The major gist,
Authored by Christina Maas via ReclaimTheNet.org,
In France, a storm is brewing (again), and French President Emmanuel Macron appears to have figured it all out – it’s social media and video games that are to blame for the ongoing riots in France!
This came following five nights of rioting initially triggered by the fatal police shooting of a Muslim teenager, Nahel M.
Macron’s comments are hardly original, yet they warrant scrutiny from a free speech perspective.
One cannot help but raise an eyebrow as President Macron pleads with social media giants to erase the “most sensitive” content pertaining to the rioting.
With a wave of his hand, he decrees, “platforms and networks are playing a major role in the events of recent days.”
His words, veiled under a guise of concern, echo a familiar tune that has been played on the world stage before.
“We’ve seen them; Snapchat, TikTok and several others, serve as places where violent gatherings have been organized, but there’s also a form of mimicry of the violence which for some young people leads them to lose touch with reality.
“You get the impression that for some of them they are experiencing on the street the video games that have intoxicated them,” he added.
It’s fascinating that social media platforms and video games are often the easiest targets when those in power look for a scapegoat.
It’s like a well-rehearsed performance: when there’s unrest, point fingers at technology.
Surely, Snapchat and TikTok are not centuries-old entities that have been brewing riots since the French Revolution.
[...]
Those checking the original item, as linked at the ZH beginning, will note that image selection, bolding and italics are editorial things by ZeroHedge. Basically, fascism favors censorship and unfortunate events need not be passed up as an opportunity to tout censorship of that which is not approved mainstream media content.
However, even the mainstream sees fire at night and running policemen launching teargas against running demonstrators setting fires and launching fireworks toward the police, with next day images of burned out building and vehicle hulks to show - all that as fodder for boosting viewership incomes.
France has police problems, and arguably national entrenched population attitude problems toward Arab immigrant presence, conduct and complaints.
Credit aljazeera.com with a less widespread but telling post about the French:
Fund for French police officer who killed Nahel M tops $1m
Outrage swells on social media as fund for accused police officer grows, with calls on GoFundMe to close the pot.
A collection for the French policeman who sparked nationwide riots by killing a teenager during a traffic stop has been growing, prompting outrage among politicians and activists.
Set up by Jean Messiha, a former adviser to the French far-right politician Marine Le Pen, the appeal on GoFundMe had raised 963,000 euros ($1.05m) at the time of writing on Monday.
The boy’s death has renewed debates on France’s long and troubled history with its ethnic minority populations, and allegations of police brutality.
Centrist and left-wing politicians condemned Messiha’s collection drive.
Eric Bothorel, from the En Marche party of President Emmanuel Macron, wrote on Twitter: “Jean Messiha blows on the embers. It is a generator of riots. The pot of several hundred thousand euros for the police officer indicted in the homicide of young Nahel is indecent and scandalous.”
Olivier Faure, head of the Socialist Party, called on GoFundMe to close the fundraiser, accusing the platform of “hosting a pot of shame”.
“You maintain an already gaping fracture by participating in support of a police officer indicted for intentional homicide. Close!”
[reposted tweet omitted]
Some called out the hypocrisy of the pot still taking donations.
In 2019, the fund for a former boxer who had punched several police officers during “yellow vest” anti-government demonstrations in 2019 was quickly closed down.
Left-wing politician David Guiraud wrote on Twitter: “The assumed message is kill Arabs, and you will become millionaires, and the government watches this horror pass without saying anything when it had closed the yellow vest pot in 2 days who hit a policeman. Repugnant.”
The French activist group Sleeping Giants tweeted the “sheer existence” of the fund “inflames the sentiment of injustice and furthers tensions”.
Amid the riots, which often feature vandalism and see protesters clash with police, France has been deploying 45,000 officers onto the streets each night to quell unrest in cities including Paris, Strasbourg, Marseille and Nice.
On Monday, demonstrations began at French town halls opposing the riots, during which violence and looting has also been reported.
Europe is not without ethnicity issues dating in France back to Charles Martel, but more recently in large part France now faces immigration related to its previous colonization and imperial control over northern African Arab states which ended years after the end of WW II (during deGaulle years). Most immigration to France is from those northern African Arab states. As with Vietnam, the French attempted to continue pre-war imperialism with consequent opposition of the populations of nations not wishing to see it continue.
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| Wikipedia - Charles Martel |
Film note, Battle of Algiers. Track it down and watch if you are unfamiliar with it. The same goes for Day of the Jackal.