Forbidden word of the day: “allochthone”

Our favorite radio essayist, M. Fouad Laroui, reports a strange story of linguistic politicization:  the banning, by Holland and Belgium, of the rather scholarly-looking and politically quite innocent word allochthone:

Un mot interdit

Now, allochthone is the antonym of autochthone, as you can tell by the prefixes, borrowed from Greek: allo- ‘other’, auto- ‘self, same’.  The root chthon- means ‘earth’ and appears in the learnèd English word chthonic.    Neither word is common in English, but autochthone is quite common in French.  Harrap’s defines it as ‘native’, and allochthone as ‘immigrant’.

Given its forbiddingly philological-Hellenistic hue, the word allochthone would seem as unlikely a target for political hysteria as, say, shibboleth or postlapsarian.   Yet such is the case today:  the word is legally banned;  anyone who uses it may be subject to punishment.

How did this come about?   As Laroui explains it,  the word itself is innocent enough but came to be soiled by the mouths that uttered it.   Just as, in America, the wingnuts came to use the term “liberal” (whose core meaning is something like ‘generous’) as a sneer-word, a hate-filled epithet, so the likes of Geert Wilders (of “scum villages” ill-fame) has used the Dutch version of allochthone invidiously, in his diatribes against immigrants.   And now -- just as they did in the “scum villages” affair -- the palladins of political correctitude have over-reacted and over-reached, with a tyranny that comes naturally to the self-righteous.

That the word is, von Hause aus, entirely blameless, can be seen in such passages as the following, picked almost at random:

Das Sociaal en Cultureel Planbureau (SCP), eines der wichtigsten Beratungsorgane der niederländischen Regierung, hat am heutigen Tage eine Studie veröffentlicht, aus welcher hervorgeht, dass autochthone Niederländer von Zeitarbeitsfirmen bevorzugt werden. Während 28% der nicht-westlichen Allochthonen, die sich bei einer Zeitarbeitsfirma persönlich vorstellen, einen Job angeboten bekommen, liegt die Quote bei autochthonen Niederländern …

http://nlpolitik.wordpress.com/tag/allochthone/

Hmm… As an experiment, let us take a somewhat scholarly word, and see if we can similarly besmirch it:

“Donald Trump is nothing but a sniveling, low-down mercantilist !!!”

~

[Update 8 March 2015]  Fouad Laroui reports another editorialist’s call to suppress the use of a word:  in this case, islamophobie.   Docking a word, says Laroui, you cripple thought itself, “ce qui est propre de l’homme:   L’homme  nomme.”

رمضان مبارك

We have often had occasion to praise the Moroccan-born radio-feulletoniste Fouad Laroui.  Here is the bio thumbnail provided by Medi1:

Depuis les Pays Bas, il nous offre chaque lundi sur Medi 1 le regard distancé, ironique, amusé ou caustique d’un maghrébin vivant en Europe du « Nord », et a pour cible la bêtise, la méchanceté et le fanatisme.

All that is true enough;  but he is not simply a satirist.  Here, he chronicles some quite intelligent and inventive innovations by Europe-based Muslims -- one taking into account history and northern latitudes, another observing Ramadan in what is effectively more a Lenten Christian spirit:

http://www.medi1.com/player/player.php?i=6031585

Back of the Bus

Suppose that, in some country that vaunted itself on its record of human rights, in North America or Western Europe, there was a cardiac hospital whose waiting-list for heart-surgery numbered both black and white patients.   Now suppose that the hospital had -- not surreptitiously and shame-facedly, but quite openly and unabashedly, even as something to pride themselves on -- a hard-and-fast rule:  So soon as a white becomes a candidate for surgery, he automatically zooms ahead of all the blacks on the waiting list;  and so on forever.   Assuming that, as in most places, the demand for the surgical service always slightly outpaces the supply, the upshot is that no black could ever receive heart surgery.

This morning there appeared a radio essay by the Dutch-Moroccan academic and journalist Fouad Laroui, Je fume, donc je suis, reporting just such a case, in the north of ultra-bien-pensant Holland;  only, with one difference:   The group continually sent to the back of the bus  are not blacks, but smokers.

And such is the climate of political correctness there reigning, that the principal challenge to this invidious rule  has come, not from the quarter of general societal welfare and logic (shall such exclusions be applied, on the same grounds of ills abetted by personal behavior, to other risk groups, such as the obese or homosexual?),  but rather, from the ranks of Identity Politics themselves!  For the Turks resident in the Netherlands have -- not opposed the rule per se, but merely demanded that they themselves be excepted, as a group, on the grounds that, in their culture, smoking is not an individual choice, but an ethnic identity badge: Among Turks, a man wears a moustache, and smokes;  un-point-c’est-tout.

