Society, politics, history, revolution
How to pluck the petals from a daisy
October 24, 2004
Translation: Stephanie Helle
Jean-Pierre Petit
Readers of my generation surely remember Brigitte Bardot’s film of the same name. But today I’m not speaking about that daisy. I’m thinking of a comparison suggested to me by one of my readers: In France and many other countries, people pluck the petals off daisies. Step by step, state authorities are dismantling all our freedoms and social achievements. Since people no longer stand united, no party or trade union can defend individuals or employees within companies. Everything quietly dissolves. No petal reacts when its neighbor is attacked; no petal realizes it will soon be the next victim.
And since no real solutions are emerging, one can simply despair. Arlette Laguiller regularly runs in elections and delivers her monotonous, plaintive speeches. She speaks of the “workers’ party” and “employers.” Even though she denounces the monstrous injustices in our society and the erosion of our social rights, her political message remains meager, nonexistent—just like that of all those who claim to be “left-wing,” regardless of whether they dine on caviar on the left or not. Some of her speeches echo the theme of “self-management” from the 1968 social revolution—a colossal absurdity that humanity has ever conceived.
No, companies don’t function when worker groups run them. Communism didn’t work either. But of course, the whole matter is far more complex. Even though there was goodwill (and much decency) in the Soviet Union, this regime built on extreme autocracy—a system conceived by Stalin the butcher—was economically strangled, forced by the United States to develop a defense arsenal that consumed the bulk of its gross social product. The Soviet Union never had enough resources to afford both butter and guns. In the end, everything collapsed like a house of cards, and the Russians demonstrated their inability to shift from one extreme to another—from an outwardly isolated planned economy to a market economy. It seems they instantly adopted all the flaws of our economic system, yet without gaining its few advantages. Now Russia’s train stations are filled with underage prostitutes, markets are packed with elderly people selling their possessions just to survive. The Soviet Union’s social safety net has been replaced by abject poverty.
Not long after Castro had abruptly expelled them from the country, the American Mafia reestablished itself in its former headquarters. Mao’s China inherited the iron fist of its tax collector. There, the state combats drug invasion by simply executing anyone caught with the smallest amount of narcotics. China has left behind the eccentricities of its guru-leader, a literary figure who, in his time, wanted to play metalworkers with his famed efficiency. For those readers who may be unaware, let me add that he instructed Chinese peasants to produce their own steel in the blast furnaces of their villages. On the other side of the world, Stalin played the role of agronomist and immediately after the war decided that his people could dramatically increase harvest yields if fields were plowed “one meter deep” by tanks repurposed as tractors. As a result, entire regions’ fields were rendered sterile for years, because the fertile topsoil was now one meter below the surface, while the seed-unresponsive layer lay above.
In Arab countries, religious leaders profit from people’s fear and present Sharia law and the burka as life jackets, offering salvation amid the ever-more apparent moral confusion in Western nations. This strategy has the advantage of being simple to understand—even if the proposed solution was invented over a thousand years ago. Moreover, this worldview offers a ready-made answer for every problem. It provides a rigidly regulated, clearly defined life model, an ultra-stable social system capable of coping with all inequalities, and answers to human existential anxiety. In this worldview, everything is predetermined. While people in Western nations combat their melancholy with antidepressants, build walls, or blindly launch rockets in accordance with another biblical law—retribution—those on the other side are shown a different escape route: suicide, guaranteed salvation in the afterlife. Of course, politicians never send their own children to war, neither in Arab countries nor in the United States. Death has always been reserved for the poor.
The phenomenon of Islamic fanaticism is gradually becoming an international political force. The actions of suicide bombers are unparalleled in effectiveness. One might call them the “nuclear bomb of technologically underdeveloped peoples.” Against them, the cowboys armed with lasers and thermonuclear weapons, supported by spy planes and guided by GPS, are utterly powerless. Never before has our planet faced such a situation. Historically, it is remarkable. Even European countries resemble haystacks ready to catch fire at any moment. Just look at the Algerian War to understand how quickly a situation can ignite. After the first bomb explodes, right-wing parties will unleash their previously dormant poison. Who will set off the first bomb? A good question! Who is pulling the strings? Who organizes the first wave of suicide attacks in this or that European country? The religious leaders—or… the Americans themselves, attempting to force Europeans to join America’s crusade “against terrorism”?
Did the American hawkish faction accelerate events through a completely Machiavellian, self-directed terrorist attack on that famous September 11th, transparent as pipe smoke? Was it a well-calculated political move to gain free rein and plunge gracefully into insurmountable, humanly catastrophic situations? Iraq resembles Russia’s withdrawal. Historically, these two situations are comparable. Science offers no solution either, and since it collaborates closely with military-industrial lobbies (a collaboration that has become, today, its most important “research and development work”), it discredits itself. It primarily serves to boost profit margins, entrench power structures, and strengthen monopolies, with complete irresponsibility—evident in the adventure of genetically modified crops...