Monday, April 28, 2008
Saturday, April 26, 2008
May'68
from: L'Actualité, May15, 2008.
by Michel Vastel
My May'68!
May 68 was the longest month in the history of France, and one in which my generation lived through a Revolution not as quiet as that of Quebec.
I was past the age of sit-ins on the steps of University buildings. I was working in the land of ordinary folks in a corner of France more akin to a Zola novel than a Léo Ferré song. I was a young journalist in the agglomeration of Lille-Roubaix-Tourcoing when the strikes of May 68 happened.
Strikes? We were not used to seeing that in the textile industries. The plants were generally owned as family businesses. To give some idea of the prevalent atmosphere: at the beginning of each year, the workers male and female, would parade in front of the patron, and would greet him on a first-name basis: «monsieur Paul» or «monsieur Roger». And the owner would also know the names of his eldest employees.
This was not the situation in the coal mines of the Somme or Pas-de-Calais, very close, where the unions - usually communist - fueled an ongoing climate of conflict. These unions had unresolved issues with public authority: five years earlier, as the miners were on strike, the President of the Republic had ordered an end to the strike, no questions asked! He even called in the army, and there were a few deaths.
But there were a lot of deaths in those days. When the workers, in their blue overalls, would hit the streets, they were faced with the CRS - special police forces known as Republican Security Companies -, true elite forces ready to use clubs, tear-gas, and the occasional shot from a gun. These paramilitary forces were present at all demonstrations, and since the beginning of the 1960s, there were quite a few of those in France.
Naval works, mines and the steel industry were particularly affected by the coming into being of the European Community for Coal and Steel. Strikes would erupt everywhere but never with any results. And we experienced the first attacks from independence movements - first of all, Britanny, then Corsica. In the Universities, students were organizing in the footsteps of leaders such as Alain Krivine, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, Alain Geismar and..., Jean-Paul Sartre who had refused the Nobel prize for literature for 1964.
In short then, in France, one had the impression that things were coming apart on many fronts while in Quebec, in July 1967, General de Gaulle was making a triumphant entry, projecting an image of France that was no longer accurate.
Agitation in the Colleges and at the University of Nanterre, the occupation of the Sorbonne, in Paris, the nights of barricades and overturned cars? Television - black and white - was only in its infancy, and the images of Parisian agitation did not seem to have much impact on the rest of France.
This is why the movement was slow to start in the North. So long as it merely occupied the sons of bourgeois who attended university, only the Parisian newspapers were much concerned. «Youthful exuberance», seemed to be the judgement from afar. Certainly there were hecto-numbered wounded, and even two dead in Paris, but we had seen worse.
May was already half-over, and it is very progressively that students, and then farmers joined the strikes of the workers. It is the occupation of major industrial plants - in particular those of Renault - that started to paralyse France. In industrial sectors such as textile or clothing manufacturers, many owners enabled the closing of their plants to avoid breakage or to follow the general movement.
These closings and the ensuing occupations revealed to the world working conditions from Germinal. In the north wee discovered some plants which employed clandestine workers from Africa or the Maghreb. An empty building served as a dormitory, in which one also brought meals. These workers toiled six days per week, sometimes for 12 hours, and it was forbidden to leave the compound on the seventh.
So, that too, was France in 1968. By bringing to light everything that wasn't working well in those plants, one was also shaming the owners. And «monsieur Paul» or «monsieur Roger» would make a show of offering excuses, sometimes pretending not to know what was going on under their noses. Certain employers were even sincerely sorry! I remember the story of one boss coming back from a week-end spent at his sea-side house. He had brought back a bag of those delicious grey shrimp which one eats, with a beer, in the restaurants of Ostende, in Belgium. He handed over the bag to the workers who were manning the picket lines, and everyone shook hands!
