Romo Posted August 6, 2002 Share Posted August 6, 2002 It seems France wants to ban the political party that the attempted assassin of Jacques Chirac was associated with. Should countries be banning political parties? How can one claim to be a democracy if political parties are banned? No matter how distasteful some far right-wing racist groups are should we really not allow them to exist? France to ban far-right party August 6, 2002 Posted: 7:34 AM EDT (1134 GMT) A spectator grappled with Brunerie before police arrived and overwhelmed him. PARIS, France (CNN) -- The French government has agreed to disband Radical Unity -- a far-right group with ties to a gunman who police say attempted to shoot President Jacques Chirac. Police say Maxime Brunerie, 25, who allegedly tried to shoot Chirac during the Bastille Day parade in Paris on July 14, was involved with various extreme-right and neo-Nazi groups, including Radical Unity. Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy told reporters on Tuesday the government had adopted a decree that breaks up the group. A 1936 law prohibits the existence of groups that provoke racial discrimination or ethnic hatred. The decision requires approval from the Council of State, France's highest administrative body. Radical Unity said in a written statement it "never tried to cut itself off from legality" and was not a militia group, the type of organisation targeted by the law. Brunerie was placed under investigation last week for attempted assassination. Bystanders wrestled Brunerie to the ground as, police said, he attempted to fire at Chirac with a .22 calibre rifle. Nobody was injured in the incident and the parade continued without further interruption. Brunerie was taken to the Palace of Justice on Friday under a heavy police escort for a meeting with Investigating Judge Jean-Baptiste Parlos. He has been put under formal investigation, which will lead to a psychological evaluation. Brunerie is alleged to have told police he hated Chirac and wanted to kill him "to save France." http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/08/06/france.party/index.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Henry Posted August 6, 2002 Share Posted August 6, 2002 Things are different in Europe than they are here. They have more respect for tradition, less trust in their governments. IMHO this actually makes sense for France, just as outlawing the Nazi party makes sense in Germany. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sarge Posted August 7, 2002 Share Posted August 7, 2002 All this right wing group has to do is ask the French government to surrender...................and they will. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JackC Posted August 8, 2002 Share Posted August 8, 2002 Why do we care about what they do in France? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Romo Posted August 8, 2002 Author Share Posted August 8, 2002 Originally posted by JackC Why do we care about what they do in France? Thats a pretty ignorant point of view. Why do you care what people do in the Middle-East? Why should anyone have cared when Hitler took over in Germany? Why should Americans have cared about the Taliban taking over in Afghanistan? To ignore things going on outside your borders is dangerous. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RiggoDrill Posted August 8, 2002 Share Posted August 8, 2002 Thats a pretty ignorant point of view. Why do you care what people do in the Middle-East? Why should anyone have cared when Hitler took over in Germany? Why should Americans have cared about the Taliban taking over in Afghanistan? To ignore things going on outside your borders is dangerous. But it's also somewhat ludicrous to view a foreign country's decisions through an American lens. We can sit in our high chair and question party-banning only because our winner-take-all system virtually ensures that we have a two-party system, where each party must appeal to the center to get in office. Imagine if, instead, we had a parliamentary system. Would you want violent left-ecological extremist parties, or American Neo-nazi parties taking office? In a sense, we "tolerate" extreme groups here because, for the most part, they are politically powerless. And we look the other way when our extremists cause problems elsewhere -- let's not forget that America is the world's largest publisher and exporter of Nazi literature and propaganda materials, some of which is smuggled via Denmark into Germany, where such material is banned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
panel Posted August 8, 2002 Share Posted August 8, 2002 outlawing an assembly of political thought, doesn't sound too too smart to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burgold Posted August 8, 2002 Share Posted August 8, 2002 Depends on the character of the political party. There are some parties which are more like cults or militias. The Nazi party was a good example. Banning the far right is usually right. More seriously, depending on what their agenda is, some extremist parties are very dangerous. Of course, officially disbanding it as a party does not really do much to address the danger of the current members. It may reduce the future influence which would be a good thing. I would need to more about this party and what it stands for and what it's actions are though before I could really take a stand on this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Romo Posted August 9, 2002 Author Share Posted August 9, 2002 Originally posted by RiggoDrill But it's also somewhat ludicrous to view a foreign country's decisions through an American lens. We can sit in our high chair and question party-banning only because our winner-take-all system virtually ensures that we have a two-party system, where each party must appeal to the center to get in office. Imagine if, instead, we had a parliamentary system. Would you want violent left-ecological extremist parties, or American Neo-nazi parties taking office? In a sense, we "tolerate" extreme groups here because, for the most part, they are politically powerless. And we look the other way when our extremists cause problems elsewhere -- let's not forget that America is the world's largest publisher and exporter of Nazi literature and propaganda materials, some of which is smuggled via Denmark into Germany, where such material is banned. I do live in a parliamentary system and am not seeing things through an "American" lens. In most parliamentary systems the parties do need