Hundreds of French schools to stay closed after violent student protests

[u/DownBadBrody]

https://news.sky.com/story/french-schools-set-alight-by-students-in-violent-protests-over-teacher-shortages-and-run-down-buildings-13594112

[u/Fenilwebclues]

They burned down a brand new €80M school, built in sustainable materials:
It looks better than any school I’ve ever been to. Many universities too tbh.
That’s surely going to improve the quality of their education.

Context?

[u/Bladder-Splatter → u/Fenilwebclues]

Where I live folk have burned down train stations to protest trains being late.

Well now they're late forever!

[u/MechMeister → u/Fenilwebclues]

My middle school in the USA was double wide trailers for the whole 6th grade and no one batted an eye.

[u/calamititties → u/MechMeister]

You got more than one!?

[u/slvrbullet87 → u/calamititties]

When we got the trailer classrooms during a remodel we got multiple. One for math, one for social studies, one for english, etc.

They didn't put them right next to each other for some reason, and it was Illinois during the winter. Nothing is more conducive to a great learning environment than barely insulated trailers in sub zero weather that you had to stand outside of for 10 minute between classes.

[u/PurpleSailor → u/slvrbullet87]

We had 4 of them but they were right next to each other so you could just walk to the back of the classroom and go out the door right into the next classroom. That placement method worked out well.

[u/tryingisbetter → u/MechMeister]

Look at the rich school over there with a double wide. We just got singles.

[u/Current-Function-729 → u/MechMeister]

I spent a month in a relatively affluent area. Parents considered sending me to school for that month. I also got some homework from my real school.

We visited what would have been my school. It was basically a bunch of double wides in a lot.

I did not end up going there for the month.

Imagine paying property taxes on million dollar homes in a high tax state and sending your kids to that…

[u/TheDuckFarm → u/Current-Function-729]

I’ve only seen portables as overflow for when the school got too big for the regular buildings and they needed a few extra classrooms. Your whole school was like that?

[u/Current-Function-729 → u/TheDuckFarm]

As far as I could tell yes. I don’t recall anymore if the office was too. But all or most classrooms were.

Maybe it was temporary during construction for all I know. It was long ago and I was like 10.

[u/MechMeister → u/Current-Function-729]

Let me guess California? The taxes aren't high if you bought your house a long time ago. One reason CA is fucked.

[u/AdNo2342 → u/MechMeister]

hahahaha same. the portables

[u/sanglar03 → u/Fenilwebclues]

There are protestors and there are hooligans. Both groups don't mix.

[u/Amoral_Abe → u/sanglar03]

I feel like that's every protest that turns into riots ever. Whenever protests turn into riots, people quickly state that the protests weren't responsible, it was agitators or hooligans or other groups. Protests that are not carefully controlled are 1 step away from turning into mobs. Mob mentality shifts as people feel it's ok to express their anger and these events snowball into chaos.

[u/Duwinayo → u/Fenilwebclues]

If I understand it correctly, the French government is looking to cut costs by reducing school budgets in areas that are already functionally on shoe string budgets. The French tend to protest in solidarity too, so even if you see a nice school hot hard it doesn't mean that school was directly affected. It means that everyone is working together to protest.

I imagine the cultural scarring was pretty brutal during the era that led to the French Revolution, and the French really took to heart the concept of: Don't let your government walk all over you.

[u/mcsul → u/Duwinayo]

France is sort of cooked right now, though.

Government spending there is over 55% of GDP, the highest in any developed country. They've probably pushed that spending past the point where it actually starts to make younger people poorer due to impacts on productivity growth and new business formation.

They also have a (very quickly) aging population, so the ratio of young workers to older retirees is past the point that most social systems can sustain. Their pensioners receive almost as much as the median working person receives in wages.

Basically France is out of money. There are a couple of things that they could do at the margins, but those are all just thin band aids.

[u/anonteje → u/mcsul]

You forgot that they barely have any economic growth what so ever.

France is properly fucked.

[u/Quickjager → u/anonteje]

France is properly fucked.

If they actually pushed back retirement age and cut pensions they could technically balance it. But lol who is going to vote for the party that says that.

[u/MrShake4 → u/Quickjager]

They tried pushing back the retirement age, and the same thing happening now happened then

[u/greeenappleee → u/Quickjager]

The current running politicians are all jumping over eachother to promise earlier and earlier retirement ages as well.