So why were there strikes in may 1968 in what Jean-Pierre Raffarin later called «the basement of France», that province of the country which Parisians often deride? This had nothing to do with Trotsky or Mao, whose writings one consulted on the stairways of the Parisian university buildings. Among the little folks, there are no slogans such as «It is forbidden to forbid» or «Be realistic, ask for the impossible»! And even if there were many more rocks paving the roads of the North than on the boulevards of Paris, demonstrators were not pulling them out to throw at shop windows.
In the North of France, a region in decline which interested neither the public authorities nor investors, many were quite simply depressed. In the West, it is agitation among farmers which led to the closing of roads. Here and there outside of the capital, workers would go on strike for a few days without getting anything and would then return to work.
This had been going on for some ten years. France had lost the war in Algeria. Decolonization had reduced provisions of cotton to the point where entire blocks of the textile industry were in danger. General de Gaulle, brought to power by the army, in turn used the armed forces to contain the strikes. For this man of rigft-wing persuasion, demonstrations were not to be endured. While a huge demonstration organized by the Communist Party was paralysing Paris, the Prime minister George Pompidou, had armoured vehicles parade in the suburbs.
This is when General de Gaulle sought refuge in Germany, protected by his friend general Massu, to prepare what the Left would later call his «overthrow of power». For everything almost flipped over at that point. The workers were still in the streets although not altogether sure why. They were awaiting orders from their Union leaders which were not forthcoming. Over two days, May 28 and 29, France came close to Civil War. In all the cities, there were still stocked arms for civil defence, a hold-over from the wars of the beginning of the century. The arms and munitions were very real and , some mayors, with the help of local police, has started distributing these to peace and order committees, spontaneously created by veterans and right-wing militants tired of general strikes. There was a real danger that these groups would assault demonstrators.
Happily, on-going negotiations at the Department of Labour, on Grenelle street, gave rise to the now famous «Grenelle-agreements», calling for a 25% augmentation of the minimum wage. And even though these accords were never signed, management agreed that salaries should increase, «by at least 10%». The Communist Party and the various unions then ordered people back to work.
Certain unions yet resisted , and occupations continued: three weeks after the end of May'68, a skirmish between Peugeot workers and the CRS, in the East of France, left two dead.
As for Charles de Gaulle, whose return to Paris was greeted by a huge demonstration of the Right - up to perhaps one million persons - on the Champs-Elysées, he dissolved the National Assembly. Elections are called and he is re-elected, end of June, with a large majority. Yet his day was over: less than a year later, he resigned when a majority of Frenchmen said no to his project for regionalization and Reform of the Senate. Gaullism as a political force will continue on for some 13 years!
Many historians are in agreement to hold that May'68 ended, in fact, on the 10th of May 1981, with the election of François Mitterand to the Presidency of the Republic with a majority of Socialist Members in the National Assembly. It will have taken some twenty years, after the end of the War in Algeria, to change France: that is a long time culminating in a mere month whose memory has marked the generations that followed...
by Michel Vastel
My May'68!
May 68 was the longest month in the history of France, and one in which my generation lived through a Revolution not as quiet as that of Quebec.
I was past the age of sit-ins on the steps of University buildings. I was working in the land of ordinary folks in a corner of France more akin to a Zola novel than a Léo Ferré song. I was a young journalist in the agglomeration of Lille-Roubaix-Tourcoing when the strikes of May 68 happened.
Strikes? We were not used to seeing that in the textile industries. The plants were generally owned as family businesses. To give some idea of the prevalent atmosphere: at the beginning of each year, the workers male and female, would parade in front of the patron, and would greet him on a first-name basis: «monsieur Paul» or «monsieur Roger». And the owner would also know the names of his eldest employees.
This was not the situation in the coal mines of the Somme or Pas-de-Calais, very close, where the unions - usually communist - fueled an ongoing climate of conflict. These unions had unresolved issues with public authority: five years earlier, as the miners were on strike, the President of the Republic had ordered an end to the strike, no questions asked! He even called in the army, and there were a few deaths.
But there were a lot of deaths in those days. When the workers, in their blue overalls, would hit the streets, they were faced with the CRS - special police forces known as Republican Security Companies -, true elite forces ready to use clubs, tear-gas, and the occasional shot from a gun. These paramilitary forces were present at all demonstrations, and since the beginning of the 1960s, there were quite a few of those in France.
