Tuesday, November 08, 2005

Two more thoughts about riots

Modern rioting appears to be a gendered phenomena (if I recall my early modern history right, women participated in the bread and grain riots). It does make me wonder, where are the sisters of the rioters? They're living the same lives, suffering from the same racism, and poverty, while being paid less, and doing more unpaid work (although I think also more likely to have paid employment). Is it the exhaustion of the double shift? Is it the responsibilities women have? Or is not safe for women to go out, even to burn cars?

David Farrar imagined the reaction would have been different if the riots happened in America, I thought I'd oblige by comparing my reaction to the riots in Paris to some hypothetical riots in America.

I imagine there would be several dozen commentators all saying that this shows how deeply flawed, repressive and racist the US is.
The riots show how deeply flawed, repressive and racist France is.

Have I missed anything? Oh yes, don't forget how it would all be Bush's fault again.
I wouldn't think the riots were Bush's fault (anymore than I think they're Chirac's fault). Capitalism isn't individual leaders 'fault'. But I am convinced that Bush would act like a complete fuckwit, and make things worse for all involved, probably in some kind of incompetent way.

No comments:

Post a Comment