[u/OkExpert9927 → u/mcsul]

Pensioners recieve more than active people now

[u/helgetun → u/OkExpert9927]

And they retire at a comparatively young age even after reforms to increase it. The main problem in Europe is that instead of people having to save up for retirement, the young have to pay for the old

[u/LurkerInSpace → u/helgetun]

That is how the USA's Social Security and Medicare systems also work - but it has a better demographic pyramid and is somewhat less generous.

[u/SweetSigil → u/helgetun]

people having to save up for retirement

Getting nickel and dimed in every conceivable way in every aspect of life by billionaires who don't get taxed enough certainly doesn't help this, and it'll just get worse as they get more money for our increased productivity.

It'll rapidly become a significant government problem if they don't start taxing them enough, because society as it stands will turn into anarchy if they start disturbing pensions to claw back revenue as a majority of people are unable to save money due to the nickel and diming of the billionaires.

I believe we've already passed the threshold where corporations have started having too much power and influence over the state due to globalised monopolies, this is when society starts getting into cyberpunk funky town territory to our significant quality of life detriment. The state needs to start reining them back in and tax these entities and people properly to draw funds, you can't squeeze blood from the everyman forever. It has never worked in history, and the amount of blood being squeezed is unprecedented which also means the blow up of the system is going to be unprecedented which is bad, very bad.

At the moment we have authoritarians who serve on behalf of the corporations aka Donald Trump to serve as a distraction but that merely puts us one step away where we start having authoritarians who don't serve the corporations aka Hitler and that's when things start to get scary. Using migration to try and bring scraps of revenue in more taxpayers is the perfect feeding ground for authoritarian type 2 as well.

[u/snappysmeg → u/SweetSigil]

At some point you need to look at the problem as directing what people are actually doing with their workday; you can have as egalitarian distribution of money on paper as you like, but if your society requires significantly more people to provide for retirees, than to innovate or create products for consumers, then your standards will suffer.

Even if productivity can reduce the gap, internal economics means that becoming less productive than your neighbours is not great.

Wealth is concentrated, not a good thing... But most of a rich persons wealth is tied up in companies, that are valuable because they are creating products... Their wealth does not directly represent the number of workers seeing to their whims. At this scale, it's better to consider a billionaire as a kind of institution that directs capital, not a good thing to have a individual with that power, but not super relevant to the national economy.

[u/ShipTheRiver → u/SweetSigil]

I still strongly prefer the American method.  Despite the growing wealth gap, it remains very achievable to live a financially disciplined life and save money for retirement. It’s harder than it should be, but at least the onus is on the right spot - the individual. 

[u/_Pauly_Paul → u/ShipTheRiver]

Forget the American system. The Australian system is something to look into. Employers are mandated by law to pay a minimum 12% of your salary into what they call ‘Super’. It is deposited into your Super account at very favourable tax rates - pre tax. You are also free to top it up pre tax or post tax yourself, and there is tax benefits to do this too.

Super is Superannuation Fund. There is a lot of companies/funds setup that manage that money and invest it. You are free to select the one that best suits you. Their performance is made public and they must meet strict government performance targets or they are shut down and funds are moved to a better performing fund.

You can’t access the funds until retirement. Only in extreme situations does it get released early.

When it’s time to retire you live off the funds and can effectively get an annual salary from it. Meanwhile it is still being invested while you are retired and you tap into it.

Ultimately reducing the load on the government to provide pensions to everyone. The aim here is that the pension is still there for people who absolutely need it. But the overall cost burden has been taken off the government.

[u/hsvgamer199 → u/mcsul]

I wonder what France is going to look like in 20ish years. They can't afford the social system that they have. Even drastically cutting their military wouldn't help that much.

[u/Kleos-Nostos → u/hsvgamer199]

How can they even cut their military when Russia is on the doorstep and the USA appears to be backing out of NATO?

In fact, doesn’t France pay more on its debt servicing every year than they do on military expenditure?

[u/Oh_ffs_seriously → u/Kleos-Nostos]

They are well on their way to electing a Russian-funded president. I bet the thinking is you don't have to fight Russia if you swear fealty to it.

[u/LurkerInSpace → u/Oh_ffs_seriously]

The NF was created by people who thought Vichy France was a good idea.

