Warning : we might have to hunker down and weather some renewed French bashing following Marion Cotillard’s foolish comments over 9/11 and the moon landing.
Working in another field of academic research, I must say that I did not notice such a bias. It may have been there at the margin, but I suspect it was more than compensated for by the extra recruiting opportunities that ambitious French institutions had as a result of the U.S. becoming less hospitable and attractive to non-American researchers after 9/11. In the long term, any bias by American journals will only contribute to the decline of these journals as well as the U.S. as a relative research power.
The alternatives are Gripen or Rafale and, of the two, the Rafale is probably the best option as it is designed for carrier operations. What a fantastic saving is here and, in addition, what a tremendous nod in the direction of Europe. We will have truly compatible carriers and air operations at one fell swoop. Not just vast capital savings, but through life savings as well. However, the UK cannot bring itself to realise that the threat from Napoleon has disappeared, or perhaps it is simple pride. How humiliating!
I never thought this was possible BUT Democrats are acting just as bad as Republicans. (from an AP article)
“Having made sure that Iraq gets new schools, roads, bridges and dams that we deny America, now we are making sure that France gets the jobs that Americans used to have,” said Rep. Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill. “We are sending the jobs overseas, all because John McCain demanded it.”
McCain called such criticism off base.
“In all due respect to the Washington delegation, they vigorously defended the process before — which turned out to be corrupt — which would have cost the taxpayers more than $6 billion and ended up with people in federal prison,” he said. “I’m the one that fought against that … for years and brought down a corrupt contract.”
Keith Ashdown, with the watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense, said Boeing executives who broke the law were to blame for the demise of the tanker contract — not McCain.
An interesting article from Washington Post by Steven Pearlstein. Includes this silly rant:
“We should not be beholden to the French for parts and maintenance for the defense of our nation,” roared Sam Brownback, a Republican senator from Kansas, where Boeing, not coincidentally, has a big plant, “and we should not require our military personnel to learn to speak French to be able to operate our refueling tankers.”
CNN’s resident curmudgeon, Jack Cafferty, apparently found a ‘funny’ viewer comment to end his on-air nightly pontificating:
“Q: France’s foreign minister says “the magic is over” for the U.S. Is he right?”
“Mark, Berwyn PA March 13th, 2008 1:54 pm ET
No. And there is no ‘magic’ to what this country is all about, and what this country stands for, and what this country has proven since the dawn of the US. The US has faced difficult situations before, both economically and foreign-policy wise, and we survived and became better for the challenge. This time is no different. The French would just love to see us fall, but they should not hold their collective breathes. And by the way, who listens to the French anyway? Seriously?”
Well, apparently Congress and Boeing are interested in listening to Airbus. And a quip by the French Foreign Minister made the national news in the States today, so there’s another case of ‘somebody’ listening to the French.
From where I sit ‘down here’, French-bashing is FAR from over.
Gobsmacking in the extreme. Agree — bigotry ain’t exclusive to Republicans no more.
I dare say that if at all possible, those French-bashing Democrats should realise that most French might be closer to them in political ideology, i.e., liberal, than to Republicans.
Anyway, I would put all these French bashings to pervading culture of parochialism in America.
“””By the way, just wanted to tell you people, we missed — the International Olympic Committee missed a golden opportunity today. If they had picked France, if they had picked France instead of London to hold the Olympics, it would have been the one time we could look forward to where we didn’t worry about terrorism. They’d blow up Paris, and who cares? – John Gibson, July 6 2005″””
Any Frenchman being accused of anti-americanism should bring up this statement and demand to be shown a similar statement made by a French journalist wishing for terror attacks in the United States.
So what if the military personnel has to learn French?, i had to learn English, no big deal. It’s just a problem of national pride!, America needs to yield & will have to do more of it with the rise of other nations, especially China!. The US is like a child , having a temper tantrum over a deal that went sour or went to someone else for a change!. I do understand how the US feels but sometimes its way of overreacting can be silly. Thank god all Americans don’t react that way!!
