Talk:Anti-French sentiment in the United States/Archive 3

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Accusations section

I have moved this section here because contributes nothing to the understand of the subject and only serves to perpetuate boorish stereotypes. It is a collection of bad clichés disguised as opinions, none of which are attributed, with no explanation of the origins of such sentiments. As such, it is unworthy of Wikipedia. If the author of this material disagrees strongly, let's discuss it below. -- Viajero 15:08, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Often, anti-French Americans allege that France is a weak country that chronically appeases and surrenders to its enemies:

• France has never had a military victory. see joke This of course diminishes the French military contributions throughout history.
• France is a cowardly country that chronically prefers surrendering rather than to fight. Alluding to France's invasion by Nazi Germany in World War II, this of course disregards the huge toll that France paid for not surrendering to Germany in World War I.
• The French are ungrateful. The implication is that France displays an obstinate and unreasonable opposition to the United States' foreign policy, treating the US intervention in World War I and the American liberation of France in World War II with either forgetfulness or perhaps a sense of resentful shame for their necessity. One could also interpret this as a demand that French should feel indebted to the US and refrain from having an independent foreign policy.

Other accusations target France's internal policies:

• France is a communist or socialist country that cannot manage its economy.
• France is racist and anti-semitic.
• France does not recognize civil rights. (freedom of religion, freedom of speech, presumption of innocence...)

Such accusations are generally mixed with clichés often inspired by immediate post-World War II life or the lifestyle of the artistic minority:

• The French are lazy and spend their time chatting in cafés and smoking cigarettes.
• The French don't bathe.
• French women do not shave their bodies.
• The French eat frogs, snails, rats and horses.
• The French men are largely homosexual/bisexual.
• The French are emotional and flamboyant.
• The French are rude and disrespectful to tourists.

It has been discussed above, please read talk/discuss in talk before removing large blocks of text, as per policy. Sam [Spade] 15:20, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Sam, this article is also being discussed on the mailing list Wikien-l and there is general agreement that is a biased, poorly written article. Parts of the accusations section really don't belong in Wikipedia. "French don't bath", what kind of nonsense is that? I suggest that rather than revert again you take a good look at that section, perhaps some small part of it could be salvaged. Right now the article probably belongs on Votes for deletion. Fred Bauder 18:09, May 24, 2004 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but the proper place to discuss an article is on the talk page. It is, I think, not nonsense to state that the mainstream US media and politicians sometimes make very cliché and ill-tasting jokes on France. David.Monniaux 19:47, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

I think some of this should be discussed in some context. It is a widespread notion in American culture, and to some extent British culture, that French people do not bathe and their women don't shave their bodies, among other stereotypes, and this forms the backbone of quite a few popular comedy routines. Anti-American sentiment has a similar set of stereotypes about Americans, including nonsense like "low intelligence" that's no less offensive than these French stereotypes are. --Delirium 18:18, May 24, 2004 (UTC)

If the mailing list is going to be the method of determining article content, I'll happily leave the project. If this is the policy please show me where it is specified so that I can protest, attempt change, and give up if necessary. Otherwise, please list your objections to the section on the Talk page if it is longer than a few sentances of text which you'd like removed. Sam [Spade] 19:09, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Simple, just remove the insulting material. Wikipedia is viewed by a world-wide audience. Fred Bauder 19:18, May 24, 2004 (UTC)

So? I'm French and I think that it is entirely appropriate that the crude and uninformed views of some Americans should be documented, if they are repeated as part of attacks against a certain foreign country.

If we were to discuss nazism, I'd find it appropriate to state a few of the favourite allegations that the Nazis had against the Jews, including the most ludicrous ones. David.Monniaux 19:30, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Any article that doesn't mention these stereotypes--inaccurate and insulting though they may be--is incomplete, just as no article about anti-Americanism could go without a reference to cowboys. Maybe not a list, but the article is about popular perceptions, not reality. Meelar 19:23, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Encyclopedic

