#french colonization

[daughterofdessalines]

We cannot say we are against gen0cide globally .. but celebrate a holiday with gen0cidal roots by supporting a film romanticizing colonizer who was the architect of gen0cide…

[sissa-arrows]

random question, but why do Algerians still hate the French? French Algeria hasn’t existed since 1962, so why so much hatred still?

First of all 1962 is 61 years ago. You’re saying it as if it was centuries ago and nobody was alive anymore. My grandparents who are very much alive Al hamdulilah were born under French colonialism. I’m 29 and I saw the consequences of French tortures on my great grandpa with my own eyes (they cut off some of his fingers) as I was lucky enough to meet him (he died when I was 8-9) This is not some ancient event that has no consequences anymore on people. It still has consequences on the country and on the people. Like you’re going to pretend that France didn’t have lynching against Algerians until the 90’s? You’re going to pretend anti Algerian racism is not so present in France that the French word for a racist attack/lynching (ratonnade) is not a mix between an anti Algerian slur and the word “beating”?

Now to answer your question.

We don’t hate the French they hate us that’s different. Algerians don’t give a flying fuck about France. Algerians would want few things more than pretend France doesn’t exist.

But France hate us and resent us for taking our independence. Are we supposed to stay silent when France says we should be grateful for colonialism? Are we supposed to stay silent when they say we should be apologizing not them? Are we supposed to stay silent when absolutely nobody got punished for what they did to Algerians and that they actually got rewarded? Are we supposed to stay silent when the remains of our ancestors (some of them children) are still kept and exposed in French museums despite asking to get them back? Are we supposed to stay silent when France still has our archives including the ones before they colonized Algeria and still refuse to give us those archives? Are we supposed to stay silent when they say the trauma of their colonizers grandparents leaving Algeria is worst than the trauma of our grandparents seeing their loved ones being killed, tortured, raped? Are we suddenly pretending transgenerational trauma doesn’t exist and that 132 years of colonialism and the denial of the horrors committed, worst than the denial switching the blame, has no consequences on Algerians today? My grandpa still sleeps with a shotgun because of the trauma. My father left Algeria because his mother was so traumatized by what the French did during the war of liberation (they killed one of her child, he wasn’t 2 years old yet) that when the civil war started she told my dad to leave cause she didn’t want to lose an other child.

Now do you plan on asking French people why they hate Algerians or do you keep your questioning to Algerians only? We don’t hate France but if we did we would have every single right to.

Lastly if I was a Jewish woman posting about Nazis Germany and antisemitism in present Germany as well as Neonazis would you have felt you have the right to ask me why I still have issues with it cause it happened in 1945? Unless you’re a racist scum you wouldn’t have done it cause you know how horrific the holocaust was and how fucked up it would be to question the feelings of descendants of survivors (I’m still giving you the benefit of the doubt maybe your ask was genuine and you didn’t know any better). So why do you think you have the right to question how Algerians feel about France?

[sissa-arrows]

Sometimes I remember that white chick who decided to quote a tweet of mine where I was saying that it’s fucked up to talk about settlers being traumatized by decolonization… and like she decided to bring up her settler grandma “trauma” into it. Algerians were calling her out and then this Algerian girl said “Oh your grandma is a pied noir? I’m a wahrania” and this will forever be my favorite tweet of all time.

The historical reference was perfect and over a year later I still think about this answer.

Context: During French colonialism in Algeria Wahran (Oran) was a settler majority town. It was a region very violent against indigenous Algerians and the segregation was worst than in the rest of the country. When the war of liberation started it got worst the settlers became more violent. Even buying food was dangerous and Algerians from Wahran had to send group of men to be able to go buy food for the neighborhood safely, you couldn’t send a child or a woman or even go alone as a man it wasn’t safe. Toward the end of the war when they realized that Algeria would be independent and the OAS was created (a white supremacist terrorist group) they found a lot of support in the settler population of Wahran. It was so horrible for Algerians that at the independence they attacked the settlers who were still in Wahran to kick them out. Colonial nostalgia means they call what happened a “massacre” and always talk about how traumatizing it was. Wahran is THE “traumatic” experience they love to mention so much. So the girl saying “your grandma is a settler? I’m a Wahrania” is just so freaking sweet.

[sissa-arrows]

Hello, could you explain more how/why france not applying secularism on Algerians made it easier to control them???

Under secularism the state consider all religions to be equal. The state does not recognize religion. By refusing to apply secularism in Algeria (and in most colonies but Algeria was a specific case)it allowed them make laws targeting only “Muslims”. On top of it they redefined the term “Muslim” as an ethnicity and not a religion (a Christian indigenous Algerian was legally “muslim” for example). It also meant that mosques and imams could be controlled by the government. The colonial government presented the situation as a form of respect for “Algerians religious beliefs” but it was about control. The lack of secularism only benefits the religion of the oppressor never the religion of the oppressed. So in the case of French colonialism the lack of secularism would have benefited Christians but not marginalized communities. In some colonies with bigger Christian communities secularism was actually applied on Christians but not on Muslims because France being a “Christian country” the lack of secularism may have benefited Black Christians.