Naval works, mines and the steel industry were particularly affected by the coming into being of the European Community for Coal and Steel. Strikes would erupt everywhere but never with any results. And we experienced the first attacks from independence movements - first of all, Britanny, then Corsica. In the Universities, students were organizing in the footsteps of leaders such as Alain Krivine, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, Alain Geismar and..., Jean-Paul Sartre who had refused the Nobel prize for literature for 1964.
In short then, in France, one had the impression that things were coming apart on many fronts while in Quebec, in July 1967, General de Gaulle was making a triumphant entry, projecting an image of France that was no longer accurate.
Agitation in the Colleges and at the University of Nanterre, the occupation of the Sorbonne, in Paris, the nights of barricades and overturned cars? Television - black and white - was only in its infancy, and the images of Parisian agitation did not seem to have much impact on the rest of France.
This is why the movement was slow to start in the North. So long as it merely occupied the sons of bourgeois who attended university, only the Parisian newspapers were much concerned. «Youthful exuberance», seemed to be the judgement from afar. Certainly there were hecto-numbered wounded, and even two dead in Paris, but we had seen worse.
May was already half-over, and it is very progressively that students, and then farmers joined the strikes of the workers. It is the occupation of major industrial plants - in particular those of Renault - that started to paralyse France. In industrial sectors such as textile or clothing manufacturers, many owners enabled the closing of their plants to avoid breakage or to follow the general movement.
These closings and the ensuing occupations revealed to the world working conditions from Germinal. In the north wee discovered some plants which employed clandestine workers from Africa or the Maghreb. An empty building served as a dormitory, in which one also brought meals. These workers toiled six days per week, sometimes for 12 hours, and it was forbidden to leave the compound on the seventh.
So, that too, was France in 1968. By bringing to light everything that wasn't working well in those plants, one was also shaming the owners. And «monsieur Paul» or «monsieur Roger» would make a show of offering excuses, sometimes pretending not to know what was going on under their noses. Certain employers were even sincerely sorry! I remember the story of one boss coming back from a week-end spent at his sea-side house. He had brought back a bag of those delicious grey shrimp which one eats, with a beer, in the restaurants of Ostende, in Belgium. He handed over the bag to the workers who were manning the picket lines, and everyone shook hands!
So why were there strikes in may 1968 in what Jean-Pierre Raffarin later called «the basement of France», that province of the country which Parisians often deride? This had nothing to do with Trotsky or Mao, whose writings one consulted on the stairways of the Parisian university buildings. Among the little folks, there are no slogans such as «It is forbidden to forbid» or «Be realistic, ask for the impossible»! And even if there were many more rocks paving the roads of the North than on the boulevards of Paris, demonstrators were not pulling them out to throw at shop windows.
In the North of France, a region in decline which interested neither the public authorities nor investors, many were quite simply depressed. In the West, it is agitation among farmers which led to the closing of roads. Here and there outside of the capital, workers would go on strike for a few days without getting anything and would then return to work.
This had been going on for some ten years. France had lost the war in Algeria. Decolonization had reduced provisions of cotton to the point where entire blocks of the textile industry were in danger. General de Gaulle, brought to power by the army, in turn used the armed forces to contain the strikes. For this man of rigft-wing persuasion, demonstrations were not to be endured. While a huge demonstration organized by the Communist Party was paralysing Paris, the Prime minister George Pompidou, had armoured vehicles parade in the suburbs.
This is when General de Gaulle sought refuge in Germany, protected by his friend general Massu, to prepare what the Left would later call his «overthrow of power». For everything almost flipped over at that point. The workers were still in the streets although not altogether sure why. They were awaiting orders from their Union leaders which were not forthcoming. Over two days, May 28 and 29, France came close to Civil War. In all the cities, there were still stocked arms for civil defence, a hold-over from the wars of the beginning of the century. The arms and munitions were very real and , some mayors, with the help of local police, has started distributing these to peace and order committees, spontaneously created by veterans and right-wing militants tired of general strikes. There was a real danger that these groups would assault demonstrators.
