French protests over fuel prices etc.

[clv101]

It's worth talking a step back, remember why we're here, why PowerSwitch exists. Remember Peak Oil? Remember Limits to Growth, remember collapse?

We all know our globalised, post-industrial society is primed for collapse. I expect many of us read Heinberg's Powerdown more than a decade ago. We're flirting with 'last man standing' and 'waiting for the magic elixir'. The exact nature/timing of our collapse is both unknown and fairly unimportant, 'shocks' like Arab Spring, Trump, Brexit, Yellow Vests etc are just details, just noise and there's little to be gained by over analysing the minute by minute situation.

100 years from now, global civilisation is be totally unrecognisable from today.

[Little John]

Yes and no to that CLV.

Yes, these and other associated events are the early and relatively insignificant signs of collapse. However, I would argue that what happens over the next decade or two will dictate the overall shape of how we humans organize ourselves over the next several decades deep into the Long Emergency to come. In other words, like a snowball rolling down a hill, whilst nothing can stop it reaching the bottom of the hill, its eventual size, shape and final specific destination is determined by seemingly imperceptible nudges at the start of its journey.

What happens now does matter.

[kenneal - lagger]

..... What happens now does matter.

"The flap of that butterfly's wing in the Great South American river basin..." again.

[Lord Beria3]

https://paularbair.wordpress.com/

Superb essay on the protests...

[adam2]

Violent protests continue for a fifth week in France, though numbers appear less than previously.

It seems to be giving voice to general dissatisfaction rather than being over any specific problem.

[kenneal - lagger]

If it had been election time Le Pen might be smiling now!

[adam2]

Protests have continued today, but on a much smaller scale than previously.
Numbers have been estimated as under one thousand, compared to many thousands in previous weeks.

[adam2]

The now traditional Saturday protests are underway in Paris and other French cities.
One current cause of dissatisfaction is reported to be fines for speeding, which the protestors describe as a "tax on the poor"

Having achieved lower fuel prices by rioting, I suppose that the right to drive faster is a logical next step.

News of todays protests has been somewhat eclipsed by reports of a large explosion in Paris, this is believed to be an accident and NOT related to the protests.

[raspberry-blower]

Diana Johnstone: French Democracy Dead or Alive?

French Democracy Dead or Alive? Or perhaps one should say, buried or revived? Because for the mass of ordinary people, far from the political, financial, media centers of power in Paris, democracy is already moribund, and their movement is an effort to save it. Ever since Margaret Thatcher decreed that “there is no alternative�, Western economic policy is made by technocrats for the benefit of financial markets, claiming that such benefits will trickle down to the populace. The trickle has largely dried up, and people are tired of having their needs and wishes totally ignored by an elite who “know best�.

President Emmanuel Macron’s New Year’s Eve address to the nation made it perfectly clear that after one unconvincing stab at throwing a few crumbs to the Gilets Jaunes (Yellow Vests) protest movement, he has determined to get tough

A good essay on the revolt against Neoliberal policies that have been ruthlessly pursued by France and the EU in general

[adam2]

After a couple of weeks of, protests in France have resumed.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-47101435

[raspberry-blower]

An ex-pat's view on the on going protests:

David Studdert: Gilet Jaune and France Profonde

[raspberry-blower]

Great article from Ilargi at TAE that actually covers more than one thread but has most resonance here.

In France, the main complaint that the Yellow Vests movement has now taken into its 13th consecutive weekend is crystal clear: people can’t pay their bills anymore. In the UK, austerity has demolished wages, social care, the NHS and much else. In the US, many millions of Americans can’t afford a $400 emergency payment, have ever scarcer access to healthcare and live from paycheck to paycheck.

Rinse and repeat for every western nation. The storylines vary somewhat, but they all tell the same tale, they could be, they are, chapters in the same book. And it makes one think if people are not connecting them.

On the Green New Deal:

And sure, her Green New Deal/Dream can easily be dismissed as crazy, but pray tell what the difference is between how the Green New Deal might be financed, and how the Federal Reserve has financed its QE schemes. Perhaps the big difference is who profits; in one instance, the banks, in the other, society at large.

on MSM reporting:

If people already find the very large and very obvious political changes too much to comprehend, here’s some awkward news for you, and it’s not just that the media vs social media fight must inevitably lead to an ever stronger tsunami of ‘news’ overkill. Though that’s a big one: the media once upon a time reported the news, an outdated business model; today they don’t report the news, they manufacture it.

Conclusion:

And I’m also pretty sure that we’re a lot less smart than we tell ourselves we are considering we kill off that without which we have zero chance of survival, and considering we let people starve in the richest human society the world has ever seen (make that: will ever see), but we still have trouble seeing our own noses, let alone following them.

We’re such blind masters of pretence that we hardly ever noticed the Great Discontent entering our nations, our communities and our homes. What then are the odds we will perceive the arrival of the Great Unraveling?

The Great Unravelling has only just got going

TAE: The Great Discontent

[adam2]

Ongoing.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-47596476

There does not seem to any specific grievance, just a general dissatisfaction with life in general.

[BritDownUnder]

The guy in the first photo of the BBC article looks a bit like Father Jack.

I had the chance to work with a Frenchman on a recent grid testing project in Asia and I asked him about the Yellow vest movement. He actually now lives in Bulgaria to avoid high taxes on the wages paid gross to him by his Swiss based employer.

As he was a Breton from Nantes he was quite friendly and not at all arrogant and quite interested in my Welsh ancestry. He could probably not articulate himself very well in English but said that he thought it was due to the people having to 'remind' the politicians that they should not just think about the people only at election time, but while they are enjoying the expenses paid life in the national assembly, all other times as well. this seemed fair enough to me. He didn't mention paying the bills as being a cause of it all.

[fuzzy]

An army of Father Jacks would kick ars

Basic maths for us plebs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5QwKEw ... e=youtu.be