"Analysis" in the Sunday Independent

[Furet]

I gave up buying papers a few years ago. Still, I like to glance at the Sunday Independent online every few weeks. Like its daily sibling paper, it's crap. And getting crappier by the week. Today offered this piece of "analysis" from a commentator called Eilis O'Hanlon:

The French? Frankly, I couldn't give a crepe about their view of the world

THE Lisbon Treaty referendum Mark II is done and dusted. The Yes camp is going to win by a mile this autumn. Even if it were proven beyond doubt that Europe was a conspiracy led by giant lizard men from Alpha Centauri, most Irish voters would still conclude that the aliens surely couldn't be any worse at running things than the people currently in power.
But still it never ceases to amaze when one is confronted by the waste and bureaucracy and sheer dodginess of so much that happens in the federalist European institutions. Whistleblowers in Irish hospitals might think they have a hard time, but that's nothing compared to the treatment of those who expose the corruption of their masters in the European Parliament, most of whose careers subsequently sink faster than a Mafia victim in concrete boots.
Last week, it was finally admitted that French farmers had received State subsidies, deemed to be illegal by the EU to the tune of €330m -- half a billion once interest payments and the like are taken into account.
The French government has promised to pay it back, following a report which criticised the payments as "market distorting", but farmers are insisting they won't give back a penny and their union bosses have threatened a "blazing summer" of protests if anyone tries to extract the cash from them.
This coming from a country that already benefits more than any other nation from the absurd Common Agricultural Policy.
Is it any wonder that France doesn't want the Irish No vote of last year jeopardising the cosy financial arrangements it has wangled for itself in Europe? They didn't let a No vote from their own electorate a few years ago hold them back, so they're hardly going to stand idly by whilst a few uppity Paddies spoil the party.
French fruit and vegetable farmers were actually being paid during the period in question for storing their own crops. One would imagine that storing fruit and vegetables came with the territory of being a fruit and vegetable grower, but apparently not. They had to be paid extra to do it. They were also given financial incentives for processing the fresh fruit and vegetables that they were growing. Their behaviour is a bit like that of a sulky teenager who refuses to tidy up his own room unless he's paid to do it. In fact, teenagers is exactly how a British woman, who lived in the country for 20 years, describes them in a new book on the French. She says they are constantly in rebellion against their parental figures, but still expect to have the social equivalent of their meals provided and their laundry done by the state. France has one of the highest suicide rates in Europe, precisely because they have high expectations of what life should be, and don't cope well when it fails to live up to their exacting standards.
Spending a few weeks in France again this summer confirms that impression. It's a lovely country, and the weather is like manna from heaven to anybody coming from rain-soaked Ireland. Ooh, la soleil! The only problem is that it's full of French people, who seem to consider it a matter of national pride to be the rudest, most arrogant people on the planet.
Find yourself stuck in a cycle lane behind a French cyclist, and they're about as likely to pull over to let you pass as Ayers Rock would be to shift out of the way for a kangaroo. The French really do seem to consider themselves to be the most important people in the universe, and everybody else has to get in line.
Maybe they're overcompensating for the fact that they surrendered in record speed during the Second World War, by being extra contemptuous of incomers ever since.
What, to paraphrase Monty Python, have the French ever done for us? So they have a pretty language. Big deal. Culturally and economically, they've been stagnating for years. President Sarkozy is doing his best to snap his fellow countrymen out of their complacent torpor, but to change you have to want to change, and the French don't appear to see the need to change their ways for anyone, certainly not for those pesky Anglo-American types who have usurped the dominant place globally which the French always considered to be theirs by right of birth. For a country which has had more than
its fair share of revolutions, the resistance to new ways of living and thinking is practically absolute. France might not be an island geographically. Mentally, an island is exactly what their country is to the French.
The European project, on a grand scale, is symptomatic of the malaise. It's run for their benefit, and always will be. Everybody else can sit at the high table just as long as they don't make too many waves, and simply fall in with the French view of the world. The Poles found that out when they dared to question the way things were run following their ascension to the EU. France's spluttering outrage was hilarious.
Not that the French would see it. They're very serious people. That's probably another reason for the high suicide rate. Life is not to be taken lightly. There's a right way of doing things, and a wrong way, and woe betide those who don't choose correctly.
A couple of weeks ago, I tried to order crepes for my children in a creperie, which is the kind of place where one would expect crepes to be willingly served, only to be told that crepes were a dessert and could only be ordered as a dessert. But crepes are what my children wanted to eat. Tough, you can't eat crepes as a main dish because the world would clearly collapse in on itself if eating became a matter of having what you want rather than conforming to a set of rules laid down in French antiquity. We went elsewhere, stopping only to take a photograph of the creperie so that we could laugh at it later.
Meanwhile, the French continue to stuff themselves with frites, which are as ubiquitous now in the French diet as they are in the American, for all the Gallic propaganda about how "French Women Don't Get Fat". It's their dirty little secret. This is their great fear. They're clinging on to the last vestiges of Frenchness because they know that eventually they'll just be the same as everybody else.
Which is fine, if that's what turns the miserable, condescending buggers on, but I don't see why the rest of us should foot the bill.

