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hpunitif -> RE: The struggle between the Left and Right in Europe (11/19/2012 3:09:31 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: fucktoyprincess
quote:
ORIGINAL: hpunitif
Hello,
I'm french, so my point of view might be biased, but I don't think we are more or less racists than americans. We just deal as we can with our own matters, which are probably different than yours. About algerians, since you talk about them you probably know that Algeria is a former french colony, and that France practiced torture other there during the independance war, it was pretty ugly and it was less than 50 years ago. Yet now french of french and algerian descent have to live together... it is not simple. It's not as if algerians were a small minority in France, they are the biggest minority.
There's also the religion matter, Europe, and especially France, is challengend by Islam. It took the french revolution and many years of terror to get rid of the religious masters, anti-religion feelings are almost written in our DNA.
I'm not trying to excuse racism, I'm just explaining. It's true that racism is growing over here. (all kind of racism, there is anti-white racism too, even though it is not as institutionalized as anti arab or anti black racism).
Yes, I suppose it is a matter of perspective, but I know that immigrants as a group do much better in America than they do in Europe. And I find it hard to believe that racism isn't at least some piece of that.
And yes there is anti-white racism is France - the country has a long history of anti-Semitism.
And yes, I agree that racism is complicated. The racism in the U.S. is also rooted in history. But that's why it rubs me the wrong way when Europeans say that the U.S. is "racist". By what standard? Racism, in its many ugly forms, is alive and well everywhere. The important question is what, as a society, one is doing to combat it. And in the U.S., since the country began, issues of race have been on the agenda, particularly so since the Civil War, Reconstruction era and the Civil Rights movement. America has been actively engaging in the political issues surrounding race and race relations for much, much longer than most other countries. It is only relatively recently that countries like France and Germany are starting to come to grips with what it means to have a heterogeneous society.
So you will not get any argument from me that racial relations are a simple thing. Of course not. They are extremely complicated. But I think people should look more carefully at what is actually going on in the U.S. before just labeling as incurably racist. The picture here is much more varied than that. Yes, there is racism. But this is more of a meritocracy than any other place in the world. And from whatever background, one has a better chance of making it in the U.S. than anywhere else in the world. I know from personal experience.
How long do you think before France were to elect an Algerian-French president?
Because in the U.S. we have a half-black president serving his second term of office. Where else in the world would such a thing be possible. Only in America. I love my country.
I don't think that european people consider the USA as an especialy racist country... at least that's not what I hear around me. After all you have elected a black president, not because he is black of course, but if american where so racist a black man could never have gone this far. Maybe it was the case a few years ago, but we have to deal with our own racism now. There was a golden age of multiculturalism in France in the 90s, but it's over.
It's hard to make generalisations about american people anyway, I've never been in the USA (I'd really love to), but it looks like new york and Austin are two different world for example. And as a french man, I think I have few in commun with an english or a polish.
And of course, don't forget that multiculturalism in France only exist since 40 years or so. We're not doing too bad considering the few time we had to adapt.
(By the way, when I talked about anti-white racism, I talked about agression of white people on a racial basis or degradation of churches by muslims, not about antisemitism)
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