Apparently some feel that certain sorts of documentation is too insulting to be encyclopedic, perhaps even violating the "no personal attacks" policy. If this is so I'll need at least a dozen articles removed in their entirety ;) What it comes down to, IMO, is Factual accuracy and NPOV. Some (prob. most or all) people are insulted by the truth, a fact I know quite well. The reason I love encyclopedias is that they are (supposedly ;) impartial places where I can look up the wacky stuff near and dear to my heart which would elsewhere be censored as too insulting/disturbing/offensive. If we begin censoring useful, factual, NPOV material from the wiki, I think we'll need to substantially alter the project goals as well, and might well wander into the realm of Newspeak. Just a thought. Sam [Spade] 20:33, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

To explain what I think Sam means: documentating that a person or a group make "personal attack", even copying the attack themselves, is by no means an endorsement of them. It's just factual information. It's like when we say that Khomeiny called the US the "Great Satan". David.Monniaux 20:38, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Right. And I am offended by the personal attack of someone calling the USA a "great satan", being american. But its encyclopedic, and should be here. What if someone wants to know why some americans (or english speakers generally) dislike the french? I have heard ALOT of anti-french jokes BTW, and heard them more often, not less, over-seas. In fact the only time I saw a real act of descrimination was against 2 frenchmen, not in the US but in Amsterdam. Anyways, this is nothing so very new, there are several articles w similar listings. Sam [Spade] 21:25, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Israel

Hi.

First of all, sorry for my english, but you know french people and the english language....

Would you be so kind as not to mistake *your* ignorance for a general case? :-)

So I found some mistakes in this article. I Just want to start with one : "France also ended its traditionally close relations with US ally Israel and began to support the Palestinian cause in the Middle East." . I think this sentence is partialy false. For Israel, I want to remenber you that french scientists helped Israel between 1949 and 1960 to have the atomic power.

That's exactly the point. France distanced itself from Israel, which it was formerly very close to (France used to be Israel's foremost supplier of weaponry).

Next, that France was (is) supporting the palestinians... that means that France is supporting the palestinian terrorism wich is the more known "politic" :No, it does not. You may support the Palestinian desire of a state while not supporting the methods of groups like Hamas activity since many years, that totally false. So If someone can re-establish the true in this sentence ? Kelson 07:58, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

I tried to rephase the sentence. The sentence was probably not as bad as you said in the first place; I suspect that your poor English may have resulted in a misunderstanding. David.Monniaux 09:40, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Hi,

Your sentence implies that since there is this opposition between french and americans, we change of side because the ameicans are with the israel, and now we are with their ennemies. This is completely false. fr:Colette.

Not really. I tried to make it clear that the Israel/US alliance was a consequence of the decision of the French government to distance itself from Israel rather than a cause. David.Monniaux 13:15, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

pardon, I had not seen that it was in the past. My English is approximate

I just wanted to say, solidly, that I don't think any reasonable person thinks France supports terror, despite their obvious sympathies for the palistinian people, and attempts to support them (as MANY nations are doing) in the U.N. I don't think the article misrepresented that, but perhaps we can make it especially clear. Sam [Spade] 19:32, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Anti-americanism

I think that your item is an occasion for you to express your anti-french feeling. This is a little as if I created an entitled aticle anti-us and that I link it with pages of bad ones joke, or in which ones I said this that I thought about the war: the Americans want the oil of the Iraqui ones to pay less their gasoline, or the americans eat on the Iraqui ones because they are racist. But reassure you this is not that I think about you; You there cannot nothing. but know that there is not clean war. Surtout continuez ça manque d'illustrations ;o)

There is a page for this, see the header. Sam [Spade] 20:46, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Is there a page to say that you understand nothing ?

For your information, the jokes on the French were inserted into the page by me, and I'm French. According to me, they are a testimony of the bad taste and the arrogance of some US politicians and journalists.

I advise you to learn how to read and write English before contributing further to the encyclopedia. Also, you may want to get acquainted with the concept of "quotation", which does not imply endorsement. The page on Jean-Marie Le Pen is full of quotations from the man itself, which I think say more about him than merely chanting "oh, he's a bad bad man". David.Monniaux 20:51, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Sure that they are the political powers and the medias which create the tensions or which make believe that they exists tensions between the populations. But this article for me is propaganda, since before the war, you would have spoken of the friendship between french and americans. this not step is measured.