Laroui regularly reports on issues affecting Muslims in his current country of residence, les Pays-Bas;  and generally to defend them.   But in this case, he twits the Turkish case for absurdity, pointing out that it is a slippery slope down which other groups can be expected to snowboard, as some already had:  Muslim Somalis in Holland demanded group exemption from Dutch anti-narcotic laws, on the grounds that qât is part of their culture.   (Such an exemption was successful in the United States, in the case of Amerindians and peyote.)   He does not, however, take explicit exception to that hospital regulation itself;  perhaps deeming such comment superfluous in the case of so evidently overweening a rule, but perhaps not.

Word of the Day: «ultralaïcard» (bis)

[Again, a re-post, merely and purely to deprive the evil Web-bots of their landing-site, which now has been deleted.]

Headline in Le Figaro (Paris):

Le Pen prend la pose de «l'ultralaïcarde»

Marine Le Pen espère que la grande majorité des Français, devenus indifférents aux religions, ne lui tiendront pas rigueur de son idée d'interdir le voile ou la kippa dans la rue.

There is no word for this in English;  a good translation would be “supersecular”.   Even that will still not give the flavor, to Americans who have never lived with an established State religion.  

Marine Le Pen, who inherited the mantle of her father Jacques, is France’s most prominent …. what?  I was going to say “right-wing politician”, or perhaps ultraconservative, but again, in an American context, where those tendencies are associated largely with Christian evangelicals, her initiative will sound baffling.  For what she is proposing is to ban the wearing of a head-scarf or a yarmulke in the street.

Yes, you read that right.  Not making it up -- toleja, I’ve retired from satire, the world is just too weird.  A state ban on private citizens displaying religious symbols is the sort of bogeyman that keeps American conservatives up at night.

You picture the headlines:

Cops Nab Bar Mitzvah Boy

Bicycle chase through the crowded streets of Paris

In the context of Old World history, such a proposal is not as far-fetched as it sounds to us here.  Ataturk implimented much more drastic sumptuary laws when he took power in Turkey.

*

Pour d’autres friandises

de la confiserie 

du docteur Justice,

consultez:

http://www.linguasacrapublishing.com/justice.html

*

The readers’ comments upon this article  are not the sort of thing an American would expect;  I’ll quote a few of the most colorful.

La kippa est, malheureusement pour elle, le Cheval de Troie des communautaristes de toutes natures.

À choisir entre interdire la kippa et accepter les diverses sortes de cagoules, le choix est malheureusement clair:

Il faut interdire la kippa.

Ce serait d'ailleurs une interdiction toute provisoire:

La disparition de ce Cheval de Troie priverait de carburant une grande partie des jusqu'au-boutistes musulmans.

Ils se retrouveraient en slip, ou plutôt: en burkini.

--

Marine Le Pen a tout à fait raison, au grand dam de notre journaliste qui cherche à mettre les propos de MLP à tort. Elle n'a jamais interdit le port de la soutane, ou De la croix (qui font parti de notre patrimoine et de nos coutumes). Ce qu'elle veut dire surtout c'est qu'il faut arrêter ce communautarisme du à l'immigration musulmane qui mine notre pays et qui met en grave danger notre façon de vivre. Ces minorités sont constamment en conflit avec notre république et essayent de nous imposer leurs Us et coutumes

--

Ma fille est religieuse et je trouverais inadmissible qu'elle soit obligée de retirer son voile.
Et je préfère voir une femme musulmane avec son voile, qu'une autre qui montre ses fesses ou exhibe sa poitrine comme une prostituée.
Marine a poussé son bouchon laïcard un peu loin...

--

Le FN, parti laïque et franc-mac, c'est le monde à l'envers…

I won’t undertake to translate these;  culturally, they are untranslatable.

*

Si cela vous parle,

savourez la série noire

en argot authentique d’Amérique :

http://www.linguasacrapublishing.com/justiceexcerptdivorce.html

*

~

In the Netherlands, the most prominent right-wing anti-immigrant hardliner is the flamboyant bouffant-bottle-blond  Geert Wilders, -- digne héritier of Pym Fortuyn (who, however,  as badge and emblem of one knows not what subvariety of paraphilia, sported a shaved pate) -- whose most recent proposal for keeping the riff-raff in their place  is to flood Holland’s streets with police-dogs, since Muslims don’t like them:

Les chiens et la circoncision

http://www.medi1.com/player/player.php?i=5265759

(Actually, I know what it is like  to live like that, since when I was there as a graduate student, Berkeley was flooded with dogs:  only, it was the riff-raff themselves that brought them.)