Happily, on-going negotiations at the Department of Labour, on Grenelle street, gave rise to the now famous «Grenelle-agreements», calling for a 25% augmentation of the minimum wage. And even though these accords were never signed, management agreed that salaries should increase, «by at least 10%». The Communist Party and the various unions then ordered people back to work.
Certain unions yet resisted , and occupations continued: three weeks after the end of May'68, a skirmish between Peugeot workers and the CRS, in the East of France, left two dead.
As for Charles de Gaulle, whose return to Paris was greeted by a huge demonstration of the Right - up to perhaps one million persons - on the Champs-Elysées, he dissolved the National Assembly. Elections are called and he is re-elected, end of June, with a large majority. Yet his day was over: less than a year later, he resigned when a majority of Frenchmen said no to his project for regionalization and Reform of the Senate. Gaullism as a political force will continue on for some 13 years!
Many historians are in agreement to hold that May'68 ended, in fact, on the 10th of May 1981, with the election of François Mitterand to the Presidency of the Republic with a majority of Socialist Members in the National Assembly. It will have taken some twenty years, after the end of the War in Algeria, to change France: that is a long time culminating in a mere month whose memory has marked the generations that followed...
Friday, April 25, 2008
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
The Ages of Life
THE ADULT IS A SCOUNDREL!
Among contemporary thinkers, two philosophers in particular interested themselves in the question of the ages of life, Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) and Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986). These two companions of existentialist philosophy for all that did not have the same idea on ages.
For Sartre, the adult is a "scoundrel": « The scoundrel is he who, to justify his existence, pretends to ignore the liberty and contingency to which he is subject, arising out of his being human», he demonstrates in Nausea(1938). Three dimensions are to be investigated: that of social importance, a serious demeanour and a great capacity for deception of self and others. Sartre never bows down, according to de Beauvoir, to this adult life which means the end of gaiety and the irresponsibility of youth, the alienation of liberty, the end of the age where all is possible. For her, adulthood did not mean only routine and boredom. Beauvoir saw in adulthood - that of man and woman - the age where one can leave behind the status of child and fully exercise one's « concrete liberty». For her the two difficult ages were youth and old age, where one is not yet a part of human engagement, or one is beyond it. For young people, and for the old, «the world is silent», she wrote in La Force de l'âge.(1960)Martine Fournier
Sciences Humaines
mai 2008; n°193
THE STATE AND THE AGES OF LIFE
Mythology and philosophy are not the only takers on the question of the ages of life. The modern state, as it slowly comes into play, will also have its say.
It all starts, this is well known, under François 1er, with the ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts(1539) which orders the keeping of baptism registries at the parish level. The French Revolution transforms this to a non-sectarian form in 1792 with a civil registry. From that time on, every citizen of France has a proper identity, defined by his parents and age. Indeed this is the beginning of the custom of celebrating one's birthday, contrary to the teachings of the Church who see this as a sin of pride!.
These practices permitted the development of a science of demographics, but they also facilitated the waging of war. By enumerating its male citizens, the State could better organize conscription, put in place as early as 1668 by Colbert. The Draft (between 1905 and 1996) will long be seen as a rite of passage into adult life.
Civil adulthood, in turn, is defined by the Revolution as 21 years of age. But the Code Napoleon extends to 25 paternal control over marriage and the power to exercise correction (including through judicial means) on one's children... At the end of the XXth century, civil majority will be fixed at 18 (1974) and retirement age at 60 (1982): paradoxical, if one considers that entry into adult life occurs increasingly late and that one ages to a greater life span.
Martine Fournier.
Recommended reading:
Philosophie des âges de la vie
Eric Deschavanne et Pierre-Henri Tavoillot,
Grasset, 2007.
