The White Working Class Are Rising Up To Revolt In Europe
The White Working Class Are Rising Up To Revolt In Europe. The yellow vests protests began after the French government imposed a tax on gas and diesel. The citizenry was furious, the rising tax would affect those from rural areas more so than those in cities. This meant that once again the urban areas would continue unscathed following government action on climate change and be immune to the economic ramifications of a globalized economy. In response white working class people from the rural areas rose up and began to revolt in major cities. They called themselves the forgotten majority, similar to Trump's silent majority. Now entering week three, it is expected to continue as French president Emmanuel Macron refuses to negotiate.
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It depicts three men on a rooftop above the French Yellow Vests protests, and one has a sniper rifle.
This has led to a conspiracy where people believe that the snipers are actually taking out protesters, though I'm told by a local this is routine, and these are here to prevent terror attacks.
Following this, we saw another video.
A man in France with his hands up collapses.
Then you see something streak past him.
There are now people claiming this is evidence that snipers are actually taking out the yellow vest protesters.
Whatever happened here, we don't know, but you can see people rush to the aid of this individual.
I think it's highly unlikely snipers are taking out protesters, but that's the theory.
I don't think it's true, and until we have confirmation, we shouldn't press on this.
But I think it's fair to say, and the reason why I bring this up, is that tensions in France are escalating to an extreme degree.
We're seeing these protests spread to Berlin, To the Netherlands.
To Belgium.
Whatever is going on with this movement, many people are either excited or scared.
Some people are calling it a civil war.
We saw that from Time Magazine.
Protesters said it feels like a civil war.
Some people have said it's a revolution.
And some people believe that it's actually spreading to other countries because it's a rebuke of globalism.
But one thing I can say, and what I want to talk about today, is who exactly is protesting?
Because in my video yesterday, I kind of touched on this.
It is white working class people from rural areas.
And to me, that sounds very similar to who voted for Donald Trump in the U.S.
But the other thing that was really interesting, too, is that some of these protesters have called themselves the
unwashed, the forgotten majority from the sticks. And that sounds an awful lot like Trump
supporters who refer to themselves as the silent majority. So today, let's take a look at the
escalation of the LFS protests and look at the comparison between these protesters and the
supporters of Donald Trump, which may not be perfect, but there are some similarities
here.
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First, let's take a look at the latest update.
The French government is considering imposing a state of emergency after Yellow Vest protest violence.
Masked, black-clad groups ran amok across central Paris on Saturday, torching cars and buildings, looting shops, smashing windows, and fighting police in the worst unrest the capital has seen since 1968, posing the most formidable challenge Emmanuel Macron has faced in his 18-month-old presidency.
Disturbances also rocked several cities and towns across France, from Charleville-Méziers in the northeast to Nantes in the west and Marseille in the south.
We have to think about the measures that can be taken so that these incidents don't happen again, government spokesman Benjamin Guevra told Europe 1 Radio.
The popular rebellion erupted out of nowhere on November 17th and has spread quickly via social media, with protesters blocking roads across France and impeding access to shopping malls, factories, and some fuel depots.
They add one motorist died overnight after colliding with traffic which had built up due to a protest near Alès in southern France, marking the third accidental death associated with the protests.
Macron will hold an emergency meeting with the Prime Minister and the Interior Minister later on Sunday to discuss the riots and how to begin dialogue with the Yellow Vest protesters, who have no real structure or leadership.
Griveaux urged the Yellow Vest movement to disassociate itself from the radical groups that had instigated the violence, organize itself, and come to the negotiating table.
However, he ruled out a change in government policy.
We won't change course.
It's the right direction.
We are certain of that.
And this is in reference to the fuel tax.
They're imposing a tax on diesel and gas because they want to curb climate change.
And they're saying they will not change on that.
They want the Yellow Vests to organize.
But the Yellow Vests are just people.
There's not an organization.
It's just people from rural areas who are hit hardest by this tax, who are upset and coming into the cities to protest.
I asked a local journalist, why is it that we are seeing the white working class rise up?
What's different about this protest?
And she said, migration primarily affects cities.
When people come to France, they move to Paris.
They move to bigger cities.
They don't move to rural areas.
So when you're increasing fuel prices, the people who live in a city who have buses and the subway, they're not hit by that cost.
But the people in rural areas, who need cheap gas because they have to travel, and they need that for work, are impacted to a much more extreme degree, and thus, they're coming into the cities and protesting.
One thing I found really interesting, however, is yesterday in my video, these people referred to themselves as kind of a forgotten majority.
And it's kind of similar to what we heard with Donald Trump.
These are rural individuals who have lost their jobs and are now seeing rising fuel costs, and they're upset with the way the government is handling it.
There is some similarity there to Trump supporters, who are rural individuals who have lost their manufacturing jobs.
The Guardian published an opinion piece called, France is deeply fractured.
Gillette's jaunes are just a symptom.
That means yellow vests.
They say, from the 1980s onwards, it was clear that there was a price to be paid for Western societies adapting to a new economic model, and that price was sacrificing the European and American working class.
No one thought the fallout would hit the bedrock of the lower middle class, too.
It's obvious now, however, that the new model not only weakened the fringes of the proletariat, but society as a whole.
The paradox is this is not a result of the failure of the globalized economic model, but of its success.
In recent decades, the French economy, like the European and US economies, has continued to create wealth.
We are thus, on average, richer.
The problem is, at the same time, unemployment, insecurity, and poverty have also increased.
The central question, therefore, is not whether a globalized economy is efficient, but what to do with this model when it fails to create and nurture a coherent society.