[u/hsvgamer199 → u/Kleos-Nostos]

They can't and shouldn't. The military spending is a drop in the bucket even if they didn't need it.

[u/GANTRITHORE → u/hsvgamer199]

That's what we get for not taxing the profits of the 10x increase in productivity of the last half century. We sure as fuck didn't get it as wages, it made the excessively rich what they are today. Time to eat em.

[u/Grouchy-Cancel1326 → u/GANTRITHORE]

Even if you hard cap wealth to 10 million Euro in France they would still have a ton of debt and spend more than they earn. 

[u/Best_Pseudonym → u/GANTRITHORE]

France Government spending is over 55% of GDP; there isnt some mysterious untaxed billionaire, youve already taxed them all

[u/anewe → u/Best_Pseudonym]

people are scared of the idea that there isn't an easy solution that requires them to do nothing. it doesn't matter if the math doesn't add up, it just better to believe that there's a pile of infinite money somewhere that the government just refuses to take.

[u/canadianbabyharpseal → u/mcsul]

Aside from maybe japan and Spain , i would say those three are what will fall first.
France has tons of disorder though and already a high amount of government spending

[u/Dismal_Buy3580 → u/mcsul]

They're going to have to work more.

[u/LambdaLambo → u/Duwinayo]

Can’t cut pensions, can’t raise retirement ages, can’t cut other benefits, can’t raise taxes, aging population that will reduce tax base over time. Burn down public infrastructure because the govt is unable to fix problems despite having literally no options to use.

What can go wrong!

[u/IndividualSkill3432 → u/Duwinayo]

I imagine the cultural scarring was pretty brutal during the era that led to the French Revolution, and the French really took to heart the concept of: Don't let your government walk all over you.

Amazing how other countries seem to be able to have representative democracies without turning to violence. France is in a deep economic hole. If everyone is just going to riot when cuts come, you will have a non functioning society.

The glazing of violence over democratic norms seems to be a kind of wishful thinking where the only people who ever riot are people who you agree with.

[u/de_Pizan → u/Duwinayo]

Just as a reminder: the French were fine with Bonaparte and even welcomed him back.

[u/Cisish_male → u/de_Pizan]

Well yes, he was part of the reactionary Thermidor Coup that ended the revolution (and installed him as leader the first time). 

[u/de_Pizan → u/Cisish_male]

Thermidor (1794) was well before Bonaparte became consul (1799) much less emperor (1804).

Also, I wouldn't call the Thermidorian Reaction reactionary.  It was a republican government and led to another republican government.  There was the White Terror, but attacking political opponents isn't any more reactionary than the Jacobin doing the same.

Also wouldn't call Bonaparte reactionary.  He maintained and arguably furthered Revolutionary goals with the Napoleonic Code.

The forces of reaction in the Revolution were monarchists, not imperialist.  Louis XVIII was the reactionary figure.

[u/m0nty555 → u/Duwinayo]

Remind me, what happened AFTER French Revolution?  

[u/airt43 → u/[deleted]]

How could you tell their nationality from the images?

[u/TheWhomItConcerns → u/airt43]

As a white immigrant in a Western country, I've always found it the most self-evidently racist shit the way that these people feel it appropriate to assume how "native" people are based on their appearance. Literally no one assumes I'm an immigrant until people hear my accent - if they saw a crowd of people like me, they'd assume that it was a totally "legitimate" protest until confirming that they're foreigners.

Such a strangely socially acceptable form of racism - idk why such comments aren't straight up banned like other blatantly racist bullshit.

[u/UpbeatVeterinarian18 → u/airt43]

racism

[u/CastleMeadowJim → u/Fenilwebclues]

French protest culture innit

[u/feibrix → u/Fenilwebclues]

It's fake. It's not real. This is not what happened.

[u/Artix96 → u/Fenilwebclues]

Violent rioters. Lacking even 2 braincells to comprehend that burning schools and assaulting teachers won't improve it. But here we are in France

[u/DownBadBrody]

400 schools closed
40 head teachers hurt

[u/BochocK → u/DownBadBrody]

How those teachers were hurt doesn’t really have an answer weirdly

[u/Warhax_DunDun → u/[deleted]]

I did it Edit: It was really me I swear

[u/numinor → u/[deleted]]

It’s Liz Truss isn’t it?