That radio essay, by journalist Fouad Laroui, also touches upon the bizarre anti-circumcision campaign in Germany, likewise directed against the Other.  It all reads very strangely for an American of my generation:  in my age-cohort, babies were routinely circumcised.   My best friend for a while was a Norwegian-born boy, who felt quite weird and isolated, since he didn’t look like anyone else in the showers.

*     *     *

~ Commercial break ~

Relief for beleaguered Nook lovers!

http://murphybros.blogspot.com/p/read-murphy-on-your-nook.html

We now return you to your regularly scheduled essay.

*     *     *

[Encouraging update!] Two weeks later, M. Laroui offers another radioessay:

http://www.medi1.com/player/player.php?i=5278867

Turns out the Dutch are not that crazy.

~

For more wild ‘n’ wacky words, click here:  logophilia.

Pour davantage à propos de l’Hexagone, cliquez ici:  francophonie

(French !) Phrase of the Day: “scum villages”

In our essay from yesterday,

            Word of the Day: “pipolade”

we instanced French and German derivata that purported to be based upon English constructions -- which, however, do not exist in English, although the base word does -- “people-ade”, “pee-pee room”, “pee-pee pause”.  And just today, another one, in French, though apparently taken directly from Dutch:  scum villages.

Last year,  we reported in extenso on the Dutch proposal for building social leper-colonies, housing the unwanted in shipping containers:

            The Rise of «la Racaille»

At that time, the proposal was floated by the ineffable Geert Wilders, under the name of “tuigdorpen”:

http://www.volkskrant.nl/vk/nl/2824/Politiek/article/detail/1833354/2011/02/10/Nieuw-is-het-idee-van-Wilders-tuigdorpen-niet.dhtml

Back then it might have been dismissed as the provocation of a notably histrionic right-winger. But this time around, the sociology is quite different, since the measure is being proposed by the mayor of Amsterdam -- Europe’s longtime hippie-city -- who moreover is from the Labor party, and who admonishes the citizens to pay no attention to the precedent behind the curtain:

   Des villages pour rassembler les marginaux à Amsterdam

Let Le Figaro tell it:

       

Le maire de la ville doit lancer en janvier un programme visant à construire des camps où seraient logées les personnes violentes ou considérées comme antisociales.

Les opposants à ce projet parlent de «scum villages», des villages pour marginaux.

This “villages pour marginaux” is a decidedly euphemistic translation, of a phrase deliberately provocative, like Sarkozy’s la racaille, or Wilders’ tuigdorpen, which it directly reflects.  

Philological note:   In English, scum (of old Germanic origen) is a very harsh word when applied figuratively, though it is cognate with the much nicer German Schaum ‘froth, foam’ (which figures in the English word meerschaum), and its etymon is the source of the equally frothy French word écume.

A German derivative of Schaum -- Abschaum --  does, however, mean ‘scum’ with all its connotations, and that is what the German press is using, rather than the pseudo-anglicism in the French:

Plan gegen "anti-soziale Bürger" Amsterdam pfercht Unruhestifter in "Abschaum-Dörfer"

*     *     *

~ Commercial break ~

Relief for beleaguered Nook lovers!

http://murphybros.blogspot.com/p/read-murphy-on-your-nook.html

We now return you to your regularly scheduled essay.

*     *     *

-- Back to Le Figaro :

En janvier, Eberhard van der Laan, le maire travailliste d'Amsterdam, lancera un programme visant à lutter contre les comportements antisociaux. Les familles à problèmes, les personnes violentes... seront réunies dans des conteneurs maritimes basiquement aménagés, rassemblés dans des banlieues, où on leur apprendra «à se comporter».

Now, given the reputation of Amsterdam-the-open-ward, and that of European leftists, one would sooner have imagined such a proposal being launched to quarantine, say, “homophobes” (a weasel-word, but that must wait for another day), rather than the sort of people whom Wilders most prominently has in his sights (immigrant Muslims).  Yet indeed -- I had to read this passage twice, scarce believing my eyes -- such indeed, it would appear, is the actual idea behind this plan!