France had an election only about 18 months ago.
Emmanuel Macron, who won, was considered a bankster.
The left, the far left, viewed him as just another crony capitalist who made his fortune off banking, and he was considered to be rather centrist, much like Hillary Clinton.
And he ran against Marine Le Pen, who was considered a far-right populist who wanted to restore French sovereignty.
What I find fascinating is that in the U.S., the inverse happened.
Trump won, the right-wing populist won, and thus policy started to change in a different direction.
People have accused Trump of damaging the economy, of starting a trade war, but the reality is the economy is up, unemployment is down.
In France, however, the prices are going up, people in rural areas aren't seeing those jobs, and it was the populist who lost.
I wonder if in the U.S., if Hillary won, we would see something similar to this.
And I want to highlight this segment that I talked about yesterday from the BBC.
They say, And this is a reference to those from the rural areas who are being ignored.
And it is very similar to what we heard when Donald Trump was elected.
From NPR, Trump champions the silent majority.
Light unwashed, the forgotten majority from the sticks and they've had enough.
And this is a reference to those from the rural areas who are being ignored.
And it is very similar to what we heard when Donald Trump was elected.
From NPR, Trump champions the silent majority.
But what does that mean in 2016?
The article from The Guardian is actually kind of fascinating because it's a left-wing
They're actually advocating for some kind of more socialistic stand.
But they spell it out.
The globalized economy has caused damage to the rural working class who are now rising up in anger because they can't live on like this.
And this is why many people in Europe and the US have started to embrace nationalism.
Because the globalized economy, hey, it works.
But it starts creating wealth in urban areas.
And the migration that comes to these countries, they go to urban areas.
So there are the forgotten majority of the sticks.
There is the silent majority people who are left out of the wealth creation, who through no fault of their own, are now facing strife.
In the US, many of these people are seeing jobs come back.
Not all of them.
There have been some problems.
And these people are happy.
In France, It's the inverse.
These people are angry, and they're coming into the cities, and they're rioting.
These riots are happening in a place called Champs-Élysées.
That's considered to be the Times Square of Paris.
Could you imagine if white working class people in the US, upset with the Hillary Clinton victory, showed up in Times Square three weeks in a row, rioting in the streets?
It might not be a perfect comparison.
But perhaps it's a way to kind of understand the severity of what's going on.
Like they said in the first article from France 24, violence hasn't been this bad since 1968.
But some people are becoming hopeful.
They're claiming this may be a civil war in the EU over the failed globalized economic policy.
From the Telegraph, Brussels protesters attack PM's office as Paris braces for more yellow vest unrest.
France's Yellow Vest movement spread to Belgium on Friday, as police turned water cannons on stone-throwing protesters who torched two police vehicles in central Brussels.
In Brussels, around 300 people demonstrated near major EU buildings, with at least 60 arrested in possession of box cutters, smoke bombs, or tear gas canisters.
Two police vans were tipped over and torched.
But it's not just Belgium.
We saw this tweet talking about Yellow Vests protests happening in Berlin as well.
But we also saw a Yellow Vest protest in the Netherlands for similar reasons.
This might end up being a blip, right?
We know right now the protests are quite historic, because according to France 24, it hasn't been this bad in Paris since 1968, and it's spread to other countries.
So at this point, I think it's fair to say it's significant.
To see the white working class come into the cities, And revolt, to flip cars and burn them down.
Now I want to end by addressing the issue of the white working class, because people often talk about how Trump supporters are all white, and how these are white working class people, and they like to claim this has something to do with racism.
But as a local journalist in France pointed out to me, when people migrate to these countries, they go to cities.
So there's a reason why we see typically white working class people standing up and voting for more nationalist policies.
They're the ones negatively impacted by the fuel tax in France.
But there's a great meme that I think explains very well what's happening.
This meme went viral, and I thought it was actually kind of hilarious.
Justin King tweeted, headline, This is a real story.
They actually wrote this.
The implied correlation, horses make you live longer.
The reality, if you own a horse, you can probably afford health insurance.
And this meme accurately sums up what we see when it comes to Donald Trump's base and those protesting in Europe.
Migration primarily comes to big cities.
Therefore, those who are from the rural areas tend to be more ethnically homogenous.
Then, when they protest after being negatively impacted by globalized economic policy, the headlines will then say, With the implied correlation that it is white people who are revolting due to racism.
Because we've seen the headlines time and time again.
That those voting for Donald Trump, it's a white lash, they've called it.
That white people are angry with the changing demographics.
But it might actually be much simpler than that.
When you impose policy that negatively impacts the farming community, the rural communities, who aren't as impacted by migration, the reality is not that white people are racist and experiencing a white lash, but that rural people, in general, are those experiencing the negative consequences of the globalized economy.
I don't know if this will spread.
I don't know if those calling it civil war are correct.
Maybe it won't be.
But certainly, a state of emergency, an emergency meeting, and this spreading to several countries is absolutely significant.
Maybe this is a rebuke of globalism, or maybe it's just a symptom of successful globalism, and France will have to figure out how to appease the working class and make sure they get a piece of the pie as the wealth comes in as they've explained.
But let me know what you think in the comments below.
We'll keep the conversation going.
To me, reading through this, it felt so similar to what happened in the U.S., the difference being the centrist banker won in France.
The populace didn't.
In the U.S., the centrist bankster, Hillary Clinton, a bit hyperbolic, but I think you understand what I'm saying when I say that, she didn't win, and the populace did win.
Maybe we would have experienced something similar, but let me know what you think.
We'll keep the conversation going.
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