On the Paris riots after PSG Champions League win
An American's perspective
So it was: Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) topped Inter Milan 5-0, becoming the first French team to win the Champions League trophy in 30 years, the most prestigious title in soccer. That news spread rapidly throughout Europe and Africa, and a celebration was planned. Interestingly, that news hardly reached the United States and Japan and likely had little impact on much of Asia.
The PSG celebrations began immediately after the match ended in Paris, and then, as night fell, the celebrations spiraled into riots. Multiple sources reported violence as early as halftime. Chaos erupted across the city after thousands of people took to the streets, spreading throughout the cities of France, primarily in Paris and its outskirts, or banlieues. Several videos and photos from the riots exhibited people, mostly young men, clashing with police, crashing through barriers, destroying vehicles and bus stops, climbing monuments, and causing mayhem. 264 cars were burned to the ground. Into the night, the police are desperately trying to keep order and peace. Bikes are being thrown from the top of buildings. Water cannons and tear gas were deployed. Packs of young men are overrunning freeways. At least two people were killed, and hundreds more were injured in Paris. Then, precariously, protesters waved Palestinian, Moroccan, Algerian, Tunisian (and some French flags) and clashed with police. A rioter assaulted a firefighter near the Champs-Élysées. One of the officers injured had to be placed in an artificial coma. This man’s life will never be the same. Protesters waved Palestinian flags amid the chaos following an anti-Israel protest during the championship match in Munich. The chaos seemed planned by terror gangs with international implications.
Tragically, people lost their lives. And this all started with a celebration. Maybe that’s where we need to pause. Is this a true celebration? PSG pays their athletes hundreds of millions, and winning a championship is indeed big. When celebrations descend into riots, which is something the philosopher Nietzsche predicted quite elegantly: that when people were left to their own devices and allowed only to eat cake and further the advancement of the species, they would create chaos just to see what would happen, this celebration turned into a riot certainly seems to fit that picture. Shouldn’t we ask: Where are the parents of these young men (and women)? With unemployment rates of nearly 30% and more young men living at home than ever before, again, where are the parents in these situations? Where are the young workers who need to wake up in the morning and work? This is beyond comprehension.
A French friend tried to assure me that “the French always have riots after soccer games.” This isn’t the France I once knew 25 years ago. This isn’t the France my father was in shortly after the Second World War. And indeed, this isn’t the France my grandfather saved from the wrath of authoritarianism from Hitler’s Germany. I wish that I could believe my friend, but France is a different place.
And these riots in France are not celebrations at all. Instead, they are exact manifestations of what the American people went through as a divided nation. These are precisely the riots in the United States during the Vietnam War and in Los Angeles of Rodney King. Or the riots that followed the murder of George Floyd. This is a divided world, not one where people celebrate the awe of perfection in sports.
To recap: A 19-year-old in a BMW plowed into fans in Grenoble, striking a family and leaving one dead. 5400 French police were deployed and cracked down and arrested hundreds of people. Three people died in the tumult: a 17-year-old boy who was stabbed in the chest in the nearby town of Dax, a 23-year-old man who was hit by a vehicle while riding a scooter, and a pedestrian in Grenoble. The French Interior Ministry said that 559 people were arrested. Officials reported that 192 people were injured. The needless deaths from these so-called celebrations must stop.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ckgqyg325gno
When I lived in France, particularly in Avignon in the late '90s, I began to sense what the future might look like. There was a noticeable shift—street life was becoming more dangerous, with incidents at concerts and at night becoming more common. Unemployment had long been an issue in Europe, but the social climate was also changing, influenced by shifting demographics and cultural differences stemming from immigration, especially from North Africa. It felt like the core values of the French Republic—Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité—were no longer being upheld, and the government wasn’t doing enough to preserve them. Sadly, I saw this transformation coming, and it played a major role in my decision to move to the United States, along with the better job opportunities available here.