À ceux qui qualifient ce plan de liberticide, il rappelle qu'il a surtout été lancé afin de protéger les homosexuels, fréquemment victimes de harcèlements. «Nous voulons une société qui les défende», clame-t-il.

An astute reader of Le Figaro  comments:

Il y a un épisode de South Park dans lequel les gens intolérants sont envoyés dans des camps de redressement... on s'en rapproche!

*

Si cela vous parle,

savourez la série noire

en argot authentique d’Amérique :

http://www.linguasacrapublishing.com/justiceexcerptdivorce.html

*

The article continues:

Si le maire d'Amsterdam a récemment assuré que les coffee shops vendant légalement de la marijuana resteraient ouverts malgré la nouvelle loi contre le «tourisme de la drogue», ce nouveau plan pourrait faire perdre à la capitale hollandaise sa réputation mondiale de «ville de la tolérance».

 

Again we note a linguistic oddity, in the Languages-in-Contact line.  What need has French of the English phrase coffee shop -- we who have, precisely, borrowed the French word café ?!?

A comment by another reader  clarifies the situation -- while introducing yet another pseudo-English borrowed phrase:

Triste situation, qui semble désespérée. Mais nous avons aussi des zones assez comparables, si ce n'est que nous n'avons pas de drogue en libre circulation (pas encore de "coffee shops" ni de "salles de shoot").

In other words:  coffee shop is being used in a quite specific, narrowed, Eurocentric sense, with the sort of naughty aroma that French borrowings into English used to give off. -- As to salles de shoot, it is a part-borrowing, part-loan-translation, cum typical Gallic arbitrary deformation of an English root, just to show who’s boss (despite all evidence to the contrary):  from shooting gallery, in the druggie sense;  in parts of Europe, these are state-sponsored.

Pour nos essais

en langue

la plus châtiée qui soit,

checkez-out   …..

La francophonie, à l'usage du Dauphin

~            ~            ~

Once again, several of the Readers’ Responses are worth quoting:

Voilà ce que la Drogue Libre a engendré à Amsterdam. Une population marginale, certes mais nombreuse, de paumés et encombrants et tout-à-fait inaptes dans la société "normale" du travail et capable d'autonomie.

---

Dommage que la Guyane et l'Australie ne soient plus disponibles !

--

pourquoi pas des villages aux iles kerguelen ou en centre afrique

---

Et ils vont construire des miradors autour? comme quoi l'occupation allemande aura laissé des souvenirs et des idées.

---

Nous rejoignons certains films d'anticipation comme New York 1997 ou Banlieue 13....

---

Chez nous, ça existe déjà! Il y en a en périphérie de toutes les grandes villes : ça s'appelle des "Cités", avec le statut juridique de Zone de Non-Droit!

~

[Update 5 November 2014]    Of course, what counts as habitable housing, and who counts as scum, is a relative matter. 

The most inhumanely compressed living-space I ever witnessed, was in undergraduate housing at the University of California at Berkeley.   There was just room enough for a camp bed, and to stand beside it with the door closed, and little else.   The reason this view sticks in my mind is that the student whose misfortune it was to spend his life in that room, was apparently going mad, as he had drawn on the wall, in ink, the outline of his erect penis.

Actually I did live in something just as bad, in the downmarket Sunset district of San Franciscio the summer before I began graduate studies in math at Berkeley:  I lived, literally, in what had been a pantry, just off the kitchen that was now a communal kitchen for everyone who roomed at the dwelling.

Another instance of students pickled and packed like kippers:

Israeli students find affordable housing — in metal boxes

Three years after mass protests against living costs, a student village made of shipping containers rises.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/israeli-students-find-affordable-housing-in-shipping-container-apartments/2014/11/03/0349cf5e-5f9a-11e4-9f3a-7e28799e0549_story.html

*

Pour d’autres friandises

de la confiserie 

du docteur Justice,

consultez:

http://www.linguasacrapublishing.com/justice.html

.

La conjuration des imbéciles

Fouad Laroui has a witty and observant radio-essay on some recent meshugaas from Haarlem  (the double -aa- is accurate in both cases), which you can savor here:

http://www.medi1.com/player/player.php?i=5310972

A school was decorated with some calligraphy reminiscent of arabesque, though the letters were Latin. “C’est alors que la conjuration des imbéciles  se mit en branle.”  Right-wing xenophobes and “salafis analphabètes” (pour ne pas dire: analphabêtes)  sounded the alarm:  This was Arabic writing, was the (innaccurate) cry from both (otherwise interopposing) sides; and either vocally opposed it, though for opposite reasons.