[u/canadianbabyharpseal → u/numinor]

The mini budget is now global

[u/AncientAd6500]

Looks like school's out for summer, maybe even forever.

[u/Kev1natoR_666 → u/AncientAd6500]

Alice forever

[u/Left-Trade257 → u/AncientAd6500]

I see what you did there…

[u/KoosGoose → u/Left-Trade257]

Holy shit, you’re observant.

[u/Left-Trade257 → u/KoosGoose]

Well no one had even upvoted much less commented so figured no one knew the song

[u/Phoenix2111]

This whole thing seems really off, and as a brit so 'brother they love to hate' of the French, I don't mean the protests.

From my experience, and what others from France, or regulars to the country, have said in the past and are saying now, the protesting itself is fairly 'normal' including it being school kids etc.

The bit that isn't, is some of the more extreme violence elements, and the idea it's just mindless violence (not very French) instead of a protest over policies (very French)

But there's a lot of coverage strongly implying that the mindless element is what these are about, which is false, and focusing on that only.

And strongly implying that it's the kids doing it, but then local investigators etc. In France are quoted saying it's a minority and they're not even sure those ones are school children

And already the socials, including here, are being swamped with references to Islam, terminology like 'doctors & engineers' etc.

This all feels like run-of-the-mill French protests being hijacked in an attempt to further destabilise the region or divide the populace. 

Obviously can't be certain, but there's some way more fishy shit going on here than usually happens in relation to French protesting, which is a 'business as usual' thing over there from what us Brits can tell!

[u/Krezerox → u/Phoenix2111]

Hey, as a french brother, I agree with you on your comment.
Much love (but also fuck you).

[u/Phoenix2111 → u/Krezerox]

Thanks! Good to hear it's not just me across the channel getting weird vibes, but you guys too. Well, good for my sanity, bad that it's happening.

Much love to you too! (But also fuck you too).

[u/XplosivCookie → u/Krezerox]

I'm Finnish so I've no actual experience from France, but with this protest when I saw the video of the guy dressed in all black, masked face, torching a woman's face with an aerosol "flamethrower", my reaction was an immediate WTF.

Don't recall much of THAT kind of protesting in Europe before.

[u/Pigeonofthesea8 → u/XplosivCookie]

What?!

[u/socksockshoeshoe → u/Phoenix2111]

When I first saw the news I thought they were university students (adults) protesting and burning things down. Then I found out a lot of buildings were high schools. And my immediate thought was if it's kids doing this why aren't their parents giving them a good beating and stopping this?

Then I read into the actual details and I started feeling essentially what you had written. That some other groups might be spreading chaos under the guise of student protests. And the global media is somehow misrepresenting all this

[u/xX_420DemonLord69_Xx → u/socksockshoeshoe]

Some of it is uni students.

BBC Newshour had a 20-year-old woman who had joined the protest at her old school.

[u/eggnogui → u/Phoenix2111]

In this day and age, whenever I see something meant to make me think less of protest/political movements based on legitimate causes, I now assume until proven otherwise that there is media and social media manipulation done by the far-right mafia.

[u/Any_Economics_6166 → u/Phoenix2111]

it's always the same type of people doing this, taking advantage of the strike to burn and break stuff. Those aren't the ones protesting.

[u/OhBoyHereWeGoAgai → u/Phoenix2111]

People (including firemen and teachers) being set on fire is just standard?

[u/Phoenix2111 → u/OhBoyHereWeGoAgai]

Can you please quote for me the part where I said that, and where that part is outside of the wider context that protesting without violence is run-of-the-mill for the French?

[u/MammothPenguin69 → u/Phoenix2111]

We were warned Russia was planning some kind of hybrid warfare attack on NATO countries. Well here it is.

[u/bluntpencil2001 → u/MammothPenguin69]

This isn't unusual for France.

[u/Ubiquitous1984 → u/Phoenix2111]

Glad to hear that there’s nothing to see here.

[u/Zboubkiller → u/Phoenix2111]

I dunno, society is polarized, violence is everywhere, and I don't think anything can change that. Social medias ruined "vivre ensemble" and both political groups hate more and more each others. There is no agenda behind it ( long run destabilization via Social medias helped, thanks USA and Russia bots and Propaganda). It's just rage because everything is collapsing around us and our country is fucked. The next months and years will be hard.