[…] * In France, they’re having trouble translating a lot of Internet terms into French. In France the law is you have to use French words. For example, there are no French words for surfing the Web, there aren’t any French words for chat session, and there aren’t any French words for hacker. Of course, a lot of other words don’t translate to French either: military victory, deodorant.. ** It is so cold the French now have another reason to be in bed with the Iraqis. *** I’m watching the sports news and they had this psychologist on and he said that this strange behavior means that deep down, Mike (Tyson) is afraid to fight. I had no idea he was French, did you? 0 Votes […]
That guy looks like a miniature Rush Limbaugh (another anti-French scumbag) with a toupé.
As for this called piece of ‘journalism’. Well, fuck him.
We could remind him of the 12 French soldiers who died in Afghanistan. None of them with their hands up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalition_casualties_in_Afghanistan
Thanks to Miquelon.org for bringing us these sad events. Here’s the email I sent to Mr. Martin:
Dear Mr. Martin
it’s with great regret that I’ve read your column on the French engagement in Afghanistan. I’m saddened to see that you use your role of journalist to pass down, bigoted, racist and xenophobic view regarding the French. The “cheese-eating surrender monkey uniform” crosses the lines of acceptability and decency. Frenchmen and women are humans, not monkeys. I never thought I would one day have to explain this to anyone, even less to a journalist. Then again, perhaps you do not really believe in what you write. However, are you aware that you are participating in creating a background of hatred against an entire people -which is bad enough- based on no tangible facts?
Something in your piece also strikes me as absurd. You write “French troops will reluctantly step into the line of Taliban fire”. The implication being that somehow French soldiers are not courageous enough. Well, sir, would you happily step into any line of fire? There is not any sane person on this planet eager or even remotely pleased to be in the cross-sight of any gun, anywhere.
I’m not concerned whether you approve or not of French foreign policy. What matters to me is that you can intelligently make the difference between policies and people. If you are still having trouble understanding my point of view, just re-read your column replacing the word “French” by “Canadian”.
I hope you realize what the effect of your column can have on less informed people or those who have had no contact with the French. What you are doing is called disinformation. I am calling you, for the sake of journalism and the character of my country men and women, to refrain from engaging again in this deplorable activity. If you can acknowledge my remarks have any merit, then please write an article about what you just did and how it was wrong. You will come out of it as a man of greater thought and integrity.
I sincerely lament having to write to you under such unpleasant circumstances, and I would like to assure you that I’d rather not be, in the first place, in the violent situation of my country and countrymen being consistently insulted with such vehemence. I refer, of course, to your column on French military assistance in Afghanistan, in which, through the cheap and tiresome phrase “cheese-eating surrender monkey” catchphrase you dismiss an entire nation as a band of grotesque, sub-human cowards.
I assume, sir, that as an educated man you grasp the gravity of such a discourse. Anyone who would write words even remotely as hateful about possibly any other ethnic group, say, African-Americans, Jews, or Mexicans, in a serious newspaper would be fired in no time and strongly attacked by anti-defamation lobbies.
In the first place, I assume you either ignore or dismiss military procedures. Soldiers don’t stand around “lollygagging around Kabul — shopping for carpets along Chicken Street, munching fresh lamb kebabs” because they don’t feel like fighting. Surely you are aware that not attacking when ordered to would have implications as severe as a court martial and the ensuing consequences. Just as soldiers do not attack unless ordered to, if ordered to attack, they don’t stay back. Any alleged “cowardice” does not enter the equation.
Secondly, sir, I am no coward, and neither are most of my countrymen. If you ever feel curious or have some spare time, read up on French history; it’s a fantastic read, and you’ll feel rewarded. I can guarantee it. When reading, you shall have a taste of everything: Of heroic acts, of crushing victories, and also of humiliating defeats and moments of shame. A country as old as France has gone through everything you can imagine, from being a small, fragmented feudal kingdom to an empire to a nation-state. And French history has got plenty of great military victories to spare, if that would quench your curiosity. The French soldiers in Afghanistan are all well-trained and brave professional military personnel. I hope you are aware of that.
And I can assure you, Mr. Martin, that when ordered to do so, they will not “reluctantly” step into the line of fire.