If that's "analysis" I don't know what a lazy rant would look like.

[Julie2046]

Thanks for your message !
I was so shocked myself (especially as a french person living in Ireland) that I sent an email to the Sunday Independent.
Unfortunately I don't think it's gonna stop as she has writen a couple of article on the same tune before (10th of Agust last year for instance).
Anyway, good to read that people like you are reacting !

[Furet]

Hi Julie, the Sunday Independent is balanced on the French issue. So much so, in fact, that last September they published this letter:

Sunday September 21 2008
Sir -- With reference to Brendan O'Connor's page one article: 'No More Mr (Irish) Nice Guy' (Sunday Independent, September 14, 2008), Mr Paddy, sorry for disappointing you, but, no, not everyone likes you.
As a matter of fact, it is pretty amazing how disliked the Irish are.
Of course, this is not said aloud as it is not politically correct. (French and German are the only two nationalities one can hate openly). Anyway as I was saying, keep dreaming.
The great craic: where, when, how, who?
Did I miss anything these last 30-odd years? I never see any craic with the Paddies. I agree, you sincerely believe you've got it, but noooooooo, wrong again. Only when you're binge-drinking do you dare open your mouth. And then, it is to talk total rubbish. You are loud, that's for sure. Well, one is Irish, so, one must pretend to be enjoying oneself. The usual topic is -- God, we are great!!!! Everybody loves us. (Please God, let it be true!).
Your accent? Well, first of all, like in any country, there are different accents. But again, no, no, no, no -- the Irish accent is vile! Last month, I was in Ireland for a week. As soon as I arrived in Dublin and was surrounded by that awful noise coming out of the mouths around me, I wondered how would I be able to last that long. For sure, to wake up next to someone with such an accent must be some anti-climax! Give me the south east English accent anytime. But Irish?
It is a fact that the Irish are totally ignorant regarding the cultures of thousands of beautiful countries and regions all over the world. Most of those cultures include story-telling, playing music, singing. But , again, silly us, we forgot, only the Irish sing and play music .... How many times do you want to hear the boooooooring Danny song?
So Mr Paddy, I've been married to an Irishman for 32 years. I know the Irish history (I made sure I read the books), I know what Ireland was like 30 years ago, I know the mentality of the Irish, I know everything about you all. And it is not very pretty.
The chip on the shoulder? Well, you have one on each shoulder, for balance. And that stops you from rising up. You see the other nationalities, (let's take the French and the German you hate so much) they are very secure about themselves and they are bloody right about it. So, they don't care what anybody thinks about them. I am French (ho la la, a frog!) and the one thing I am proud of is that in France, unlike in Ireland, we are very curious about other nationalities.
My origins are in Brittany. Brittany -- where people do not like the Irish. Why? Because you are ignorant. You are the ones who are not interested in other cultures. The Scottish and the Welsh are loved in Brittany, Why? Because they are interested in all those people coming to the festivals from all over the world to introduce us to their culture. But you? Forget it.
Even when it comes to business in France, you are known as not trustworthy. A lot of bull****, yes!
When I was in sales in London, the Irish clients were the easiest to get. Why? Just telling them, "I am married to an Irishman" was sufficient to get the appointment/the deal. They all thought they were loved. Idiots! Sometimes I even found it too easy.
I have a friend who is the director of a recruitment agency for hotel industry management. Well, guess what? Irish women are the most difficult to place. Why? Because they are vile. They believe that being a good manager is to bully people. Very Irish!
Irish friends? No, it does not exist. I am not saying there are no nice Irish people. But friendship can be difficult among people who begrudge the success of their neighbour. (Don't deny it, even the Irish say it themselves). For whatever reason, you are obsessed with money. In France, we consider it vulgar to talk about money.
So, to your last comment, that everybody likes you when you are rich, let me tell you something. No matter what, Paddy, and don't forget it, no amount of money will hide the smell of dung which will always stick to your magnificent boots wherever you'll go.
And next time, don't mix up "patronising you" with "liking you".
A nationality is just an accident of birth, which means that when people say, for example: "I am proud of being Irish", it is an absurdity. We do nothing in order to have a nationality. And to be proud of something, you must achieve something, work at it, like when you succeed at your exams.
But for sure, I am very happy to be French. Thank God for that accident of birth. How awful to think I could have been born Irish! Italian, Spanish, yes. But Irish! And maybe that is why deep down you're so afraid of not being liked. You realise yourself how pathetic you are.
As for the accent of my husband, he has a great musical ear, and maybe that is why he has hardly any Irish accent. Lucky me!
Anyway, keep dreaming.
PS: All the people I know from Italy, France, Poland, etc are French, Italian, Polish. Nobody calls himself/herself European. Nobody.
Name and address with Editor

http://www.independent.ie/opinion/le...h-1479352.html

I was in America last year when I read it and couldn't stop laughing!

