fraunch riots
13 Nov 2005There’s an interesting discussion over at Reason that tackles the elephant in the room (or is it?) as to the nature of the riots in Paris.
Basically, I agree with Julian’s take. Look, that the rioters are Muslim is important, but no more than that they are also young, male, and unemployed. This is an issue of class, economics and culture within the sphere of France’s demographics. The amount of ignorance in handling this in both the press (slightly off-topic case in point) and the blogosphere is appalling. So, let’s go over the basics: Not all Muslims are Jihadis. Not all Muslims are Arabs. Not all Arabs are Muslims. Not all the French rioters are Muslim. Not all the French rioters are Arab.
The riots in France are not an extension of any “islamo-fascist” enemy terr’ist plot.
The riots in France are also not not an extension of some “islamo-fascist” enemy terr’ist plot.
As a cause of the riots, on a scale of 0 to 1, where 0 is ‘tree falling in the forest when no one is there to hear it’, and 1 is ‘billiard ball hitting billiard ball’, ‘“islamo-fascist” enemy terr’ist plot’ is not 0 and not 1. It seems to me that it’s probably close to 0. English isn’t good at representing this type of causative ambiguity, unfortunately.