Among contemporary thinkers, two philosophers in particular interested themselves in the question of the ages of life, Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) and Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986). These two companions of existentialist philosophy for all that did not have the same idea on ages.
For Sartre, the adult is a "scoundrel": « The scoundrel is he who, to justify his existence, pretends to ignore the liberty and contingency to which he is subject, arising out of his being human», he demonstrates in Nausea(1938). Three dimensions are to be investigated: that of social importance, a serious demeanour and a great capacity for deception of self and others. Sartre never bows down, according to de Beauvoir, to this adult life which means the end of gaiety and the irresponsibility of youth, the alienation of liberty, the end of the age where all is possible. For her, adulthood did not mean only routine and boredom. Beauvoir saw in adulthood - that of man and woman - the age where one can leave behind the status of child and fully exercise one's « concrete liberty». For her the two difficult ages were youth and old age, where one is not yet a part of human engagement, or one is beyond it. For young people, and for the old, «the world is silent», she wrote in La Force de l'âge.(1960)
Sciences Humaines
mai 2008; n°193
THE STATE AND THE AGES OF LIFE
Mythology and philosophy are not the only takers on the question of the ages of life. The modern state, as it slowly comes into play, will also have its say.
It all starts, this is well known, under François 1er, with the ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts(1539) which orders the keeping of baptism registries at the parish level. The French Revolution transforms this to a non-sectarian form in 1792 with a civil registry. From that time on, every citizen of France has a proper identity, defined by his parents and age. Indeed this is the beginning of the custom of celebrating one's birthday, contrary to the teachings of the Church who see this as a sin of pride!.
These practices permitted the development of a science of demographics, but they also facilitated the waging of war. By enumerating its male citizens, the State could better organize conscription, put in place as early as 1668 by Colbert. The Draft (between 1905 and 1996) will long be seen as a rite of passage into adult life.
Starting in 1880, obligatory schooling between the ages of 7 and 13 will regulate the lives of children and protect them from early labor.
Civil adulthood, in turn, is defined by the Revolution as 21 years of age. But the Code Napoleon extends to 25 paternal control over marriage and the power to exercise correction (including through judicial means) on one's children... At the end of the XXth century, civil majority will be fixed at 18 (1974) and retirement age at 60 (1982): paradoxical, if one considers that entry into adult life occurs increasingly late and that one ages to a greater life span.
Martine Fournier.
Recommended reading:
Philosophie des âges de la vie
Eric Deschavanne et Pierre-Henri Tavoillot,
Grasset, 2007.
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Saturday, April 19, 2008
Friday, April 18, 2008
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Saturday, April 12, 2008
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Debray
From Le Monde 10.04.08
TO BIN LADEN, forward to, by Regis Debray
Sir,
Why have it in for Europe? By going on-side with the Americans, in aid of a government parachuted in by Washington, these brave people have, in Afghanistan, put themselves at your service. This Christian coalition (with Turkish back-up), ignorant of all languages, mores and history of that country, is but sinning in the direction of the clash of civilizations it objects to at home. It will lead to, as with all foreign occupations, with undue demands and civilian victims, a nationalistic and tribal spasm, which gives back power to your friends the Taliban to whom we are unintelligently handing the flag of independence. The people of Afghanistan have always ended up ex pulsing their invaders, be they British, Soviets and tomorrow Nato. Algeria and Vietnam have taught nothing to our elites, who always repent fifty years too late. This colonial war, counter-productive, stupid, and lost in advance, should answer to your desires, even to the fears of Mr Huntington. Thus is the dark irony of history. If humour is not your strong point, nor forgiveness, an artist of destruction should at least appreciate the strategic paradoxes of backlash.