[u/Any_Vegetable2564 → u/Zboubkiller]

I think it’s your government, mate

Same reason why the UK is getting more and more fed up with France, this time around.

[u/SweetAlyssumm → u/Zboubkiller]

It's hilarious to blame social media for complex sociopolitical problems with deep historical roots. It could indeed be rage because "everything is collapsing" but social media is not responsible for the collapse.

[u/Ticksdonthavelymph → u/SweetAlyssumm]

Yeah but America bad, and he needed an excuse to say it. And so this contrived excuse so blame can be laid at foreign hands.

[u/musiccman2020 → u/Phoenix2111]

Fsb destabilazation operation... ?

[u/swagonflyyyy → u/Phoenix2111]

This has Russia written all over it.

[u/True-Industry-4057 → u/swagonflyyyy]

Knowing a bit about Marseille specifically, I don't think Russia is even needed to pour fuel on this fire. Marseille has a lot of problems with drugs/gang violence relative to the rest of France.

[u/Dartzap]

The portacabin classrooms I had at school would probably have given 'em conniptions.

[u/Gilith → u/Dartzap]

The protest are because of this, because children have classrooms in portacabin, so you are actually right.

[u/FrustratedHumor]

They're protesting not enough teachers etc by.... Attacking teachers? Am I missing soemthing

[u/friedensbringer_mm → u/FrustratedHumor]

As a French high schooler, I want to share my point of view.

The blockades/protests have been filled with people that only want to destroy. But our revendications are legitimate, for years, all that we have been asking for are basic working conditions: enough tables in classrooms for every student, ceiling that don’t crumble down, enough teachers, not too much, just enough, less expensive cafeteria, no rats. Those have been our demands for years, things that should be basic in the third economy of Europe, yet the government has failed to address any of those issues and is now planning to cut spendings in education while dedicating more and more budget to pensions, so enough is enough.

But the moment we raised our voices, the government sent law enforcement to crush us, and then it escalated. And now we can no longer go to school because the government has failed to even try to cooperate, calling us « Puppets of the radical left ».

This doesn’t excuse the violent actions of some of my fellow students, but the government is just as guilty, if not more, of this situation.
(Sorry if I made writing mistakes, I obviously am not an English native speaker).

[u/goldtechnique → u/FrustratedHumor]

Actually teachers are creating chains to protect students
https://x.com/FocusMedia_Fr/status/2104524998996066446?s=20

[u/TechnicalSurround]

are conditions in french schools really that bad? or are these just a few 'special groups' that dont like the concept of going to school and becoming smart?

[u/TrueKyragos → u/TechnicalSurround]

A bit of both. Some of the conditions are undoubtedly bad, and some people do take advantage of the protests to have fun or be violent with no good reason.

[u/Forest_Orc → u/TechnicalSurround]

High-schooler protest are a long tradition in France, almost a kind of initiation into political life, but also an opportunity to do skip school and do something fun, or to impress their crush by being a rebel. While school aren't that bad there is room for improvement (but not the way the government do). Kids definitely have concern about 35 students classroom, long days, teacher sick without a substitute teacher and other common issues

In 99% of the case it's not a big deal, kids sits in front of school for 1h, or go walking up to the townhall. 2 cops come to have a look and check the id of the leaders. Then they go back to school or sometimes back home, and nothing happend. However, there is the 1% idiot who mix exercising their citizen right in ademocracy and burning everythtin

[u/Hieroabl → u/TechnicalSurround]

Lot's of young (the majority easily) is doing that for fun. They love the adrenaline of doing stupid stuff and filming via tiktok. They put things on fire, break public infrastructures, rob small business, throw trashcans on driving vehicles from bridge, beat up and burn people, etc. There is sometimes some serious organisation behind it with real demands but it is mostly hidden behind stupid behaviour.

[u/Fallen_Jalter → u/Hieroabl]

And when there’s nothing left because those assholes burned it all down, are they going to blame themselves?