What caught my attention was this detail:   When their linguistic error was pointed out, nobody slapped his forehead and said “My bad!”;  rather, they redoubled in vehemence, contriving further reasons for outrage.   And this is but too reminiscent of the scene in America these dark days, where (among others) the Birthers are simply outside the realm of logic, evidence, and rational discourse.

The Rise of «la Racaille»

Depopulation had begun in Italy and Greece  in the third century B.C.  … The Roman army was kept to strength  only through the recruitment of barbarians -- a practice that was destined to bring disaster.  The emperors invited immigrants from beyond the frontiers  to colonize Italy,  and even the uninvited joined them.

-- Morris Bishop, The Middle Ages (1968)

My favorite radio journalist (and this amounts to:  broadcast journalist, since I almost never watch TV) is Fouad Laroui.  Trilingual, tricultural, with a generous sense of humor and a keen eye.   Here is his latest, and well worth a listen:  Des villages pour la racaille.  (Be sure to learn French first, if you have previously neglected that detail.)

*

We suddenly find ourselves living  in unsettled times.

It is difficult to recall a time, since 1848 (when a wave of revolutions swept Europe), when there was upheaval across so broad a swath.  I do not yet say “revolutions”, since it is as yet unclear, whether these will prove to have been more than a popularly instigated palace coup (Mubarak’s gone, long live Sulayman:  Meet the new boss, same as the old boss  [cf. now this -- and now [3 IV 11] this as well], and also [22 IV 11 this) and the prelude to chaos or civil war:

Reform Lawyer Says Tunisia Risks Anarchy

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/world/africa/22tunisia.html?ref=tunisia

Qaddafi’s Son Warns of Civil War as Libyan Protests Widen:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/21/world/africa/21libya.html?scp=1&sq=tunisian%20lawyer&st=cse

But meanwhile, largely off-camera so far as the American public is concerned, recent events in the Maghreb -- including simply the breaking of political taboos -- are beginning to jiggle the perilous metastability of Europe.

Here is a mild, not to say mealy-mouthed view (typical of anything with dateline BRUSSELS):

In Unrest, Europeans Focus on Migration

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/world/europe/22migrants.html?ref=global-home&pagewanted=print

For the full-bore, dead-center, shape-of-things-to-come version --  listen to Laroui.

(Further background to Wilders' proposal here:)
http://www.volkskrant.nl/vk/nl/2824/Politiek/article/detail/1833354/2011/02/10/Nieuw-is-het-idee-van-Wilders-tuigdorpen-niet.dhtml

Laroui was translating Wilders' Dutch  with the term made infamous by Sarkozy.

*

It is difficult to find first-hand information about the Wilders incident.  We did eventually find this third-hand reference, on a blog:

Enfin, le Monde jette un regard sur les Pays-Bas, mais cette fois il s'agit d'une nouvelle rodomontade du populiste Geert Wilders, qui préconise l'installation, en bordure des grandes villes, de "tuigdorpen", littéralement des villages à racaille, où s'entasseraient tous les indésirables: récidivistes, personnes en attente de procès, ou en période de probation. Un système déjà appliqué dans quelques villes danoises.

Assuming that by “le Monde” he meant the well-known sheet  which enjoys a (partly undeserved) reputation as the French newspaper of record, I searched their site.  But met only stonewalling:

Aucun élément publié "depuis un mois" avec le(s) mot(s) ou expression(s) "geert et wilders" dans "tout l'élément" et classé par "pertinence".

There are genuine issues here which the European establishment -- both politicians and press -- are too squeamish to confront.  Which is why the public discourse winds up dominated by wackos like Geert Wilders.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
[update 12 IV 11]
Re the renationalization of European countries
("Renationalization":  another term for le grand remplacement.)

[update 18 IV 11]
"The dignity train" 

France blocks Italian train carrying Tunisian migrants

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-tunisia-refugees-20110419,0,4474996.story

"Mais le convoi, baptisé «train de la dignité», n'a jamais quitté la gare..."
http://www.lefigaro.fr/international/2011/04/18/01003-20110418ARTFIG00444-train-bloque-a-vintimille-l-ue-conforte-la-decision-de-paris.php

[Update 25 VI 11]
Denmark (in an article that actually mentions the working class)
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/25/world/europe/25denmark.html?ref=global-home&pagewanted=print

[Update 30 VII 11]
A good-humored  cinematic treatment.
(Note the similarity to the Pied Piper of Hamelin motif.)

