‘Immigration is the sincerest form of flattery.’
Jack Paar
‘It’s the creolization of France’, whispered a neighbour.
“Creolization” was the type of word we used to admire. Or, at least we admired the French for using words like that. Big, Latinate words… the kind a professor of history might use… make people sound intelligent.
And so it was, that when we first came to France, we thought the French were smart. Now, we realise; they are just as dumb as Americans. Maybe dumber.
The nice thing about being overseas is that the parade of dumbness becomes less annoying. Tragedy turns to comedy. Instead of the embarrassment, dread and shame you feel when you read the home media, you can have a good laugh. After all, it’s not your fellow citizens who are idiots; it’s foreigners. And it’s not your country that is on the road to ruin; it’s a foreign country.
Two of the five priests officiating at the Sunday mass were African. And ahead of them, coming down the aisle to the sound of drums beating, was a whole contingent from New Caledonia… now living in a nearby town.
They were big people, like Tahitians or Hawaiians, dressed in native outfits…with colourful skirts and headbands. Much of the music for the mass was of a distinctive ‘creole’ style marked by drums and swaying islanders — even the lord’s prayer was sung to a strange, palm-tree rhythm.
Going Native
When the English colonised, they were careful to keep their English culture to themselves. Even in the jungles of Africa, they stopped their safaris to have a proper tea. An Englishman like ‘Lawrence of Arabia’, who ‘went native’, mixing with the locals and taking up their culture, was viewed with suspicion, pity or contempt.
The French, on the other hand, were eager to share their culture. They saw colonisation as a ‘mission civilisatrice’. They expected the indigenes to put a beret on their heads and begin singing the Marseillaise.
But now, the sandal is on the other foot. France and England are being invaded by their former colonial subjects. And the French worry that their civilising mission failed. The natives did not become French; they just got French passports. And now, France itself is ‘going native’. Our neighbour explained:
‘It was only a few years ago that one out of every ten people in France had foreign roots. Mostly from North Africa. Now, it’s one out of every four.’
French law makes it easy for people from France’s overseas departments and territories to live in France. Many are already citizens.
Immigration has become a hot button in French politics, as it is in the US. Emmanuel Macron represents the French Hillary Clintons and Pete Buttigiegs — ‘centrists’, well-educated, technocratic, and ‘liberal’ — who claimed to be able to ‘manage’ the issue…and expect grateful immigrants to vote for them. They favour more government, more rules, more spending…and more wars to keep everyone in line.
But the recent EU elections showed how unpopular the know-it-alls have become. Bloomberg:
‘Even Macron’s Closest Allies Fear His Brand Is Toxic
‘The day after Emmanuel Macron stunned France by calling a snap election, an uncomfortable truth emerged at an emergency meeting of top government press officials: they had to manage a deeply unpopular President in what had effectively become a referendum on his leadership.’
The first round of voting is scheduled for Sunday.
Broadly speaking, the ‘right wing’ taps into anti-immigrant sentiments. The ‘left wing’ appeals to immigrants themselves… and those who don’t like to see Muslim children getting massacred.
In France, as in the US, political campaigns are mostly just an exchange of insults. Any comment that can be labelled ‘racist; or ‘antisemite’, is seized and broadcast…with little regard for the actual thought — if there were one — behind it.
An example. Yesterday, the Daily Mail reported:
‘A far-right election candidate in France is facing prosecution for unveiling an election poster reading: “Let’s give white children a future”.’
The slogan is accompanied by an image of a blond-haired, blue-eyed boy…
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The kid doesn’t look especially ‘French’ to us. He looks more like the product of an earlier invasion — by the Wehrmacht in 1940.
Regards,
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Bill Bonner,
For Fat Tail Daily
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