I wasn’t paying attention. Usually, I read the news about the US because what happens there has repercussions everywhere – and Trump is such a doofus. He is fixated on a wall between the US and its mortal enemy, Mexico, which is sending in thousands of terrorists to kill and maim Americans, or at least get them hooked on drugs. Personally, I don’t think Americans need any help doing that to themselves. But Trump, that reptilian-brained snake-oil salesman, has a fast-dwindling group of zombie supporters to whom he is beholden – and probably his campaign was financed by people who have already invested heavily in a wall and want their money back. Five billion $$$ to people who helped elect a prehistoric ape-man to presidency – so you see why I don’t pay attention to news in France.
So imagine my consternation when I spoke to a friend who said that antisemitism was on the rise in France. I live in a town in France that is largely made up of immigrants. I hadn’t noticed anything around town, and worried, I asked if she felt threatened here. But my friend said no, she lived and worked here, and everything was fine. It was Paris! The antisemitism was coming from French people – not immigrants.
“The Arabs and the Jews get along fine – we always have. It’s the French people; the ones who vote LePen.” She shook her head. “The problem is not the Arabs,” she insisted. “And the ones doing the damage are not young people, they not terrorists. They are the far right, and they are feeling enpowered again.” She lives and works in my town, and we are, like I said, unusual in that we have a large Muslim population. But we are also a largely peaceful town, with no gilets jaunes (yellow jackets), no riots, and a fairly steady rate of 3% less crime than most cities of its size (40,000 people).
What I’ve discovered it that in Europe on the whole, antisemitism is rising, and what accompanies the writing on the walls (so far, it’s mostly defacing posters of Simone Viel and bagal boutiques) are swasticas – which are the sign of skinheads, nazis, and Trump supporters everywhere. Of course, some people blame the immigrants – but it’s like the gay priests in the Vatican – the more they howl that the gays are evil, the gayer they are. So the more people complain about immigrants, the more cans of paint and swastica signs they have hidden in their cellars.
I read articles linking the rise of the far right to acts of racism in the US – so why aren’t people linking acts of antisemitism to the far right here in Europe? The press has been unusually coy about it – but I think it’s something we all better talk about before the Europeans vote for their parliament. I do not want to give any voice to these haters. It would be a good time talk about what is happening, instead of whispering. Scrape off the dirt these people are hiding under and expose them for what they are: the far right, (or the far left – the two extremes are similar), flsuh them out, pull their teeth, castrate them, show them for what they are: narrow-minded bullies who want an all white, all “Christian”, all zombie apocalypse.
Not me – I don’t care for the apocalypse. I want everyone to just get along – like in my little town. So, I’m going to call it out when I see it or hear about it. We can only beat this disease if we all work together.