[update 200 BC]
"The Roman army was kept to strength  only through the recruitment of barbarians -- a practice that was destined to bring disaster.  The emperors invited immigrants from beyond the frontiers  to colonize Italy, and even the uninvited joined them."
-- Morris Bishop, The Middle Ages (1968)

[Update 3 Aug 2011]
Too tired to fight, they pass the torch.
(" Las des intimidations, Vinci a abandonné la gestion d'un parking dans un quartier sensible de la cité phocéenne à un groupe d'individus qui facture cinq euros le stationnement.") Selected readers' comments (chosen as much for linguistic interest  as anything else):

-----

Bientôt, les commerçants de Marseille payeront le pizzo, comme à Palerme .

--

Faut-il que les citoyens s'organisent en milices pour faire respecter un ordre dont l'État, que ce soit de droite ou de gauche, se fiche éperdument ?

--

Les voitures seront sans doute mieux protégés par cette "bande" que par les vigiles de Vinci ou que de la Police Municipale. Alors 5 euro pour un stationnement sans limitation de temps etezteeet avec c'est une aubaine

--

L'indulgence coupable prônée par certaines organisations angéliques est aussi en partie responsable de la faiblesse des forces de l'ordre. Et dire que le fond n'a pas encore été touché...

--

La France devient par endroits un far-west, un univers type mad max

--

Et pourtant des spécialistes hautement informés viennent encore clamer que l'immigration débridée rapporte plus à la France qu'elle ne lui coute.

--

Ce genre de faits divers, qui deviennent monnaie courante en France, sont un symbole de l'échec de la politique LAXISTE de Sarkozy, qui n'a été que la continuation de la politique laxiste du PS. Le plus rageant c'est qu'il a construit sa victoire en 2007 en promettant qu'il mettrait fin au laxisme chiraco-socialiste!!!!!

--

Marseille, c'est Sarajevo dans 20 ans, avec une force d'interposition chinoise, indienne, japonnaise, bresilienne et russe

--

quelle honte pour la France victime de toute cette bande de politicards intellos verreux

--

Faisons de Marseille une ville de garnison . Je conseille la légion . Ca se calmera rapidement .

--

On peut dire, sans crainte de se tromper, qu'un tel événement sonne le glas de l'ordre républicain, de l'autorité de l'Etat, de la souveraineté nationale, et de l'intégrité territoriale. --- [Update 9 Aug 2011] For a picture of press coverage of recent events in London, click here.

*

Pour d’autres friandises

de la confiserie 

du docteur Justice,

consultez:

http://www.linguasacrapublishing.com/justice.html

[Update 4 Oct 2011]

And now this, re Bulgaria and the gens de voyage.  (En bref, on veut qu’ils voyagent ailleurs.)

http://www.lefigaro.fr/international/2011/10/03/01003-20111003ARTFIG00730-poussee-de-fievre-antirom-en-bulgarie.php

Check out the reader commentaries.  One reader summarizes them thus:

J'hallucine vraiment lorsque je lis les commentaires.

Demain si tout cela continue, nous allons avoir une guerre civile en France.

A lire vos messages on se croierait sous l'occupation et entendre le discours du régime de Vichy.

-- [Update 13 Dec 2011]  

France experiments with political correctness  à l’américaine:

Sciences Po(pulaires)

First paragraph, describing the dropping of a key entrance exam, in favor of what America has the sobriety to call “”life experience””,  but which the grand école, figleafless, calls simply “personality”:

Sciences Po Paris continue à réformer ses examens d'entrée dans le sens d'une «discrimination positive» assumée par son très politique directeur, Richard Descoings. Dès 2013,son examen d'entrée en première année comportera

 une sélection sur dossier, davantage d'oraux et la suppression de l'épreuve de culture générale, afin de «diversifier son recrutement». Il s'agit désormais de miser sur la «personnalité» des étudiants.

Readers’ comments (again, chosen as much for linguistic elegance  as for political content):

Avant à Sciences-Po, on brassait du vent avec un certain enrobage de culture qui pouvait faire illusion, maintenant j'ai bien peur que l'enrobage tombe et que l'on brasse du vent avec le vocabulaire des cités.

---

Supprimer la culture générale pour diversifier le recrutement, pour favoriser les familles pauvres et une ineptie.

Quoi de plus accessible que la culture dans ce pays ? Avec la profusion de médiathèques,de musées et de théâtres abordables dans toutes les villes de France, la culture générale est le véritable témoin de la curiosité sur le monde, quel que soit son milieu d'origine.