to appeal to the centre to get into office. I still stand by my point that it is ignorant to ignore what is going on around the world. The arrogance of what Jack C said about not caring about what goes on in France is precisely the reason many people around the world do not like Americans. Burgold has a good point that you would need more info about this party to make a decison on this issue. However the fact that there was very little in the article about the party and its ties to this gunman would lead me to believe that the French authorities havent found much evidence to tie them to this assassination attempt. I am not neccessarily against the banning of political parties but there needs to be evidence that their is a danger to the public rather then distaste for their views that causes them to be banned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JackC Posted August 9, 2002 Share Posted August 9, 2002 Originally posted by Romo sits to pee Thats a pretty ignorant point of view. Why do you care what people do in the Middle-East? Why should anyone have cared when Hitler took over in Germany? Why should Americans have cared about the Taliban taking over in Afghanistan? To ignore things going on outside your borders is dangerous. Why yes Romo sits to pee we should police the entire world. We could be everyone else's thought police. For you to compare what's going on in France to Hitler's Germany does really make one of our views look pretty ignorant, but not mine! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Romo Posted August 9, 2002 Author Share Posted August 9, 2002 Why cant I compare it to Germany? Remeber Hitler was in power for SIX years, yes he was DEMOCRATICALLY elected in 1933, before anyone started to make a big fuss over him. The world and the German people sat by and did nothing for SIX years. If you were in power or you were a German citizen im sure you would have been the first one to say "Oh that Hitler's not such a bad guy. He's bringing in jobs to the country. So what if he's getting rid of all the socialists we dont like them anyway." Hitler taking control of Germany, while potentially just a fluke (lets hope), should not be discounted as uncomparable to today. Intellegent, well-educated people from all over the world supported Hitler. Who is to say that something like this wont happen again?? From the left or from the right it makes no difference. Anytime around the world a political leader starts to restrict the rights of their citizens we should pay attention. I never said America should be the worlds policemen and I never even implied anyone, America, the UN should do anything. I would be against that as their is no proof that anything needs to be done. The last thing I would ever want to see is America or anyone imposing their beliefs over others. All I said is that it is ignorant to not even care about what is going on around the world. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Romo Posted August 9, 2002 Author Share Posted August 9, 2002 Double post. sorry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burgold Posted August 9, 2002 Share Posted August 9, 2002 Actually, Hitler was never elected. He came in third in a three party race, but was gaining enough influence that the Chancelor thought it would be good to keep under his eye. He made him one of his defense ministers I believe. He attained his power from the inside, but was never elected head of Germany. He siezed control. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redman Posted August 10, 2002 Share Posted August 10, 2002 Originally posted by Burgold Banning the far right is usually right. Vague statement, but you're a fool if you think that militant rightists are very different from militant leftists. The fact is that they're both radical, and to the extent that anyone is willing to accept, much less promote, violence to bring about political/idealogical change, they are enemies of us all. Also, most American's seem to forget that despite how vehement our arguments over politics are, we fortunately enough live in a very politically moderate society, especially in comparison to the rest of the world. If mainstream conservatives "got their way" politically, you might not like the changes they made but this would very much be fundamentally the same country it is now. Likewise for liberals. Not so in most of Europe, which throughout its political history has been plagued by struggles between moderates and violent radicals. Case in point, while our Revolution and the French Revolution were inspired by the same ideas, ours didn't involve setting up guillotines in town squares and lopping off as many heads of our enemies as we could. And that was true despite the fact that as many as one-third of our citizenry (including George Washington at first) favored remianing British citizens and opposed a revolt. Again, we should never forget how lucky we are in this regard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burgold Posted August 10, 2002 Share Posted August 10, 2002 For the record, Redman, that line was totally meant with tongue in cheek. Sometimes the problem with the internet is it just doesn't speak to tone and intent. I'll try to use more smilies on occassion. Deeply extreme groups on every issue have the potential to be damaging, but when I wrote that line I was just kidding. In the same manner that I hope that some of the anti-liberal sentiments were said jokingly... like the long past thread about preventing liberals from breeding. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Redskins4Life Posted August 10, 2002 Share Posted August 10, 2002 Well, I didn't see this being mentioned, but America does have a banned political party of its own: The Communist party (due to the Red Scare). Just food for thought ... or something. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redman Posted August 10, 2002 Share Posted August 10, 2002 Burgold, believe me, I have humor aplenty, even about my own political beliefs. However, tongue in cheek references in an otherwise serious (esp. for this board) thread is bound to create confusion. That's doubly true when what is being expressed tongue in cheek - that far rightists are violent (and, I assume, far leftists are not) is precisely what some people actually believe. Anyway, the more serious a topic, the more "risky" humor is when inserted into it in terms of it being misinterpreted. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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