Under French colonialism indigenous Algerians actually WANTED the 1905 law introducing secularism to be applied to them too. Because it would have meant that the colonial government couldn’t control them or discriminate them based on religion or rather their perceived religion.

[sissa-arrows]

A stand to honor the victims of October 17th 1961 to encourage people to come to the anti colonial week end on the 15th and 16th and to ask for the liberation of Georges Abdallah

France killed between 200 and 300 PEACFUL UNARMED Algerians in Paris. They were protesting because of a curfew imposed on Algerian Muslims only and because they wanted Algeria’s independence. This is known as one of the greatest if not the greatest government repression against a group of peaceful protesters in modern time in Western Europe. For days their bodies were appearing in the Seine river (a lot of them were drowned by the police). Last year Macron and the Police prefect went to put flowers saying what happened was unforgivable. All without admitting that it was a racist crime, without admitting France’s responsibility. And all while keeping Algerians (a lot of them descendants of the victims) from putting flower where their grandpa or father was killed by the police. A police prefect and a President were allowed to put flowers in front of cameras but Algerians were not allowed to mourn their grandpa or father killed because of the orders of a police prefect protected by a French President…

Today in Toulouse a pro Palestinian group organized had a stand, a small march to honor those Algerians who were killed, talk about the anti colonial week end planned in a week and to ask for the liberation of Georges Abdallah. They had signs saying « Algeria vanquished Palestine will vanquish » and they chanted these same words.

[sissa-arrows]

In today’s episode of France is islamophobic as fuck.

Some of y’all probably saw that post about Macron wanting to “reform” Islam to make it compatible with “French values” how he wants Muslims to sign a declaration about rejecting “political Islam” and embrassing “French values”.

Well let’s talk about his timing. In order to “reform Islam” and make it compatible with “French values” Macron is inviting and asking French Muslim scholars as well as Muslim leaders to help him. All of that happened a couple days ago... you know what also happened a couple days ago? The anniversary of France slaughtering Muslim scholars in Chad after inviting them to pretend they wanted to reform Islam so it would be compatible with French values. Yeah when France colonized Chad they were angry as fuck cause the guy who resisted the most and kept pushing French colonizers was a Muslim so the first thing France did was make Islam illegal in Chad. They would humiliate people making them walk naked in the streets, torture them, kill them... being a Muslim was seen as an attack against the State (France) and therefore it was illegal. A lot of Muslims had to run away from Chad because of that, a lot of scholars hid too to avoid getting killed or put in jail. On November 17, 1917 France invited about 400 Muslim scholars in Chad telling them they wanted to find a way to make Islam legal again by reforming it and make it compatible with French values. Guess what? They didn’t plan to talk at all and just invited them so they would be reunited and therefore easier to slaughter. They killed (beheading with knifes and machetes) about 400 scholars and they exposed the heads of the most famous at the entrance of the town to serve as a warning for Muslims. When asked about it the French soldiers and colonizers who killed those innocents said it was a retaliation for a French Sergeant who got stabbed and killed on October about a month before. Later it was proved that the person who stabbed the sergeant and the scholars who got killed had NOTHING to do with each other and that France knew they just used it as an excuse.

France went in a country, made their religion illegal, invited people to tell them “hey we’re gonna work toward accepting your religion” just to trick them into coming out of hiding and slaughter them and on the anniversary of that massacre France is asking Muslims scholars and leaders to come and help reform Islam to make it more acceptable for France... that doesn’t sound like a threat at all.

[sissa-arrows]

According to France’s Prime Minister one of the reasons why France gets attacked by terrorists is because this country made too much compromises and people were told to regret colonization, to apologize for it... and that the first step against terrorism is to stop being ashamed of France’s past and to start being proud of it, of French freedom, values and roots.

He said I quote “They act as if we should regret colonization and whatever”. He said that on November 1st. November 1st. Aka the anniversary of Algeria’s independence war.

That’s so much bullshit that I can’t even be horrified by the consequences of what he said (hello white supremacy, hello ending on a “fichier S” (a file where people considered as threats to the nation are) just for saying France played a huge role in slavery and should be ashamed of it, hello for ending on that same file for talking about what France did to Algerian Muslims). So much bullshit I can’t even find the energy to be horrified and instead I started to laugh uncontrollably.

WHEN THE FUCK DID THEY REGRET COLONIZATION AND APOLOGIZED FOR IT? WHEN THE FUCK DID FRANCE ACKNOWLEDGED ANY PART OF ITS FUCKED UP PAST, REGRETTED IT AND APOLOGIZED FOR IT? My great grandpa’s missing fingers because he was tortured by a white man for having the audacity to want the same right as white people would like to know WHEN THE FUCK WAS ANY OF THOSE ATROCITIES RECOGNIZED AND REGRETTED?! Senegalese men and Algerian men who were forced to fight for France during WWII but had a lower veteran pension than white men until 2006 would like to know WHEN THE FUCK DID FRANCE SHOWED SHAME FOR ANY OF ITS FUCKING PAST?

For real if so far this was France being ashamed, having regrets and apologizing what the hell is gonna happen now.

[sissa-arrows]

People discovering France’s logic honestly gives me life.