Bien entendu, elle est une ouverture vers l'élitisme, ce qui est loin d'être un mal. La France se nivelle de plus en plus par le bas, le pouvoir est au mains des marchands de tapis.Bientôt tout le monde ne parlera plus que de football et de soldes. Quelle désolation

 --

[Update 2 III 12]

Les gens du voyage  expelled from a squat near Versailles:

http://plus.lefigaro.fr/article/versailles-roms-expulses-dune-caserne-20120301-787545/commentaires?page=1

Observe the tone of the readers’ comments.  This, from a nation that used to take pleasure in lecturing America about race relations.  ----

[Update 11 III 12]

The Presidential campaign looming, Sarkozy suddenly has second thoughts about Schengen:

http://www.lefigaro.fr/flash-actu/2012/03/11/97001-20120311FILWWW00107-sarkozy-veut-changer-schengen.php#xtor=EPR-31-[flux-migratoires-nicolas-sarkozy-veut-reviser-les-accords-de-schengen]-20120311-[titre]

Again, the readers’ comments are barbed (I quote only from among the more literate):

Plus que Schengen, c'est le regroupement familial et les accords avec l'Algérie qu'il faut annuler !!!

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Pourquoi renégocier Schengen ? La solution la voici, la voilà :

Prix du Barbelé militaire, la bobine de 60 m Ø 2,7 mm : 16.00 EUR HT (sans crampillions, ces petits clous qui piquent quand on s'y pique). Calculons, pour arrêter l'immigration : 16,00 euros les 60 mètres ; Frontières maritimes et terrestres de la France : environ 5 600 km, soit 5 600 000 mètres. Coût en barbelés : 93 333 rouleaux de 60 mètres, soit 93 333 X 16 euros = 1,49 millions d'Euros. Sachant que l'immigré est capable de cisailler le barbelé, il faut 1 (un) gendarme tous les trente mètres, soit 189 666 gendarmes. Salaire moyen d'un gendarme au mois : 2 000 euros Coût d'un gendarme à l'année : 24 000 euros (hors cotisations sociales et primes) Comme il faut trois gendarmes par jour (il font les 3x8), coût total des gendarmes pour empêcher les immigrés de cisailler les barbelés : 13 655 952 000. Coût total pour arrêter l'immigration : 13 655 952 000 + 1 490 000 = 13 657 442 000. Un peu plus de 13,6 milliards d'euros. C'est pas cher et ça vaut le coup et même le coût.

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Pas possible de réviser le dernier traité Merkozy mais par contre pour Schengen pas de problème !!! Comme quoi la mauvaise foi...

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Décidément N Sarkozy n'en fini pas de copier le programme du Front national... Ceci dit, si je fais confiance à Marine Le Pen pour mettre en pratique ses propositions, ce n'est pas du tout le cas pour N Sarkozy. Comme disait ma grand-mère, chat échaudé craint l'eau froide

------------------------------------------- 

 [Update 8 April 2012]

Dati fustige le "mépris" de Hollande

[Update 28 IV 2012]

http://www.lefigaro.fr/actualite-france/2012/04/27/01016-20120427ARTFIG00636-deux-agents-de-police-blesses-a-istres.php

Attirées dans un get-apens, les forces de l'ordre ont été prises à partie. Sept personnes ont été interpellées.

Deux policiers ont été blessés et sept personnes ont été interpellées dans la soirée de mercredi lors d'une violente altercation dans le quartier des Échoppes, à Istres (Bouches-du-Rhône).

Vers 21 h 30, les policiers d'Istres ont d'abord été alertés pour une fuite de gaz dans ce quartier proche du centre-ville. L'incident s'avère factice, mais, peu de temps après, les forces de l'ordre sont rappelées pour un prétendu différend entre riverains. Les agents constatent que cette alerte est également sans fondement. Lors de cette seconde intervention, plusieurs individus commencent toutefois à s'en prendre aux policiers. Tristement courant dans certains quartiers sensibles, le guet-apens ne fait plus de doute.

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[Update 27 May 2012] http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/middleeast/la-fg-israel-africa-refugees-20120527,0,4865471.story  

 === [Update 4 June 2012] http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/06/firebomb-african-refugees-jerusalem.html === [Update 9 Aug 2012] Expulsion des Roms: --> «c'est cette colonne de fumée noire toxique qui s'élève du camp » quand des câbles sont brûlés pour récupérer le cuivre  ...