Although my letter may be read as somewhat hostile, as is understandable (as any proud Canadian would react, if they were called cowards, monkeys, and a plethora of dismissing insults) I wouldn’t like to end on a bitter note. I hope, sir, that you shall forego your mistake, correct it, and you will have proven yourself a wiser and better man.
You’re right it’s really disappointing that even supposedly reasonable people like Jon Stewart would resort to hurtful anti-French slurs like this.
It really shows how widespread and ingrained anti-French bigotry has become in America’s psyche.
ps: M. Stewart. It was the Chinese who put out the flame and stopped everything.
http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSHKG307383
““The Chinese security guards — who in Paris nervously turned the flame off several times on Monday and retreated with the torch to a bus when protesters advanced”
[…] Les français morts sous les bombes en 1944 : une grosse blague pour l’industrie du jeuwww.miquelon.org/2008/04/15/what-do-you-call-67-000-dead-fre… par miquelon il y a quelques secondes […]
The ultimate sacrifice of tens of thousands of French civilians during the anglo/american bombings in 1944 is rarely, very rarely, acknowledged by our angl_saxon friends.
This video is so sad, so pathetic and mean sprited that I can only assume that it was done in a knowledge vaccume. The real shame is that Americans never want to know of the suffering on non-British European allies, unless they have a strong lobby in the US.
Commenting the visit of a Synagogue by Pope Benedict XVI (Joseph Ratzinger), Stewart joked about not knowing if the “Jews surrendered” – A very odd joke…
The Simpsons writers have been working really hard to portray the French as cowards and other ethnic slurs.
Lenny:’I’m shaking like a French soldier’
Marge to Homer :’ You look as dirty as a Frenchman’
Episode where Lisa is Joan of Arc and is leading the French army against the English. During a battle scene, you can see French soldiers shaking looking really scared against the brave English.
In Season 1 where Bart comes back from France: ‘well to make a long story short, I only met 1 nice Frenchman’.
Season 8. Hank Scorpio,’ Hey Homer, which is your least favorite country ? France or Italy ?’
Homer: ‘France’
Hank Scorpio:’ ah ah, nobody ever says Italy’.
I won’t even talk about the cheese-eating surrender monkey thing and I’m sure I’m missing a lot of anti-French material from the Simpsons.
“Episode where Lisa is Joan of Arc and is leading the French army against the English. During a battle scene, you can see French soldiers shaking looking really scared against the brave English.”
Heh. Yeah, it must have taken a lot of cowardice to kick their arses in nearly every single battle since Joan of Ark.
That’s the big problem — the British have always been big-time bigots (it’s a part of their identity, to look down on other peoples) and the Americans are sucking up to them, imitating them, in particular in the Anglo/French rivalry. Pathetic, considering that the Brits look down on the Americans, too…
Thanx for the updates, miquelon.
That’s funny how many times France or the French are being mentioned because according to French-bashers, they actually never hear anyone ever talk about the French ever.
Once, I confronted the pathological anti-Frenh xenophobes at no pasaran and they told me that americans never talk about the French.
The irony that they had been doing just that every single day on their hate site of theirs for the past few years was apparently lost on them.
New Rule: Conservatives have to stop rolling their eyes every time they hear the word, “France.” Like just calling something “French” is the ultimate argument winner. As if to say, “What can you say about a country that was too stupid to get on board with our wonderfully-conceived and brilliantly-executed war in Iraq?”
And, yet, an American politician could not survive if he uttered the simple, true statement, “France has a better health care system than we do, and we should steal it.” Because here, simply dismissing an idea as French passes for an argument. “John Kerry? Couldn’t vote for him; he looked French.” Yeah, as opposed to the other guy who just looked stupid.
Now, last week, France had an election, and people over there approach an election differently. They vote. Eighty-five percent of them turned out. You couldn’t get 85% of Americans to get off the couch if there was an election between “Tits” and “Bigger Tits,” and they were handing out free samples!
Now, maybe the high turnout has something to do with the fact that the French candidates are never asked where they stand on evolution, prayer in school, abortion, stem cell research or gay marriage. And if the candidate knows about a character in a book other than Jesus, it’s not a drawback.
