…and it doesn’t seem like the 21st-century French Revolution is going to end anytime soon, either.
It doesn’t look like there is anything President Macron can do to appease the mob because their protest has no focal point. The demonstrations are an expression of the frustration and anger felt by ordinary Frenchmen at how the government has taken them for granted in creating policies and new taxes they feel they were not consulted on. From refugees to a falling standard of living, the French people feel betrayed and no government giveaways are going to assuage their anger.
For details on the policies and new taxes, feel free to peruse Erik’s take at No Paseran!
I think the events Over There reveal a systemic difference between the U.S. and France. In Europe, the people basically let the elites run all over them (for hundreds of years Euros seem to have had little problem with their “betters” telling them what to do) right up until the situation becomes intolerable, and then they explode: heads roll, protesters take to the streets, whatever.
On our side of The Pond, we Murkins just elect people like Trump from time to time, to try to reverse the trend of oppression. This seems to let some of the steam out of popular resentment — which is also why we respond so strongly when the elected fail or falter in their mission.
I’m not sure that Murkins have the spunk to rise up as violently as the Frogs. Perhaps it’s because we have so many guns — not that we’re ready to use them, but their very presence acts as a damper on ourselves. Instead of rioting, we form a Tea Party movement and get politicians to follow its precepts.
It’s one thing to march in yellow vests, blockade streets, break windows and deface monuments. It’s another thing altogether to break out the AKs and ARs and start a truly violent revolution. That’s not to say we couldn’t, under truly intolerable circumstances, but I think we all agree that most of us — even the most fire-breathing — would shrink from taking that final, and very deadly step until that time.
Under these circumstances, our government and elites should be grateful for the Second Amendment instead of trying to shut it down all the time. That said, our elites would ultimately prefer that the State is the repository of all guns so that they and only they can go to the guns, which of course is the current state of affairs in Europe.
An interesting mental game is to wonder what the gilets jaunes would do if France had a Second Amendment as robust as ours or whether, if they did, the State would be as oppressive towards them as it has been.
And now, if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll head off to the range. All this intellectual activity requires some physical release.
Methinks Switzerland across the border provides a valuable data point.
As I saw on Facebook, the Yellow Vest Protesters are just a bunch of socialists who are upset that “free” isn’t free.
Interesting theory WRT the issue of guns but I don’t think that’s what keeps us from having problems like they have in France.
Seems to me that the real issue is that France doesn’t have a truly “representative” government. If they did, things like the gas tax would never have passed in the first place.
The reason Americans don’t don yellow vests and set buses on fire when a tax is passed is because if our politicians pass a law we don’t like, we retain the ability to throw them out on their asses and they know it (see the Republican landslides in 1994, 2010 and 2014 for examples of exactly that.)
Not only is the voting booth the “safety valve” that keeps us from rioting, it also acts as a damper on the lawmakers, who know very well that if they vote for an unpopular law it could cost them their jobs.