On the issue of the caricatures. You see in these "an insult and a crime worse than the killing of women and children in Muslim villages". I am not denying that one might compare visual violence to physical violence. Consider a stupid and mean drawing of the throat-slitting of a prisoner on camera. Fill in the blanks on the legal papers. If the killing of an unarmed man is a crime everywhere (while a drawing kills no one), blasphemy (words, writings or images insulting God) as sacrilege ( the active desecration of places, objects or persons) remain crimes or misdemeanours in the legislation of many European countries, but not in Belgium or France (except for Alsace-Lorraine). The European Union is here -thankfully - not of one mind. Do not expect the French to expiate for a crime they do not recognize, in a country, where, since 1789, "no one is to be cited for his opinions, even religious", and, let us add, anti-religious. What virtues you make them detest, your hand men, by playing on Muslim sensibilities. As for the accusation of "injury towards a group of persons stemming from their religion", or again defamation, it is indeed recognized by our law dated the 29th of July 1881 on freedom of the press (article 29, paragraph 2). Our courts have ruled that these drawings, certainly irreverent, were aimed only at obscurantists and authors of suicide-attacks invoking abusively the name of the Prophet.
Let us come to the heart of the matter. There is more than one civilization on the planet and it is a good thing. In ours, even if these Danish drawings are of a sorrowful platitude, caricature is an ancestral art, descendant of grotesque ornaments, gargoyles and medieval masks, and an art of the people, acquired, as with the newspaper, through struggle. So come and visit the current Daumier exposition. In yours, tradition, if not the Coran, silent on the subject, forbids images, and of God even more (also true in the Decalogue). It is a fact. Let us respect this liberty. As well as the chronological discrepancies between our cultures, all equally respectable. The word caricature appears for us in the XVIth century, with Annibal Carrache, and it takes time to untangle artistic creation from moral edification. In any event, no one is forcing a follower of the Prohet to buy a newspaper or a book, although if Mahomet were being offendingly caricaturized Place de la Concorde, then it would be reasonable to protest: it would be an attack on consciousness.
Freedom of expression is nowhere without limits. An Israeli artist excludes the Shoah; the Moroccan, the king; and the French, many taboo subjects. Every culture has areas of sacredness. All the more reason to exclude the single-minded sacred. You do not want universal western culture? So be it, and I do not want universal Islamic culture. Internet now a factor, here we all are, rights-of-man proponents and Islamists, rent-payers in the human house. Among neighboring apartment dwellers, tact is important. A certain reserve, like our beloved Plantu, who does not concern himself with what happens in heaven and does not take Prophets to task, but only bearded men. And let us avoid an international police force of the visual, which would force us all into euphemism.
I doubt if a simple friendly agreement between civilizations, which would avoid throwing oil on the sacred flame, will meet with your agreement, but for the management of common spaces, a candid not overly clever man sees no better than the maxim "do not do unto others what you would not want done to you".
It is a well-worn expression, but do not worry, Confucius said it before Jesus-Christ. Holy madmen, you see, have a pacifier: the wisdom of nations. Think about it. It is always better, all said and done, than our moments of craziness.
TO BIN LADEN, forward to, by Regis Debray
Sir,
You addressed a missive on March 19 to the "intelligent beings" of the European Union, demanding explanations with respect to the publication of Danish caricatures representing Mahomet. A letter warrants a response. Your e-mail box is undoubtedly saturated, and I hardly have the time to make a hop to North-Waziristan and present you with my response in person. Le Monde will serve as my winged messenger.
Why have it in for Europe? By going on-side with the Americans, in aid of a government parachuted in by Washington, these brave people have, in Afghanistan, put themselves at your service. This Christian coalition (with Turkish back-up), ignorant of all languages, mores and history of that country, is but sinning in the direction of the clash of civilizations it objects to at home. It will lead to, as with all foreign occupations, with undue demands and civilian victims, a nationalistic and tribal spasm, which gives back power to your friends the Taliban to whom we are unintelligently handing the flag of independence. The people of Afghanistan have always ended up ex pulsing their invaders, be they British, Soviets and tomorrow Nato. Algeria and Vietnam have taught nothing to our elites, who always repent fifty years too late. This colonial war, counter-productive, stupid, and lost in advance, should answer to your desires, even to the fears of Mr Huntington. Thus is the dark irony of history. If humour is not your strong point, nor forgiveness, an artist of destruction should at least appreciate the strategic paradoxes of backlash.
