren’t being listened to, we aren’t being met; therefore
00:33   we are coming to meet the government. —I want people to live correctly.
[banner]: “Freedom, Equality [vs.] Flash-Bang.”
00:37   The fridge has to be filled. I need to fill my fridge.
[banner]: “Have you seen Manu [affectionate name for Emmanuel], we made an EFFORT, we crossed the street to tell you — ‘get out’.”
00:41   It isn’t filled every day. And then, what I’m earning, isn’t enough.
00:45   So we need the purchasing power. And I also denounce the fact
00:49   that there are companies, in France that are French, and they aren’t paying
00:53   the property tax. The property tax has to be reestablished.
00:54   [banners]: “Gas, baton, flash-bang, prison, against freedom.”, “Ecology is actions, not taxes.”
00:58   Since Christmas I keep saying and repeating that Jesus was born poor
01:02   in a manger on the straw. And that the current pope asks us to
01:06   be a poor Church for the poor. So I think that by joining
01:10   the Vests I am in the right place and in line
01:14   with religion. —Two delegations of the Yellow Vests
01:19   were nevertheless met by the State Secretary Emmanuelle Wargon.
01:23   We have already shared with them a number of demands, which are
01:27   the same that you hear everywhere, of course, but anyway we wanted
01:31   to have his attention on a particular point, the one concerning the purchasing power
01:35   of the French people, which was the very reason —you shouldn’t forget it —
01:39   for the Yellow Vests movement. A lot of other things were added; sometimes
01:43   they’re realized and sometimes not, but, well, we can see the concrete things:
01:47   among the people we met in our rallies, in the roundabouts, you see people
01:52   who cannot make ends meet, before the end of the month, and this is very tough, and it hurts.
01:56   Two months after the mobilization of the Yellow Vests,
02:00   the head of state suggested a Great National Debate in order to get out of the crisis.
02:04   A call was made to representatives. 600 mayors from Normandy exchanged views with the president
02:08   on this subject. —I don’t think that we will solve forty years of difficulties
02:12   in two months of debate. However, this debate has to be an opportunity to rethink
02:17   the way the democracy works, push the reset button to restart
[François-Xavier Priollaud — mayor of Louviers]
02:21   on a different basis, to create conditions of confidence, to listen to one another.
02:25   But you shouldn’t expect too much, because very contradictory suggestions
02:29   will appear, and the goal is to
02:33   unite rather than to divide. On the whole, the day passed
02:37   calmly; only a couple of clashes erupted between law enforcement
02:41   in very large numbers and the Yellow Vests.
 

6 thoughts on “Emmanuel Macron vs. the Yellow Vests

    • Even for a politician, he has an extraordinary ability to open his mouth and say nothing.

  1. While many of the Yellow Vests seem to realize the role that financial institutions and globalization play in suppressing wages while increasing the size and power of the rentier class, I have not heard any mention of demands for a debt jubilee or similar measures to roll back the political and financial power and concentration of wealth in the hands of the elite few. I am curious if this is being mentioned in the protests and lists of grievences, but suppressed, or if it hasn’t been hit upon by any sizeable number of Yellow Vests as a long term solution?

    Ultimately I believe that the concentration of wealth and power globally in the hands of fewer and fewer elites is something that will need to be addressed; globally, to avoid elites simply moving assets and production to different jurisdictions while they continue their divide and conquer games.

    • And sadly, Macron, May, and Merkel are simply puppets or even muppets doing and saying what they are told. You either do as you are told by the elites or their representatives or else you are tossed in the bin along with the rest of us. Don’t sweat it though, their day is coming when they will throw their gold in the streets because it can neither buy bread nor can be eaten.

    • It seems the Left only really mentions such a debt forgiveness in regards to African nations with dictators in which international debts are enormous.

      Interestingly, the Old Testament Levitical Law demands such a nation-wide debt forgiveness in a Jubliee Year to be declared every 49 (or 50 years). Among other things, it was designed to re-set portions of the economy and reduce poverty due to debt.

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