The electorate doesn’t vote for the guy they want to have a croissant with; nor do they care about private lives. In the current race, Ségolène Royal has four kids, but she never got married. And she’s a Socialist. In America, if a Democrat even thinks you’re calling him “liberal,” he grabs an orange vest and a rifle and heads into the woods to kill something!
Madame Royal’s opponent is married, but they live apart and lead separate lives. And the people are okay with that for the same reason they’re okay with nude beaches; because they’re not a nation of six-year-olds who scream and giggle if they see pee-pee parts!
They have weird ideas about privacy. They think it should be private. In France, even the mistresses have mistresses. To not have a lady on the side says to the voters, “I’m no good at multi-tasking.”
Now, like any country, France has its faults, like all that ridiculous accordion music. But, their health care is the best in the industrialized world. As is their poverty rate. And they’re completely independent of Mid East oil. And they’re the greenest country. And they’re not fat. And they have public intellectuals in France. We have Dr. Phil!
They invented sex during the day, lingerie and the tongue. Can’t we admit we could learn something from them?
So, from now on, all you high-ranking Bush Administration officials, because the French are righter than you on most things, when France comes up in conversation, you are not allowed to roll your eyes. The only time you get to do that is when your hooker from Ms. Julia is blowing you.
There seems to have been a heated debate at the URL below over WW II casualties in France and a lot of heated exchanges over numbers etc.
FRANCE: French civilians killed by Allied bombings in World War II
The total number of injured people was more than 100,000. The total number of houses completely destroyed by the bombings was of 432,000, the number of partly destroyed houses of 890,000.
The bombings destroyed 100 % of the city of Saint-Nazaire, 96 % of Tilly-la-Campagne (Calvados), 88 % of Villers-Bocage (Calvados), 82 % of Le Havre (Seine-Maritime), 77 % of Saint-Lô (Manche), 76 % of Falaise (Calvados), 75 % of Lisieux (Calvados), 75 % of Caen (Calvados), etc.
Sources: Quand les Alliés bombardaient la France, Perrin, Paris 1997.
Ref: http://wais.stanford.edu/ztopics/week020105/france_050201_civilianskilledinwwII.htm
[…] the last month we were graced with surrender jokes by CBS’s Craig Ferguson, Comedy Central’s Jon Stewart and “surrender monkey” slurs from a Jonah Goldberg Canadian Mini-Me known as Don […]
[…] In the last month we were graced with surrender jokes by CBS’s Craig Ferguson, Comedy Central’s Jon Stewart and “surrender monkey” slurs from a Jonah Goldberg Canadian Mini-Me known as Don Martin. […]
Couldn’t have put it better myself, Marc. I’ve been having the constant feeling that it’s time to emancipate ourselves from the all-too restrictive blogosphere and grow. How? I have no idea. Perhaps a post that would invite us to think about it and contribute with our own ideas? I think a constructive post at SF to discuss the matter would be nice, rather than the usual bantering and bickering (which is all good fun, but does not get us far).
These “surrender” jokes are the ones I cope with the least. The sad thing is, in France, until not long ago (and still, largely, nowadays) we had no idea of the image these peoples had of us; we still thought they had the funny, sympathetic “beret, baguette, striped t-shirt” stereotype rather than these hateful delusions…
Indeed, it’s time to rethink our strategies. SuperFrenchie and this website have done a lot over the last four-five years to keep the expat community informed, active. We met with some success, the Subway Affaire for instance or the Educating Jay Project, but also a lot of frustration. Granted we’re both sounding a little jaded, angry and frustrated, but I think it’s time we look at new strategies with limited time and limited methods.
1) Postcard campaign. We would have to design a series of poscards, something strong. Each French Bashing episode and I’d send out a standard message with the return addresses of those who want to have a card sent in their name.
2) Writing to the WGA – The Writers Guild of America is the head union for all these comedy writers, might be worth writing an informative article on the subject. Would have to be very hard-hitting.
3) A DVD campaign. Most of these writers and comedians are not readers – I bet Jay never read those books we gave him – but a DVD would get a better chance. Do we produce something on the cheap, YouTube style, or do we select a number of relevant movies about WW II?
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