French Politics

If anything, in hindsight, Arnaud Beltrame's tragic death looks a bit like a Thanatos Gambit. He garnered an unbelievable amount of sympathy for him and, by extension, our police forces. That's exactly the kind of thing that hurts Daesh's plans, because it's much more easy to get recruits when everyone hate the cops (which makes the cops hate everyone, and act brashly, and widen the gap between communities).

Here in France it's the last day of March and henceforth tomorrow will be the first day of April.

For thousands of working class families such as mine a decade ago, it's an age of fear, anger, and disbelief, facing the most inhumanely paradoxical social safety net of the country and perhaps the world, I can say without exaggerating much ...

It's the last day of the "trêve hivernale", the << winter ban on home evictions >>, so as early as tomorrow morning, anyone who hasn't paid it's rent for more than a few months will be at risk of finding him/her-self on the sidewalk as the cops break through the door, with henchmen to take everything worth money inside your home and put the rest in cardboard boxes on the sidewalk right next to you as you watch the whole process...

Unfortunately, this system is not enough to protect thousands of decent workers in budget crisis and yet doesn't protect landowners against the most egregious case of "home-rape" and chronic deliberate refusal to pay the rent .

As a kid in the turn of the millennium I found myself on both ends of the knife : first when my mother lived single for a few years we used to eat cheap cereals for breakfast because our standard of living suddenly fell down a few stairs and then when she remarried later, we climbed back up the social ladder, and they found themselves to become homeowners of an apartment in town that several clients in a row refused to pay the rent which is an experience I can use to assure you that if you are either one of those two, your whole life is in jepoardy.

I hope some day, there will be at least the beginning of something like a reform about that ...

edited 31st Mar '18 9:49:44 AM by Nuup-Kangerlua

Do you mean 'for more', as in... à l'avance? Or is the other way and there is only a small period where one can postpone the payment of previous months' rent?

edited 31st Mar '18 9:52:02 AM by Quag15

I meant "for more than a few months" as in "if you don't pay your rent at all three months in a row you're starting to dip into potentially big long troubles". As in "you have to pay the rent on the third of each month and if it's been four times that you didn't show up with the money on that day, your landowner is gonna get angry". ^^

Because you have to understand that when you incorporate the rent you get from an apartment into your standard budget sheets and that the guy/girl doesn't give you the money on time, it makes a big hole in the wings that you find yourself having to work extratime on the blackmarket to make up for it so when s/he doesn't pay for 6 MONTHS, for example (watch my eyes), then yes, you're pretty much starting to get pissed off.

edited 31st Mar '18 10:06:33 AM by Nuup-Kangerlua

The word you're looking for is "arrears". I don't think French landlords can ask for more than the upcoming month in rent (bond aside).

And then the poor evictees (who likely couldn't pay their winter rent) complain about the heartless landlords...

Forcing service providers to eat the cost of providing necessary services is a completely backwards way of providing a safety net - and I wouldn't be surprised if people simply stopped renting space in the month before winter security starts.

The system IS largely responsible for the housing crisis, since it discourages lots of landlords to actually rent at all when they could.

Speaking from experience, it takes an unseemly long time (and lots of money) to get a bad tenant out by legal means — with your house likely getting vandalized as a bonus.

edited 6th Apr '18 9:00:42 AM by StFan

Navy-blue painted heavily armoured vehicles from the Gendarmerie have been seen in the rural outskirts of Nantes on the expressway Vannes-Nantes toward the ZAD in the suburbs of Nantes on the Atlantic coast which means that an assault on the zone is imminent now.

According to SJW websites I follow through my Facebook friends the attack will likely take place on Monday, that is to say right into an active sequence of the SNCF general go-slow strike which will begin tonight and end on Monday evening, local time.

I don't want to sound callous but I feel like it's possible there's probably going to be blood up the roof.

edited 7th Apr '18 2:46:13 PM by Nuup-Kangerlua

The radical left-wing medias I was following were right ! For once ...

