Is France the Most Racist Country in Europe?

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This.

It was only last year that they elected their first black politician ever.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Gregoire_Sagbo

As a comparison, France managed to reach this milestone almost a century ago in 1914...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaise_Diagne

That's not remarkable when you consider that Russia has been under the control of a dictatorship for most of the last century and is mostly white.

Reply 101

FrogInABog

Original post by navarre

France generally sucks. It's one of the worst countries in Europe. A pathetic, wussy history, a dying language, independence movements in Corsica, Brittany and Alsace-Lorraine, an economy in the dumps and severe social margins between minority groups such as blacks and Muslims when compared to the rest of the population.

This is massively misjudged. First of all, France has an incredibly interesting and vibrant history; think French revolution, Napoleon, two world wars etc in the past 225 years alone. Secondly, far from being a dying language, French may well become more and more useful as the global economy shifts its focus to Africa. Finally, many countries (including most western ones) have separatist movements, France is no different to us in that respect.

In answer to the original question: France is not necessarily more racist, it just has a broader political spectrum than many. Both nationalists and socialists have a much stronger showing than in places like the UK.

Oh, and just as a general point, being opposed to high immigration does not equal being a racist. Many Le Pen voters are racists, but you'll find that most are just normal French people who are annoyed and looking for somebody to blame, much like people over here who vote BNP.

Reply 102

navarre

Original post by FrogInABog

French history is hardly interesting, unless you consider learning the French consistently having their arses handed to them interesting. The only even of interest is the French Revolution, and even that pales in terms of interest when compared to the American Revolution.

French is a language in decline, and all but useless to native speakers of English. Despite being spoken by a minority in a few African countries wrecked with internal problems, it is fairly unknown outside of Europe (indeed, even outside of France. Far more Europeans speak English and German than French). When you consider that students in Vietnam have protested at having to learn the useless language of French as opposed to English, you begin to get a feel of how redundant it is these days.
There was a time,100 years ago, when knowing French would have opened all sorts of career pathways in diplomacy, science and education; nowadays knowing French is unlikely to get you much further than ordering lunch at a service station on a French motorway.

France has denied its regions with seperatist movements any autonomy. Whereas Scotland and Wales have their own regional assemblies and Welsh is a language in revival, Corsica and Brittany have no such representation and both have had their language suppressed.

(edited 12 years ago)

Reply 103

Cyanohydrin

Original post by ajtiesto

France and the UK are deffo up there. Both racist countries and no rights for ethnic minorities.

pipe down wee lad! most people are friendly and minorities have lots of rights in Britain.

Reply 104

Rovey

Thought this was an interesting thread.

Original post by Vérité

Contrary to the original poster, I don't think France is a particularly racist country.

This issue lies in France's colonial past, with its hangover being the arrival of immigrants. Having a large empire in Africa has naturally resulted in a wave of immigration, but, on the whole, this is not a major concern for the French. Some may point out the spike in the polls for the FN recently, but it is necessary to underline that, from the Revolution onwards, France's political persuasion has been slightly right of centre. The FN's policies of traditionalism therefore ally themselves nicely with the main republican principles.

On top of that, the government's policy of laïcité, which creates a sense of taboo over religion, means there is hardly any discussion on this key issue. By denying people the opportunity to talk about it, hostility and tensions foments. Luckily, this rarely occurs, with the events of this week being a very rare example.

I completely disagree with the statement that France is a racist country; if anyone can suggest that it is more racist than any other European country, I would be eager to hear their opinions.

Surprised no one has yet to mention fascism, because that's what france is, a fascist country.

Secularism has developed into a tool with which to attack muslims and islam, it's become that obvious over the years there's no point even debating it. Because of the failures of past governments, be it unemployment, crime, immigration, making islam central in elections to mask the real issues has a knock on effect on the way the french treat muslims in the workplace, at schools and just on the streets. Secularism does not create a taboo over relgion, in fact it's discussed regularly except you're expecting to come away with the feeling that it's just and right, which it clearly is not and nothing more than institutionalised fascism/racism.