Way of life

J. E. Dyer, getting to the nub of  the riots in France:

In the town of Cholet, in western France near Nantes, members of the fire brigade were caught on video turning their backs on local officials and silently walking out on them — another aspect of the same deepening division between government authorities and the working-class backbone of France. In Cholet, reporting indicated the firefighters were protesting force cuts that bite especially hard when extraordinary requirements arise, such as dealing with mass protests.  Like other Frenchmen and women, the fire brigades are having to live the distorted priorities that see France cutting the main public services governments are expected to provide, while raising taxes in fanciful efforts to address “climate change.”

It's one anecdote, but it's where we could be headed. The people running France these days look at the world the same way Jacob Frey and Tim Walz do. Back to Dyer:

This isn’t 1968.  This is no ordinary development.  Reportedly, 84% of French people in the latest poll support the protests, and their top concerns are the burdensome “climate” regulations, which are undermining every aspect of their economic lives, and the uncontrollable social impacts of mass migration into their country.  As Alain said to Rebel media in the video, they’ve simply had enough.

Notably, their country is seen as a refuge for others.  But for the French, there is no refuge from policies that are destroying their way of life – because the EU idea is designed to deny them any such shelter.  That is its very purpose.

In fact, the political idea to which the UN migration compact bears the most resemblance is the EU’s.  Both are about a systematic undoing of borders and denial of local discretion over boundaries and standards.

Climate change regulations and taxes are a manifestation of a larger impulse -- the desire to control others. And it's awfully easy to be dismissive of someone else's way of life. I saw this sentiment on social media just yesterday -- I'll not name the individual in question, but suffice it to say it's the voice of an academic I know:

One enduring mystery is why Trump's supporters don't view him as a man of questionable character. Maybe they do. A friend of mine, now retired in Waco, TX, sent me an interview with some Trump supporters in Central TX. One of them said, "I'd like to support decency. But we can't afford decency when our way of life is under threat." And who told them their way of life is under siege? Fox of course. It's on all day.

So can we assume the Trump supporters of central Texas, and the firefighters of Cholet, France, do not know their own minds? Should we? Those who would be minders assume as much.