The evacuation of the ZAD at Notre Dame des Landes is now truly imminent and it will almost certainly happen tomorrow morning, according to various reliable French national medias :

https://www.francetvinfo.fr/politique/notre-dame-des-landes/notre-dame-des-landes-veillee-d-arme_2696224.html

http://www.lefigaro.fr/actualite-france/2018/04/08/01016-20180408ARTFIG00153-plus-de-2500-gendarmes-mobilises-pour-des-expulsions-ciblees.php

http://www.leprogres.fr/france-monde/2018/04/08/notre-dame-des-landes-zadistes-et-gendarmes-se-preparent-a-l-affrontement

edited 8th Apr '18 1:38:26 PM by Nuup-Kangerlua

Wait..what? Do you mean they are expecting a terror attack?

From the way Nuup was talking I thought they were moving in to break up the strike.

I guess I am naive but...how can you break up a strike? Either the people work or they don't....

I don't think so, that's not what I understood from what I read but it remains totally possible !

May I remind you that we're dealing here with Zàdists which are a radical tendance of the ultraleft that is not averse of violence as they have proven so repeatedly, and that these persons are willing to go full ahead in clashes if necessary for the advancement of their causes .

Also, the Zàdists and the Police have "heated each other's minds" for months and even years now, so both sides are now very much ready to untangle their arguments face to face ...

Zàdists are the far-left , period . They are the same kind of people who used to kidnap random state officials and to burn supermarkets to the ground back in the seventies . The terrorists from this era may now be either dead or in the second half of their lives , but their toxic ideology, just like salafism and neonazism remains alive and kicking ...

To be honest if there is a Rémi Fraisse or two tomorrow evening, it wouldn't even surprise me ...

I have been dreading this kind of "dénouement" for years and now that it's finally there I am starting to fear the consequences both for both sides on the ground (I'm no monster) and for the stability of our civil society in general ...

edited 8th Apr '18 2:15:35 PM by Nuup-Kangerlua

Well the way it's worked in other places was with good old fashioned violence, either perpetrated by the government or private security, or even both. If the government gets involved then arrest for rioting, and other trumped up charges should be expected.

If the public isn't sufficiently behind the strikers their usually isn't much of a point in continuing since the government or even sufficiently large private entities has way more resources then the strikers could ever hope to amass. Eventually the strikers have got to eat, and those strike funds aren't bottomless.

Then again I'm coming at this from an American perspective so I don't know whether such a thing would even be possible in France, but there is a first time for everything.

edited 8th Apr '18 2:21:18 PM by Mio

I'd say that is not likely in France (though I might be overly optimistic); overt violence against strikers would make a lot of people sympathize with them (including among those who were annoyed by the strike).

About 2'500 Gendarmes (militarised police) are facing about 250 ZàDistes in Notre Dame des Landes since this morning at dawn and as I am writing this piece at 11:05 AM local time there already are one Gendarme wounded and one ZàDiste that has been put into custody.

But objectively speaking, it is fortunately rather calm ...

Don't the gendarmes have anything else to deal with? 100 to 1 sounds like a massive waste of personnel.

Vast outnumbering both makes sure you succeed without having to resort to excessive violence due to sheer numbers, and shields you from retaliation. So they picked that instead of having "just enough", and then something goes wrong, a gendarme starts to panic, throws a grenade and someone dies - then total PR nightmare.

I'm assuming 10 to 1 would still work for that. Let's not forget that gendarmes have better training and equipment.

From my understanding it's also an extremely large area to canvas and cordon. I mean, they were planning to put an airport there, no?

edited 9th Apr '18 8:04:25 AM by Ghilz

I don't see why you would assume that, 10 to 1 is still close enough for trouble to possibly occur. This way they can decisively stifle any issues that could occur without any real risk of escalations.

This too.

edited 9th Apr '18 8:08:12 AM by Fourthspartan56

Well, I guess 50 to 1 would work too, but then, you should never trust in the number of your opponent. Better safe than sorry if you can afford it.

Yeah, it's far better to have too many personnel than too few.

edited 9th Apr '18 8:37:54 AM by Fourthspartan56

Also it's a forested area where those guys have been living for years, so the field advantage did not go to the Gendarmerie.

Update : According to every medias covering the events today are a tad more violent than yesterday.

Protesters have even conceived "antiaircraft rockets" ! Admittedly, far from sophisticated : these weapons are extremely lacking precision and efficiency, but still the fact is that the Zàdistes are firing antiaircraft rockets against the helicopters of the Gendarmerie which shows how far they are ready to go to resist their expulsions ...

edited 10th Apr '18 8:14:47 AM by Nuup-Kangerlua