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

Ahh, so the defence was actually a refutation of the title of "most morally reprehensible of all the european nations" and not in any way trying to defend the actions which had been listed as contributing to that title?
Sorry, but I still can;t see how saying 'well so did you' is in any way an effective defence. It isn;t going to change anyones mind, whereas a point by point explanation of why the actions were taken and any factors affecting them which may have caused them to turn out like they did rather than as intended, if indeed the intention was not for the actual outcome, would be more effective in persueding people to another opinion with the added effect of educating them about the history of another country.
I dunno, perhaps I just thought that the attributed title mentioned above was a throw away line best ignored and that there were other issues perhaps more deserving of attention.

*Agrees with Kelli*

...awake at last...morning all

just a brief look at todays front page on bbconline brings up the situation in Zimbabwe and how the fr*nch made a deal that if the EU will allow Mugabe into France for this summit, they will vote for continued EU sanctions against Zimbabwe.

let me go find some and i'll get the links.

alec.

I've just come out in a cold sweat at the vision of Kerravon pouring St Emilion or a Sauternes on her chips...

Anyway, on the more serious point made by Ictoan, no doubt the French, like every other nation have done some bad stuff. My point was that to argue that they are worse than any other state, or that there is something particularly wrong with them is incorrect.

The root causes of barbaric colonial behaviour or the UN failure in Bosnia-Herzogovina are a bit beyond what I'm capable of posting about in any sensible way in my coffee break...

Sprout

Oohh, now don't get me started on the french and their wine...

There are two problems there... Firstly the french genuinely do think they make the best wine in the world... Having said that, there is a logic behind their belief... Basically it's economical.

In the UK, with the exception of a few stark-staring mad fools who try to make British wine, all wine is imported, therefore wherever it comes from there are transport costs to deal with (and believe it or not, it's not always cheaper to get a container load of wine driven over from france than it is to get a container load shipped over from California!)

In france, you don't have to go far to get a decent bottle of wine. And as with a lot of things in life, you can have quantity or you can have quality. So, whilst it's easy and cheap to get hold of some excellent little french wines from small vineyards, the only way you'll get Australian or Californian wines over here is if a supermarket chain has decided to ship them in by the tonne. So you can't really compare like for like, you end up comparing the production of a small-family run vineyard with the output of some enormous industrial complex in australia, so of course you're on to a looser straight away.

The same also stands for a lot of the French wine you'll find in the UK... Basically, if it's on a supermarket shelf you've got to ask yourself just how much of the stuff is available if Tesco can buy enough for every single one of their outlets?

With wine (as with a lot of things in life) small is beautiful! (Well at least that's what I keep telling the ladies )

Hmmm. I'll stick to German wine thank you. There's nothing wrong with English wine either- one of the most pleasant wines I've ever drunk was elderflower.

Fair do's Sprout, I know d*mn well I couldn't,even outside the coffee break. I was just trying to avoid thread disappearing into slanging match

My only real problem with France was that when I was in Nice and had walked god knows how far in temperatures in the 30's to the youth hostel, I found they had closed the swimming pool because it was no longer officially summer. it was 35 by mid morning!! How can that not be summer?

ok...the thread only started last night, so don't expect me to list all of this country's crimes in one go.

did you all read the article on the Rainbow Warrior then? There may be some of you who don't remember that Greenpeace were there to provide support for a flotilla of sailboats who were going up to Muroroa Atoll to try and stop the Fr*nch from conducting further Nooculer tests, long, long after the rest of the world had stopped.

anyway, here's a link to some comments about Mugabe :

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talking_point/2779261.stm

in particular i would point you to the letter from 'Paul' who puts things in a nutshell.
-------------
"Right has nothing to do with it, its motivations are twofold:
1. To irritate the british
2. To increase french influence in largely anglophone southern africa.
But the french are starting to overplay their hand and the contradictions are becoming ludicrous
-they oppose 'american hegemony' but insult and threaten Eastern European countries who dare to disagree with them.

-they oppose armed intervention but are busy fighting in the Ivory Coast.

-And they grandstand about speaking for Europe whilst breaking an agreed EU sanctions policy, in place because of the human rights abuses of Mugabe and his thugs. "
-------------
i thought that was quite well put.

alec.

Come on alec... as I said before, you'll have to do better than that...

At the moment you're still sounding like you're skimming the internet looking for things to throw at the french... we can all do that for any country in the world... and the phrase people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones springs to mind here. Unless you want this thread to continue as a one-man rant, try reading my post which gives you a few suggestions, do some real research instead of googling for hate mail and get back to us...

so sorry whisky, but i'm suffering with the flu.....(you know that already)
but for a one man rant, we're already on page two...(tries to keep hand steady)

alec.

Actually I didn't know that you had the flu...

But don't expect me to let you off lightly just because of that ...

So far, apart from comments about French Wine... which I've already tried to answer, and Kerr Avon trying to wind me up I've not seen much in the way of unique arguements why France in particular should be considered the root of all evil...

(Mind you, if you've ever tasted andouilette, you might think that would be enough to condemn the french out of hand )

Oh, and if you hadn't realised it... I could rant on about problems with the french all day... but you haven't touched on any of the _real_ problems.

"andouilette"

*shudder*

I was young and innocent - it was the only dish on the menu I couldn't translate so I thought I'd give it a go...

*shudder*

Want me to send you a couple of kilos Kelli?

well what about Sangatte, the refugee centre that the french located within sight of the southern end of the 'chunnel'.
(another big mistake that tunnel thingy)

the nightly forays by would-be asylum seekers trying to get through, which the fr*nch authorities did nothing to discourage.

calls by the red cross at the camp to the authorities saying that people had left the camp en masse heading for the tunnel were ignored.

the delays caused to europe bound goods from the uk because the fr*nch wouldn't let anything through the other way until they had 'searched it thoroughly' with er two policemen.

Don't tell me that they didn't locate the camp there just to annoy the UK.

alec.

No, they located it there simply because they had hundreds of refugees/asylum seekers/scroungers(delete as applicable ) in the area anyway... It's now closed as far as I know by the way...

heres an interesting account from a guy who snuck onto Muroroa Atoll in September 95 to try and stop them from setting another nuke off.

http://www.schnews.org.uk/archive/news40.htm

(it looks blank at the top, but just scroll down to 'STOP FRENCH NUKE TESTS'
alec.

Being from the USA, I would like to jump to France's defense. Not because I agree with their government or attitude or anything else.

I do so because I know what it's like, thanks to reading posts on various message boards to be lumped in with all the other people of a country that is apparently generally disliked. Daily, you can read multiple articles and messages from people across the world who would never like me or want to talk to me because I'm an American. Some of them are even here.

I'm not going to defend France's actions, because there are a number that are indefensible. But so it is the case in every country. In my mind, criticizing the actions of a government, a policy, or an ideal is all to often the criticizm of the individuals of that country. Having had enough of it, I will say that I have indeed met a number French people, and enjoyed the company of all but 2 or 3 of them.

Vive la France, God bless America.

Then there's the way the fr*nch have behaved in the former jugoslavia.

(French gov't, military, authorities,whatever, i'm just going to call it 'the fr*nch' same way as people will say 'the americans' or 'the brits')

Notable is their arrest record of war criminals who seem to be enjoying more protection than anything. And the sneaky spies who passed on NATO's plans.

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/1999/12/21/balkans/print.html

alec.

Alec... I've read through the article on the Greenpeace activist you linked to and I'll rip it to pieces a little later when I've a few minutes... Needless to say, it's full of inconsistencies, downright lies and impossibilities...

Just to give you a little example... He talks of hiding an undevelopped film in a certain part of his anatomy, then goes on to blame radiation from the bomb for it being over exposed... totally ignoring the fact that he's previously stated he was x-rayed on capture...

He talks about a helicopter hovering for three hours... sorry, but there aint a helicopter in the world that can hover for three hours...

There are other points I could bring up, but basically, the guy's a nutcase!