==
[Update 28 IX 12]
 

http://www.lefigaro.fr/flash-actu/2012/09/28/97001-20120928FILWWW00310-des-marseillais-brulent-un-camp-de-roms.php?m_i=IlHIhba_9BkOUzv6LTNqJf30IFiCwGaHxykTzT4Ma53tqfkIM

Des Marseillais brûlent un camp de Roms

==
[Update 20 X 12]
A favorite party slogan: “Get the Stench out of Greece.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/anti-immigrant-golden-dawn-rises-in-greece/2012/10/20/e7128296-17a6-11e2-a346-f24efc680b8d_print.html

[Update 3 XI 2012]

Afflux massif de Roms de Serbie et de Macédoine

http://www.medi1.com/player/player.php?i=5317350

[Update 22 XI 2012]
Laroui himself calls for tougher measures against illegal aliens:
http://www.medi1.com/player/player.php?i=5335949
even though "beaucoup de belles dames vont jeter de hauts cris".

 [Update 23 XI 2012]  

Des immigrés très courtisés par les indépendantistes

Ayant étudié le précédent québécois, les indépendantistes catalans  ne veulent rien laisser au hasard, et font campagne  jusque dans les mosquées.

http://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2012/11/23/des-immigres-tres-courtises-par-les-independantistes_1795168_3210.html

[Update 31 I 13]

Roms : le retour des bidonvilles de la honte

Au sud de Paris, dans le camp de Vigneux, 800 Roumains s'entassent dans les immondices et la boue. Le maire se dit abandonné et la préfecture tergiverse. En France, ces migrants sont maintenant des dizaines de milliers.

[Update 6 III 14]

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/07/world/europe/spain-struggles-to-halt-migrants-at-two-enclaves.html?hp&_r=0

MARCH 6, 2014

“There are 40,000 people in Morocco who are waiting to cross illegally into Spain, and 40,000 more at the border between Mauritania and Morocco.”

15 migrants drowned off Ceuta as they tried to swim around a sea wall marking the enclave’s border.

Rajoy’s conservative Popular Party, which has a majority in Parliament, rejected demands from opposition parties to set up a parliamentary committee to investigate the Ceuta drownings. The refusal came even after the government admitted, after initially denying, that the police had fired rubber bullets into the water.

a metal netting system would soon be added to reinforce the perimeters of the enclaves.

Madrid is also negotiating with Morocco on a change of law that would allow the authorities to turn back illegal migrants almost immediately, once they entered Spanish territory. At the moment, when these migrants enter the territories, they cannot be legally expelled and must be processed the same way economic migrants or asylum seekers are on the mainland.

The refugee center in Melilla is now home to about 1,300 migrants, almost triple its planned capacity. To help alleviate the problem, Spain this week transferred about 100 migrants, some of whom had been in the Melilla center for as long as three years, to the mainland.

[Mise à jour, 11 mai 2014]  “Guardian Angels” redivivus:

http://www.bvoltaire.fr/damienrieu/generation-identitaire-ressusciter-civisme,59505

The "Femen" group has its own, quite distinct, immigration policy:
http://fr.novopress.info/167508/femen-appelle-les-francaises-sucer-se-faire-lecher-branler-doigter-pomper-niquer-autant-detrangers-quelles-peuvent/

[Mise à jour, 28 Oct 2014]  Trouble in Calais.
http://www.nzz.ch/international/ein-neonazi-profiliert-sich-1.18412750?extcid=Newsletter_28102014_Top-News_am_Morgen

[Update 16 April 2015]  They don’t want them either:

Thousands flee after South Africa mobs attack immigrants

http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/16/africa/south-africa-anti-foreigner-attacks/

Anti-immigrant attacks kill 5 in Rainbow Nation

Thousands of people have sought refuge in temporary shelters in South Africa after mobs with machetes attacked immigrants in the city of Durban, leaving at least five people dead.

And, a remarkable observation from a man on the ground, not widely reported.

South Africa's police minister echoed the president's comments during a press conference on Wednesday.

"I can tell you now that this so-called xenophobia is not that. It's more 'Afrophobia.' It's ideologically driven. But we are on top of it. We are in control and are handling the situation well," Police Minister Nkosinathi Nhleko said during a briefing on the attacks.

"It is African-on-African. It is not on other nationalities," said Nhleko.

http://www.newsweek.com/south-africa-grapples-resurgence-xenophobic-attacks-322625?piano_d=1

Beleaguered immigrant in Durban

Ponder that.