In the French translation, I added editor notes to help French readers connect allegations with related facts. I think it should also be done in the english article, mainly for the non-american audience. They are also a few allegations I have no idea where they come, like the French are homosexual allegation I've never heard of before (BTW everydody knows that tea-drinking Englishmen are homosexual :-)) Marc Mongenet 00:11, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

I have added a couple of extra links in response to your concerns. Sam [Spade] 00:33, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

Canadian Bacon

I removed the following text from the article-- "The U.S. media's encouragement of Francophobia rings a bell for those who have watched Michael Moore's film Canadian Bacon – in which anti-Canadian feelings in the US are deliberately stirred up by television sequences."

I felt that it endorsed the POV that U.S. media encourage Francophobia, not to mention endorsing the POV of Candian Bacon that the U.S. is irrationally xenophobic. Meelar 20:47, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Affirming your point, Meelar, Canadian Bacon is a broad satire, and Michael Moore is not exactly in the business of making anyone else look bad at U.S. expense. Cecropia | Talk 21:07, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Yeah, I probably shouldn't have put it in - sorry. It just came to me when I was reading that section and recollecting watching FOX News last year (what a scary station). Zoney 22:01, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

If it helps, I agree with you on that one ;) Meelar 01:48, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

French translation

Complete (and neutral I hope) French translation finished and saved: fr:ressentiment anti-français aux États-Unis. with some editors note. Marc Mongenet 21:48, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

I translated it into English using [1] and I found you to have done a very good job. The only problems are I saw were ones with the English article, that the fact of American anti-French attitudes being largely a carry-over from British historical anti-French attitudes, as well as those from English speakers generally is not addressed (it should be the focus really). I have never seen any French person treated rudely or given poor service in the USA (we almost never see French people where I live in any case) but when I was overseas I heard anti-French jokes or conversations far more often than in the US, and even saw two Frenchmen given poor service by the Dutch shopkeeper, and jokes made of them in their presence (in English, and largely insulting their poor English skills). This is personal research, and has no place in the article of course, but I know that anti-French sentiment is neither something unique to Americans, nor has its origins here. The start of the problem is the title, which should be a redirect to "francophobia" or "anti-French", a larger article of which this would be a section of. Sam [Spade] 22:26, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

The english article is (for me) not very clear with the French toast-German toast affair. It says that only the hot dog invention was successful But it also says that French toast replaced German toast. So, if it wasn't successful, what it a French toast toast (or what was it at that time)?Marc Mongenet 00:01, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

This business with the names of food is foolishness, you correctly summed it up with "gammineries". I never saw anyone selling or asking for "freedom fries", but rather it was done in Washington where food is served to politicians. It was an exciting fact for the media, but little substance. What the war has done is enlarge and enbolden previous francophobia, rather than creating many new opinions. The foolishness w the "chips of liberty" and "toast of freedom" should not be overemphasized ;) Sam [Spade] 00:15, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

Oops, it's «gamineries», not «gammineries». My dictionnary wasn't providing a good definition for "gimmickry", so I summed it the best I could. But I still have a problem. What is a "German toast"? Marc Mongenet 00:27, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

It is almost always French toast, and it is bread dipped in egg, and fried. Here are some recipes [2]. Sam [Spade] 00:41, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

Wouldn't an American francophobia section in a francophobia article take a disproportionate amount of place? Not because american are more francophobe, but because they seem to have more gripes. I am not sure the POV of americans, described in this article, can/should be mixed with the POV of Dutchmen, Italians, Swiss... I feel it's already big, interesting and complicated enough, with only the americans POV on France. Marc Mongenet 00:01, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

I agree mainly, but then we ignore these other important aspects (unfriendly opinions of Dutchmen, Italians, Swiss, etc...) as well as the historical British roots of American (and other english-speaking) francophobia. Sam [Spade] 00:06, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

Is american francophobia specific enough to warrant a specific article (like Anti-Semitism)? Maybe the fact that an article was spontaneously created speaks for itself? Or maybe not. Marc Mongenet 00:20, 26 May 2004 (UTC)