The French are Revolting !

mramra

From the BBC:

"Huge crowds have taken to the streets in France to protest over the handling of the economic crisis, causing disruption to rail and air services.
The head of France's biggest union said a million workers had rallied to demand action to protect jobs and wages.
But despite the show of public support, the strike appeared to be falling short of the paralysis forecast by unions.
Regional trains and those in and around Paris were hit, and a third of flights from Orly airport were cancelled.
Forty per cent of regional services were running, train operator SNCF said, and 60% of high-speed TGV services. Three-quarters of metro trains were running in Paris.
Paris's second airport was heavily hit by the strike, but flights out of the larger Charles de Gaulle hub were experiencing only short delays, AFP news agency said.

Schools, banks, hospitals, post offices and courts were also hit as workers stayed at home. Officials said just over a third of teachers and a quarter of postal and power company workers were on strike.
Overall, some 23% of the country's public sector workers are thought to have joined the action, which was called by eight major French unions.
Bernard Thibault, head of the CGT union, told AFP more than a million workers had taken part in the strike, making it impossible for French President Nicolas Sarkozy to ignore their concerns.
In Paris, police said some 65,000 protesters had joined a march from the Place de la Bastille towards the centre of the city.
Earlier, some 25,000 to 30,000 people rallied in the city of Lyon, according to organisers and police.


In Marseille, organisers and the authorities disagreed, with the former putting the number of demonstrators at 300,000 but the police estimating 20,000 had taken part. The protests are against the worsening economic climate in France and at what people believe to be the government's poor handling of the crisis."



Meanwhile in other news:
- One man in the UK shook his fist and said "Damn you Gordon Brown".
- pandemonia refuses to buy a house plunging the UK economy further into despair

leftieM

You have to admire their audacity.

mramra

It's quite incredible how two Western populations of similar size separated by a few miles of water can have such different outlooks on life. Generally I don't approve of the French tendency to strike/protest etc. for the slightest reason, but there is a part of me that wishes we would stand up for ourselves a bit more vociferously sometimes.

sarastark86

even if we did protest, nobody would believe we meant it. remember all the marches against the iraq war? and then what happened. the only time our opinions 'count' is when there's an election, the rest of the time the govt just does whatever it wants.

mardatha

The french govt know what happens in a revolution...and if you've had one then you can have another.
I feel a bit revolting meself really.

SailorSam

I thought when i saw your thread they had been eating to much garlic

Pobby

mramra wrote: »

It's quite incredible how two Western populations of similar size separated by a few miles of water can have such different outlooks on life. Generally I don't approve of the French tendency to strike/protest etc. for the slightest reason, but there is a part of me that wishes we would stand up for ourselves a bit more vociferously sometimes.

There`s the difference. I can remember some pretty big demos over the years. I was on a lot of them lol! Not saying they did that much good but at least............My oh my, if the folks here were about to protest they would show endless repeats of Big Brother to make sure the populace was glued to there tellies.

Old_Slaphead

mramra wrote: »

It's quite incredible how two Western populations of similar size separated by a few miles of water can have such different outlooks on life. Generally I don't approve of the French tendency to strike/protest etc. for the slightest reason, but there is a part of me that wishes we would stand up for ourselves a bit more vociferously sometimes.

It's predominantly French public sector and utility workers who are protesting - what on earth have similar sector workers in the UK got to protest about ?????

torontoboy45

mramra wrote: »

It's quite incredible how two Western populations of similar size separated by a few miles of water can have such different outlooks on life. Generally I don't approve of the French tendency to strike/protest etc. for the slightest reason, but there is a part of me that wishes we would stand up for ourselves a bit more vociferously sometimes.

from what I can gather the french don't - by and large - down tools for the slightest reason. the grievance has to be genuine and widely felt before they take mass action (e.g. the proposed privatisation of french gas or the part removal of min. wage structure).
it's a tradition in the UK to dislike 'les frogs' but I admire their refusal to defer to authority when they believe their masters have lost touch with common sentiment.
this approach doesn't make the country ungovernable -they accept, for example , the autoroute tolls and the big fines for speeding and punitive inheritance laws.
the brits might have reversed some ludicrous g'ment policies since the war by following their example. maybe we're just a little too servile.

stevetodd

torontoboy45 wrote: »

from what I can gather the french don't - by and large - down tools for the slightest reason. the grievance has to be genuine and widely felt before they take mass action (e.g. the proposed privatisation of french gas or the part removal of min. wage structure).
it's a tradition in the UK to dislike 'les frogs' but I admire their refusal to defer to authority when they believe their masters have lost touch with common sentiment.
this approach doesn't make the country ungovernable -they accept, for example , the autoroute tolls and the big fines for speeding and punitive inheritance laws.
the brits might have reversed some ludicrous g'ment policies since the war by following their example. maybe we're just a little too servile.

I think they should stick to blowing up greenpeace ships, they seem quite good at that, but maybe they should practice getting away with it a bit more though

JayScottGreenspan

The problem: GDP's falling, economy not productive enough.
The solution: Take the day off and have a nice protest.

Class. :laugh: