[11877] in Public-Access_Computer_Systems_Forum
FYI France: new Resource List, on "The Front National"
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jack Kessler)
Mon Dec 15 20:24:27 1997
Date: Mon, 15 Dec 1997 19:22:14 -0600
From: Jack Kessler <kessler@well.com>
To: PACS-L@LISTSERV.UH.EDU
Reply-To: Public-Access Computer Systems Forum <PACS-L@LISTSERV.UH.EDU>
----------------------------Original message----------------------------
Announcing: a new FYI France Resource List, on "The Front National", at
http://www.fyifrance.com/fnind.htm
-- a selective and partially - annotated Bibliography / Resource List,
hopefully of use to anyone interested in the Front National, French
politics, France, political extremism, and perhaps even the organization
of any information in a "digital" age.
>From the Main Index page you can go to the following lists, each of which
contains as many attractive and interesting images -- and live links -- as
can be provided in the space and time available:
* Web/W3 Resources of or about the Front National
* Books of or about the Front National
* Printed Periodicals of or about the Front National
Suggestions from any source -- Front National _pro_-ponents as well as
opponents and others -- as to materials which might be added to these
files will be very welcome via email to kessler@well.sf.ca.us
Comment: n.b. In case anyone would like to know which side _I_ am on:
"La culte des belles lettres est en de'cadence et me^me il se meurt dans
les villes de Gaule. Aussi tandis que de bonnes et mauvaises actions
s'accomplissaient, que la barbarie des peuples se de'chai^nait, que les
violences des rois redoublaient..."
-- Gregory of Tours, describing France in c.594 A.D.
"Mundus senescit..."
-- apocryphal (Gregory again?)
"The world is going to hell: children no longer obey their parents, and
everyone is writing a book..."
-- attributed to Cicero
"The sky is falling..."
-- Chicken Little
-- any of which could apply to my personal opinion of the views of either
the FN or its more virulent detractors, I suppose -- in my own case they
are what I think of the FN's supposed "positions", which I regard as being
merely incidental to their overall political aim of power gratia power.
The necessity of expressing this personal opinion, in a "professional"
exercise such as this Resource List, is of greater interest than the
opinion itself though, I believe.
The presentation of the FN's views online could be seen as helping either
the FN or their opponents: their opponents, in that increased publicity
for what appear to be ridiculous ideas will assist those who seek to
ridicule them -- the FN itself, in that this site increases publicity for
FN propaganda. There will be those who will say that "objectivity" would
be a better posture to adopt -- that it would be best simply to offer what
the FN and its critics say and do, and let the facts and opinions "speak
for themselves".
I was trained, however, by a generation which had lost faith in an ideal
of "objectivity" derived from a hundred years -- some would say several
hundred -- of confidence in notions of "science" and "progress". People
questioned these notions, during the 1960's and 1950's, because such
unmitigated disasters had been produced by them during the 1940's and
1930's and really during the entire first half of this century. One of my
teachers, Harold Lasswell, used to urge students, including scientific
researchers and so - called professionals, to "clarify your observational
standpoint": he had lived at the center of the 1930's / 1940's maelstrom,
and he had learned that you are a participant, no matter how removed you
think you are or wish to be.
So in this "Front National" Resource List, rather than do what most
researchers and historians and librarians traditionally have done, I
declare my personal biases very frankly to be against the FN and to be in
favor of spreading their propaganda only so as to expose them to the
ridicule which their supposed ideas deserve -- and to consign their sheer
and cynical political opportunism and growing political power to the
historical garbage heap.
This is a naive American strategy, I know, one which ultimately relies
upon an idealistic faith in the wisdom of the majority and the functioning
of democracy: in places where democracy does not work so well and
majorities are not so wise, a better strategy for dealing with the FN
might be to "sweep them under the rug" and ignore them.
But now that the FN has polled 15% of the national vote in France -- and
they poll well over the majority in several regions and major cities of
that large and significant Western European country -- the FN no longer
can be ignored. The Nazis polled under 3% nationally in Germany in 1928.
The current strategy in France is to go to the other extreme and
"diabolize" the FN, giving them a following which their simplistic and
superficial ideas do not deserve: read their Bruno Megret's book online in
fulltext, cited and linked in the Resource List. My own publication of FN
ideas here may help them even further. My hope -- naive and American
though it might be, or be seen to be -- is that others, and they the
majority, hereby will see how ridiculous and dangerous those ideas and
this party are. If the result is the opposite, well, I would not want a
world ruled by oligarchies, no matter how much more enlightened than the
rest they might be.
The presentation of the FN in this Resource List is being made not to
victimize France or the French: their "Front National" is a social illness
which any of us could have -- most of us do, in one form or another,
although the infection is perhaps not so virulent elsewhere as it is in
France today. The purpose of the presentation is more to suggest one way
in which the "new media" can be used for social action -- the FN
themselves already do this, very well -- and to attack the idea that the
useful but also professional presentation of extremist viewpoints must or
even can be "objective".
There were entirely too many "objective" social scientists and other
professionals analyzing events in Germany and the Nazi party there, during
the 1930's...
--oOo--
Christmas is a good time to forget about things. But it comes right before
the New Year, which is a good time to re - dedicate energies and
enthusiasms. I hope that some -- much -- will go into whatever it takes in
France to deal with their "Front National" problem next year: the rest of
us will work on our own local variations as well, and perhaps 1998 will be
an even better year for everyone.
Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year.
--oOo--
FYI France (sm)(tm) e-journal ISSN 1071 - 5916
*
| FYI France (sm)(tm) is a monthly electronic journal,
| published since 1992 as a small - scale, personal,
| experiment, in the creation of large - scale
| "information overload", by Jack Kessler. Any material
/ \ written by me which appears in FYI France may be
----- copied and used by anyone for any good purpose, so
// \\ long as, a) they give me credit and show my e - mail
--------- address and, b) it isn't going to make them money: if
// \\ if it is going to make them money, they must get my
permission in advance, and share some of the money which
they get with me. Use of material written by others requires their
permission. FYI France archives are at http://infolib.berkeley.edu (search
fyirance), or http://www.cru.fr/listes/biblio-fr@cru.fr/ (BIBLIO-FR
econference archive), or at http://www.fyifrance.com , or at
http://listserv.uh.edu/archives/pacs-l.html . Suggestions, reactions,
criticisms, praise, and poison-pen letters all will be gratefully received
at kessler@well.sf.ca.us .
Copyright 1992- by Jack Kessler, all rights reserved.