On the issue of the caricatures. You see in these "an insult and a crime worse than the killing of women and children in Muslim villages". I am not denying that one might compare visual violence to physical violence. Consider a stupid and mean drawing of the throat-slitting of a prisoner on camera. Fill in the blanks on the legal papers. If the killing of an unarmed man is a crime everywhere (while a drawing kills no one), blasphemy (words, writings or images insulting God) as sacrilege ( the active desecration of places, objects or persons) remain crimes or misdemeanours in the legislation of many European countries, but not in Belgium or France (except for Alsace-Lorraine). The European Union is here -thankfully - not of one mind. Do not expect the French to expiate for a crime they do not recognize, in a country, where, since 1789, "no one is to be cited for his opinions, even religious", and, let us add, anti-religious. What virtues you make them detest, your hand men, by playing on Muslim sensibilities. As for the accusation of "injury towards a group of persons stemming from their religion", or again defamation, it is indeed recognized by our law dated the 29th of July 1881 on freedom of the press (article 29, paragraph 2). Our courts have ruled that these drawings, certainly irreverent, were aimed only at obscurantists and authors of suicide-attacks invoking abusively the name of the Prophet.
Let us come to the heart of the matter. There is more than one civilization on the planet and it is a good thing. In ours, even if these Danish drawings are of a sorrowful platitude, caricature is an ancestral art, descendant of grotesque ornaments, gargoyles and medieval masks, and an art of the people, acquired, as with the newspaper, through struggle. So come and visit the current Daumier exposition. In yours, tradition, if not the Coran, silent on the subject, forbids images, and of God even more (also true in the Decalogue). It is a fact. Let us respect this liberty. As well as the chronological discrepancies between our cultures, all equally respectable. The word caricature appears for us in the XVIth century, with Annibal Carrache, and it takes time to untangle artistic creation from moral edification. In any event, no one is forcing a follower of the Prohet to buy a newspaper or a book, although if Mahomet were being offendingly caricaturized Place de la Concorde, then it would be reasonable to protest: it would be an attack on consciousness.
Freedom of expression is nowhere without limits. An Israeli artist excludes the Shoah; the Moroccan, the king; and the French, many taboo subjects. Every culture has areas of sacredness. All the more reason to exclude the single-minded sacred. You do not want universal western culture? So be it, and I do not want universal Islamic culture. Internet now a factor, here we all are, rights-of-man proponents and Islamists, rent-payers in the human house. Among neighboring apartment dwellers, tact is important. A certain reserve, like our beloved Plantu, who does not concern himself with what happens in heaven and does not take Prophets to task, but only bearded men. And let us avoid an international police force of the visual, which would force us all into euphemism.
I doubt if a simple friendly agreement between civilizations, which would avoid throwing oil on the sacred flame, will meet with your agreement, but for the management of common spaces, a candid not overly clever man sees no better than the maxim "do not do unto others what you would not want done to you".
It is a well-worn expression, but do not worry, Confucius said it before Jesus-Christ. Holy madmen, you see, have a pacifier: the wisdom of nations. Think about it. It is always better, all said and done, than our moments of craziness.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Monday, April 7, 2008
Saturday, April 5, 2008
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Chebychev
From the French-language Wikipedia
TCHEBYCHEV, Pafnouti (1821-1894), Russian mathematician.
Tchebychev belongs to the Russian school of mathematics founded under Catherine the Great by Daniel Bernouilli and Euler. This school also includes his colleague Lobatchevsky, who initiated work in non-Euclidian geometry.
...
In number theory, Tchebychev completed in 1848 a hypothesis from Gauss having to do with the increasing rarety of prime numbers. He demonstrated in 1850 a hypothesis proposed by Bertrand: For every whole number equal or greated than 2, there is a prime between n and 2n.
********************************************************
It is easy to see this is true:
2 3 4
3 4 5 6
4 5 6 7 8
5 6 7 8 9 10
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
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