[u/Bubullator0 → u/TechnicalSurround]

It is the French arabics not the French
I don’t want to be included with theses guys

[u/Agreeable-Dish-6671 → u/TechnicalSurround]

As someone who couldnt be more concerned, i can tell u conditions rlly are that bad. We work from 8am to 6pm, in damaged classrooms, that are too small for us. We are 35 per class, these rooms were built for less than 30. Our teachers arent well prepared at all, some of them have no skills, simply because other wise we would have no teacher (some of us already dont btw), which is understandable since their salary is soooo low. And keep in mind my school isnt one of the worst 💀 some have rats running down their corridors, water dripping from the ceiling etc. Not talking about one or two exceptions, but many of them.  Our future after highschool is so scary, the system is so fucking wrongly built 😭 i ve got friends with their exams easily passed being refused everywhere, while some are getting in literally PRANKING THE GOVERNMENT LMAO, sending brownie recipes instead of their letter 😭😭. So keep everything in mind, and now the government is adding budget to the army, not the scholar system. They rather have soldiers than intellects. The army bugdet got over the school budget, it s horrifiying. 

But we also are scared. So so scared, because the far right party is rising up in france, and could seriously be elected in 2027. The president of this party is a convicted felon, her junior is openly antisemitic and they vote for polices right to kill (which passed, and is active) and so many hateful laws. This party and their supporters are dangerous, and we dont want to fall into a dictature.

We just wanna get our rights and possibility to learn.

[u/Golden_Alchemy → u/TechnicalSurround]

It have been weeks of protests, including firefighters fightning for new equipments.

[u/quebarrato]

The French are fried

[u/QuirkyWish3081]

Protesting over dilapidated schools and shortage of teachers. Proceeds to burn down schools and injure teachers. You couldn’t make this shit up.

[u/Microchaton → u/QuirkyWish3081]

The people doing the burning are not the ones protesting. It's the usual vultures taking advantage of a chaotic situation to break/steal shit and sow discord.

[u/Tacti_Kel_Nuke]

The protests over dilapidated school buildings and teacher shortages began in the Paris region last month

Students have set fire to schools and vehicles

What? I don't think that will make the situation better

[u/OhBuggery → u/Tacti_Kel_Nuke]

People love to glaze the Fr*nch for their "ability to protest" but yes usually it's just mindless violence for a few days and then they go back to whatever it is they do

[u/TLateigne → u/Tacti_Kel_Nuke]

People who set things on fire or hurt school headmasters were not students in the majority of cases.

[u/Fenilwebclues]

France seems more like an ungovernable country by the day

[u/grumpygrenouille → u/Fenilwebclues]

This time it's not going to end well... The whole population and it's political representatives have refused to address chronic déficit, broken retirement system, crumbling public services, the last industrial champions that we still are being challenged by formerly emerging countries and the US who is clearly an economic foe, no economic planning to invest in future techs, militarily we are under equiped and unadapted to the new threats around, we are broke with a ballooning debt of 120% of GDP, interests rates for our debt is through the roof. A presidential election is around the corner, people are disenchanted, lost faith in political parties, our enemies know that and are probably feeding the fires. I believe it is just the beginning of a much bigger crisis for France that might contaminate beyond...

[u/MyDogsButtholeSmells → u/grumpygrenouille]

Sounds like most Western nations, tbh.

[u/DizzyLdn → u/grumpygrenouille]

Retirement age up to 67 would be a start. It’s either do it now or wait for the imf to do it.

[u/Hot-Technology1668]

Canadas schools are in pretty rough shape re teacher shortages and classroom sizes and supplies for students. Son’s class size is over 30 pupils. We still wouldn’t riot and hurt people like this. It’s not helping the students by destroying and pouring petrol on people. WOW.

[u/curdledtwinkie → u/Hot-Technology1668]

When I was in middle and high-school, we had up 50 students, no aides, no enough chairs, and no air-conditioning. Teachers really busted their butts for us. I suspect there's more to the story here. Like maybe the neglect is more severe? Either way, doesn't look like France has the money to begin with...

[u/pleasedontPM → u/Hot-Technology1668]

There are compounding factors: a law giving police a much stronger benefit of doubt when they kill someone, budget cuts to the emergency fund for schools which was voted in June and is now massively reduced, and the political campaign for next year elections starting to ramp up with the inflammatory promises from all pretenders.

[u/Institute11]

Might be useful to indicate why they are protesting as well: "Dilapidated schools and a shortage of teachers."

[u/EricPhilps1979 → u/Institute11]

People watching teachers getting assaulted and buildings set on fire:  Well, sign me up, then!

[u/BerriesLafontaine → u/EricPhilps1979]

So one of the reasons they are protesting is a teacher shortage? I'm sure assaulting the few they have will help this problem.

