However, it's a perhaps necessary one.
I've only had contact with about 20 individuals from "ethnic minorities" in France, covering 3 different communities. So all the usual caveats about the plural of anecdote not being data apply.
The basic conclusion from talking to them was:
Policy is made by the majority for the majority.
If that policy happens to suit you, then life is good. However, if you should foolishly happen to be beaten solidly by the police for being brown, then the French system's ideological bias against recording the fact that you are brown leads them to conclude that you were beaten in a random incident of police brutality.
There then will be instituted a widespread campaign against "random incidents of police brutality" which predictably have little impact on systemic racism.
But as Colman says in another diary, is that a bug, or a feature?
And yes, I've used an inflammatory example, most of the issues about being a different colour simply amount to reduced opportunities in society, rather than danger to life and limb.
And no, the British system has not eliminated racism, but comparative anecdotes suggest that while I tend to say that the situation for brown people in Britain has shifted a long, long way (for the good) in my lifetime, the French experience appears not to be so positive and this is part of the reason why...
Some of you, must remember the "Paris is on fire" titles, about how media turned the economic problem of the french banlieue in arabs vs white communities ? And how many at E.T. pointed out that it wasn't the point !
Bugs there are, everywhere, and as linca's said, we are not even sure of what's left of the "République" in four years...!
Colors are less of a problem here then elsewhere... If you integrate ! (and of course, nowadays, the richer you are the less it's a problem).
On a less "provacative" fashion :
Between Durkheim,Weber and Habermas there is an understanding on integration of an individual by society and integration by individuals of society ... Meaning the given society will be shifted by the sheer number of individuals that project it as a goal while the lone individual will have to follow society's law.
With the ending of the great 19th century models (capitalism, communism), the integration by individuals of society is failing a bit... While we still apply the integration by the society! Europe, sustainability, new economics, etc... Might be part of that society integrated by individual... But it's a long process!
In the meantime there are frictions between groups, some importing their culture in a "go west" fashion (six shooter and al), others believing they don't do any harm by staying as they were, in another place and another time, withholding the integration of the society, and those that believe that culture is made by all those difference but as a "whole" and not like a patchwork of values...
In fact we miss the "strange attractor" for our everyday "chaos" :-) "What can I do, What can I write, Against the fall of Night". A.E. Housman
Colors are less of a problem here then elsewhere... If you integrate !
is just not the experience of people I have known.
And the great glory of the French system is that there is no state collection of data, so we cannot know the truth. Although all the privately collected data suggests that there are significant problems in France.
And I have written long posts on the absurdity of classifying the banlieu problems as being about race, so I'm not just parroting Murdochia, as much as you might like to insinuate...
I'm not romanticising the Britain I grew up in as a brown person, there was a lot of prejudice and it is not magically subsiding, just slowly moving. But all the small pieces of evidence that exist about France show slower movement. And it's remarkably convenient for both the white majority and the state of France to proclaim ideological reasons for not collecting statistics on the experience of ethnic minorities and at the same time classify narrative descriptions of problems for ethnic minorities as "mere anecdotes and propaganda."
I don't judge Britain on this problem. I'v been there often in old times, was born and raised in Bengal, seeing districts in flame when I was flying my kite on the roof top terraces (as all kids there)... I reached France late and for me it was a"strange" country, I had to discover to live in!
That's why I would maybe like that people get through the surface of the "I know some examples" to practice a bit the society. I agree that it's far from perfect, I agree also that even the french medias play the same Murdoch's game then elsewhere...
Still, I work on cities and "new" (or old) districts, I build social housing and sometimes rehabilitate old ones with the people still inside for the duration o the works. I work with sociologists, anthropologists, and all the full lot of counseling structures we have... And I'm not romanticising either between knifes, guns, and changing old people's landmarks, and the drastic policy of pushing the poor further again, etc.
White majority isn't anymore a given in "metropolis", it still is true in the countryside ! Racism here can be worse from a town to the other next door, then between people! Even the "suburbia's" gangs have no real ethnicity, but a mixed population...
I had once a student who had to stop his studies because he was severely burned to the face by a molotov cocktail thrown at his car, because he was from Syria (there was no riot, pure gratuitous act)... But I also have other stories.. From both sides, hundred of them!
I agree about what you say about racism as a whole, but I don't link it to community vs collectivity... You'll find that cancer everywhere alas, but I don't believe that by making categories or communities you'll achieve a better world ! "What can I do, What can I write, Against the fall of Night". A.E. Housman
My reply wasn't meant to be felt as such :-) "What can I do, What can I write, Against the fall of Night". A.E. Housman
Racism in employment is being fought against.
The reduced opportunities - I don't necessarily have that many data points to base myself on, either, although Jerome had a few graphs during the riots about it - often originate in a social discrimination - based on where you live, and how much your parents know the system, you will or won't get a proper education. Right now, as all recent immigrants have almost always been, the people from "ethnic minorities" form a rather sizeable share of those being discriminated against ; indeed geographical discrimination - your address points to a lousy suburb so you won't be invited - is the strongest one. This discrimination is often misinterpreted as an ethnic discrimination.
Both in my engineering school, and in all my places of employment, there were many people from "ethnic minorities". But most had not actually grown up in France, they came from the privileged parts of Morocco, Tunisia, Ivory Coast, etc... Those that had come from ethnic minorities in France were much rarer. Un roi sans divertissement est un homme plein de misères