[Julie2046]

This article left me sceptical... At least the SI publishes every opinion even about Irish culture and I can appreciate the humouristic touch, but I hope the lady is ironic. Actually, I don't think that writing this kind of comment about any culture is a good point. A newspaper who is feeding this kind of prejudice is not doing its role properly in my opinion. For me journalism is on the contrary supposed to open people minds, inform them, make them think and not reinforce them in any kind of clichés... (About French, Irish, skin colour, religion or any kind of world differences).

[Furet]

I agree. Hence my view that it's a crap paper. They had a big follow up to the French lady's letter the following week: http://www.independent.ie/opinion/an...n-1484539.html which was actually a pretty good piece...then of course the editor fanned the flames by allowing a load of ascerbic letters to be published against the original letter writer! See the links here: http://www.independent.ie/todays-pap...9/28/analysis/

The issue seemed to die after that. But maybe the Indo wishes to stir it up again. My main reason for disliking O'Hanlon's piece today, though, is that it isn't remotely analytical. It's just garbage. People buy this paper, and actually think it's analysis!

[Julie2046]

I especially hate the part where she is using a personal, isolated event as a global theory (the restaurant incident) and where she concludes quickly about the reasons concerning French high rate of suicides (the same as in Japan where the political system is "barely" different...).
Her references to the book that she is talking about are non-existent (who is this author? Which book is she talking about?).
Everything is disorganised, from a crepe in a restaurant to the common agricultural policy going through the French Cuisine... Who is she kidding, it is not an article it is more a teenager’s diary...feelings from a single person.

[Furet]

Yes, just a rant. The more I read sites like boards.ie, the more I realise that it's actually a generally superior medium for analysis (once you filter out the bad stuff, of course).

[mike65]

Originally Posted by Furet

Yes, just a rant. The more I read sites like boards.ie, the more I realise that it's actually a generally superior medium for analysis (once you filter out the bad stuff, of course).

You mean you just pick and choose, isn't that what people do with print media too?

[Furet]

Originally Posted by mike65

You mean you just pick and choose, isn't that what people do with print media too?

I expect a certain standard from broadsheets. I don't of course have to agree with it all, but I appreciate a well written and well argued analytical piece regardless. In the analysis section of a Sunday broadsheet, I expect that. Here is different obviously.

[mike65]

Clearly the stadards are lower here

I haven't bought the Sindo for 10 years but its no different to most papers in that evermore copy is now given over to cheap to create opinion pieces rather than actual expensive journalism and analysis. Indeed they led where the supposedly superior Tribune has followed.

[Ernest]

At least Eilis O'Hanlon is a proper journalist and sometimes writes interesting stuff including her rant about the French in today's paper. What annoys me is the publication in that paper every week of an article by Willy O'Dea, the Junior Minister for Defence. What on earth is the point of letting this party politician have a weekly platform to utter the pedestrian and predictable things that such people are expected to say???? Likewise, the regular column in the Irish Times by Noel Whelan, a Fianna Fail hack of similar ilk whose role is to support whatever the party wants supported. At least let newspapers have opinionated material by journalists and writers who can write interesting and thought provoking copy.

[Julie2046]

At least Eilis O'Hanlon is a proper journalist and sometimes writes interesting stuff including her rant about the French in today's paper

I really would like you to develop this point because I didn't read anything which could have been, from a side or another, more than ridiculously abject. I think I missed the interesting part ...

[greendom]

Appalling stuff; how did the editor ever let that lazy piece of writing through. Should have been thrown in the bin. Really crepe

[lostexpectation]

trolling on paper is still trolling

[asdasd]

Clearly the stadards are lower here

On Boards? If we ignore the your ma's etc. boards is a better source of news and wisdom than the Indo.

trolling on paper is still trolling

BAd trolling too. She has to produce a certain amount of copy but that wouldnt pass muster on the rants and raving forum here.

There is one vaguely legitimate point - it wouldnt have killed that particular restaurant to allow the crepes as a mains. But the generalisation, from that, is absurd.

I dont find the French rude, anyway. The borded Dublin teenager scanning the groceries is worse, but in neither case do I care, since I dont shop for conversation.

I also notice that the remarks on French rudeness are never really backed up with stories - her crepes story isnt a story about rudeness but bureaucracy. I find them polite, and possibly sometimes standoffish, But not rude.

New Yorkers are rude, but that has its charms too.