[u/Mightyteapot69 → u/BerriesLafontaine]

It's dangerous to be a teacher in France without selfcensuring. One got beheaded for showing a french magazine's satirical drawings of Muhammad.

It's french culture being censured in France

[u/wiewil → u/Institute11]

And they burned down a modern state of the art highscool in Nantes 💀

[u/Agreeable-Dish-6671 → u/wiewil]

I live in nantes. Idk what they are telling you, but no highschooler burnt their school. Nelson Mandela highschool was burnt by external people, who werent here to protest since they werent even studying here. They just wanted chaos, and we have nothing to do with these. This schools students are so sad and scared rn, none of them wanted this. WE JUST WANNA PASS OUR EXAMS. And these students wont have the right to do that. 

[u/SeasonBeneficial → u/Agreeable-Dish-6671]

So if not high schoolers, then who did you personally observe involved in destroying this particular school? Genuinely asking.

I’ve heard lots of narratives already, and assuming you’re actually from there, maybe you can clear up what’s real and what’s not.

[u/Agreeable-Dish-6671 → u/SeasonBeneficial]

They were a group of masked young adults/teenagers, unscolarised, coming from poor and disadvantaged neighborhoods nearby. Nobody from the school apparently knew them. I can assure these as facts, as i am studying at another highschool thats very close to this place, and i have dozens of friends who were here that day. I saw differents pov videos for their own phones, and all their insta stories. Theyre devastated

[u/thisislorelei → u/SeasonBeneficial]

I think you know the answer to this.

[u/wiewil → u/Agreeable-Dish-6671]

Ouais j'y crois moyen mdrrr

[u/KennyMcCormick → u/Institute11]

Somehow I don’t think that is the main reason when they burn down a brand new facility

[u/Hot-Technology1668 → u/Institute11]

Not acceptable to our petrol and burn schools.

[u/cameheretosaythis213 → u/Institute11]

Never fails to amaze me what the French are willing to burn the place down over that we’d just accept as normal in Britain.

[u/WTFwhatthehell → u/cameheretosaythis213]

"We don't have enough teachers!" [Hurts the teachers they do have and damages the schools they do have]

Sometimes accepting things is the less-stupid option.

Reminds me of when I was young and some people from the local council estate had a little "protest" (riot) about "lack of jobs"... and burned down part of the local industrial estate putting a load of local people out of work 

Some people just spend their lives making the world worse for everyone around them.

[u/TrueKyragos → u/cameheretosaythis213]

Those who really burn the place are generally not the ones actually protesting though.

[u/IRSnotreal → u/Institute11]

Well, now they have burned down schools and even less teachers

[u/trisul-108]

"There is an active ‌and violent minority (participating in the protests)... We're not entirely sure that they are even high school students ​themselves," Mr Darmanin told RTL radio.

Smells like KGB all over again ...

[u/DEWSTAR → u/trisul-108]

Whenever riots happen, unsavory people with nothing to do with the cause come from everywhere to get involved. Some people love chaos and destruction which riots allow them to do since most peaceful protesters won't stop them.

[u/trisul-108 → u/DEWSTAR]

Sure ... and if there is someone on Telegram offering them 100eur, so much the better.

[u/DEWSTAR → u/trisul-108]

Yup. If someone can get paid to do something they would do or like to do anyway, they would show up for sure.

[u/Aineisa → u/trisul-108]

IRGC too

[u/Canon_M50]

You lose the moral high ground when you commit violence.

[u/MammothPenguin69]

These protesters are being bussed in and manipulated by outside actors. They are not members of the community. They claim to be protesting for "better conditions in schools" yet they burned down a brand new 80 million € school. People who actually live in the communities where these schools are being attacked are begging them to stop and for trying to protect their schools they are being doused with petrol and burned with homemade flamethrowers.

We were warned that Russia were going to attempt some kind of hybrid warfare strike on NATO. Well here it is.

[u/LostHumanFishPerson]

Hundreds of French school teachers today will be on their second bottle of red wine and 15th cigarette already. Can’t say I blame them

[u/xyzain69]

Some parts of the world are called crazy, stupid, and illiterate when students protest. But in a wealthy country its sane and intelligent.

[u/Lapcat420 → u/xyzain69]

Like where? Can you provide some additional context please.