h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

French roits in November 2005

I cannot write here what I should like, because it's to much effort to translate.

I have worked with kids on the streets about 13 years, and I had my own childhood in a rich village that had high status and a father who was a lawyer (1940 - 1990) and local politician,etc.

In 1980 I went straight to a addicts rehabilitation center in Harlem,
New York. I was there for a few weeks. It was asif I was on the moon.
A total different world.

But there was óne thing that shocked me the most; a HUGE wall of glass around this ghetto. You did not see it, but the more you could féél it. No living space for poor skilled coloured people. No way.

I came to know kids from the age of 18, who néver in their whole childhood had seen more then two or three blocks in Harlem.

Anyhow, my point is in relation to the riots in French;
Let the rich white middleclass turn down the walls and reach out.
Let the unskilled poor coloured people stop hiding themselves behind "discrimination" and use their talents.

The rich hiding behind body guards and police.
The poor hiding behind victim-cults.


I want to finish with one experience, from the bottom of my heart.

In those three weeks I had never in my life experienced so much
human "warmth" then there, in the A.R.C.in Harlem.
It was for me like a warm bath.I had never experienced that...



The poténtial among the poor is there, but meeting must come from both sides.
From the whites we might expect three dubble effort because they are the "haves".
But the other side cannot escape their prison on the wings of the victim-cult, although there would be much reason for it. But it doesn't help. It will never help them to create a better life.

I was there in 1980 at the ARC-Harlem , because it was run by former black addicts,who worked with a lot of engagement and realizing the need for real order.(250 addicts in óne building).
It was accepted, because there was no arrogance, no prejudice. If someone disagreeded he could call the chief staff day ánd night, seven days a week.

The "whites" will need the "blacks" to brake these prejudices down,
because it's almost impossible to do that from their/our/my heavely protected homeground.


http://c250.columbia.edu/c250_events/community_festival/arcbio.pdf



P.S. Do we know why the USA is that agressive to Holland in case of extacy? Because it's the ónly drug that is sold by their own white middle class kids and they don't like to send them to prison. Therefore they only want to stop the basic supplier = Netherlands.(and of course it should not be produced, etc.)
This political ánd police-strategy, has a racist element.

It makes me think of a cartoon in the New Yorke Times.

A woman looks from her appartement in Brooklyn to the ghetto Harlem and says to her husband; "what a próblem".

His answer; "it's not a próblem, it's a solútion".

Quote; "We all know that the rioters in France aren't really French.
Real French people would have more respect and concern for their surroundings".

It's not that the DNA of French are better, but because for thém they are "one of our own" and
they clearly give immigrants a far lower status.
The lower the status in society, the less input for our own neighbourhood.
Because of the low status = the feeling of being ignored and therefore the feeling of isolation.

"Brotherhood" is one of the French credo's, but not all its inhabitants are included...
Here I see the limits of the Enlightment.

The "French" should focus on really braking down the social walls (as we all have to do in our countries in Europe), while the "immigrants"(third generation!) will háve to deal with their low status and negative expectations = working and studying twice as heart, to gain the same benefits from the French society, and not hiding behind the negativity. Not because it isn't thére, but cultivating ones negative status does'nt help at all. It is the reward the racists are waiting for.

It's extremely important for etnic minorities to be able to focus on succesfull peoples from their own group.
They need to see good examples around them to be able to focus on it(ónly in football is to little)

It makes me think of that black woman in the USA that died 2 or 3 weeks ago and who inpired Martin Luther King for his mission.
She was the first one to ignore the racist rule,
that a black should give his place to any white
person who wants to sit.
And Clinton described that she needed to be succesful to repeat all kinds of indignities during twenty years.(She was over and over turned down when she wanted to vote, etc.)
Her choice and dignity have had a very great impact.
I would never, ever have such patience and strong will. She was and is a great motivator for blacks in the USA, because descrimination is far from over yet. They need to fight for themselves. Hardly anyone else is not doing it. My (white)daughter (30) has Dutch ánd American passports and lives in New York for about ten years. She
gave a huge support for about a year at Ground Zero www.monroegallery.co... and you know whát? She's on a black list because she is a member of Amnesty International.


Anyhow, after ten days the situation in France is completely degenerated and the hooligans take their chances and take it into their own hands. Nów the réal scum is infiltrating and taking it over. And for the ones that started this, it will be disappointing for them. The racists see their credo's confirmed


The struggle for etnic minorities can be compared with feminism in the sixtees, and their/our job isn't finished yet.




Quote;"The soft touch just helps to encourage trouble makers."

That's very true, therefor we need a tough approach to push back violence, inclúding the attitude and action that the troublemakers are íncluded in our goals in our society.So there's a long way for áll of us. From both sides.

Not "they" and "us", but "we" in our fight against terrorism, criminality, apathy, etc.

Only the use of police is the easy way of the "haves" who look at the other side of life as soon as their cars are not burned anymore. That is the "easy" way, the "soft" way, cause you don't want to be involved in what is going on.

There's a húge difference between problems between cultures of minorities, or the fight between cultures about the RIGHT to live in our cities an villages.

That last approach really fuels racism with very deep wounds as result of that. It makes "cultures" into "enemies".



Quote;
"You write "not they" and "us", but "we" in our fight against terrorism, criminality, apathy, etc.
I wonder if you would apply the "we" to somebody who has broken into your home and set the sitting room on fire. What is happening in France is just that, but on a larger scale".




I do not want to stangle anyones throat by a political `correct` moralism.
We should take áll our own emotions seriously,
including even peoples with real racist opinions.

I severely reject racist behaviour, but in The Netherlands we finally learned to look at the emotions behínd all that talk and behaviour,in low income areas in the big cities.

Because we shifted onto the historic inhabitants of these big cities the frustrating and painfull proces of integration. They are standing very alone in that whole process. And I don´t see any right to strangle their throat.

And most expressions are not really racist at all.
Elderly people who get isolated in their own neigbourhood with only immigrants using strong language. They need it to survive.

Not because emigrants are criminals and parasites.
No, because immigrants are mainly living in the poor areas and it takes a lót of your energy to feel a tourist in the city where you were born and raised. It can be very, very hard.

A lot of emotions are born from a range of understandeble frustrations, mainly because the rest of society is looking at the other side and plays the `no discrimination theatre`.

We had to learn it the hard way here, in Holland.

Even if I feel sometime racist feelings in myself, well, they are mine and no one, not even myself, should ignore it. In such a period they are mine and I take them seriously, because they are míne. I don´t need to morally fight against them.
I need to `let them be`, as they are and continue my journey trough life. It won´t make me a racist.


P.S. Holland has a reputation of being tolerant. Well, that's not true. There is a lot of hyprocrisy. Really a lot.