Sorry, but this isn’t about science, for reasons that will become obvious.
I took my parents to Nantes airport yesterday. They were supposed to leave on Thursday via La Rochelle but their flight was cancelled. I followed my parents to La Rochelle so that they could return their hire car. As we tried to join the motorway we were informed that it was closed and advised to follow an alternate route. We took a detour suggested by my SatNav and rejoined the motorway at the next junction. It was only then that we ground to a halt. Without any information being posted we continued to follow detours until we arrived at a closed airport. The reason was a demonstration by the airport workers union. A mere four and half hours later we returned home. Demonstrations of this type are known in France as manifestation.
This is why yesterday I set off at 09.30 to take my parents to Nantes where their rearranged flight was due to depart at 14.05. With unusual foresight we departed early because my parents did not want their rearranged flights to affect me unduly. All went well until we were less than 2 km from the airport. Then the traffic ground to a halt and, just like yesterday, nobody seemed to know why. We inched our way forward until finally meeting the protestors who were stopping every French car passing the airport, handing them a leaflet and explaining their cause. They were REALLY annoying their fellow French citizens who had earlier flights to catch than did my parents. They were leaping from their cars and running to the airport from well over a kilometre out – presumably planning to go on holiday without whoever was driving. There were cars abandoned on the side of the road by people who felt they had no other option. Recent arrivals at the airport were walking back towards the traffic hoping to meet whoever had been sent to collect them. It was chaos.
At the manifestation itself there was music playing and despite the large numbers of police it had a party atmosphere. Since I have English plates we were waved through – with no eye contact nor a hint of an apology for the inconvenience caused. Right at the beginning of that clip you see two blokes holding out flags to stop the cars (coming away from the airport). Every car stopped – I stopped. A flag is not a sufficient device to stop a car but out of cultural respect I stopped. I have no idea what their protest was. It had greatly affected me for two days in ways that they could not possibly know. However, I love that the police were apparently allowing their protest to carry on. I suspect that if I had decided to charge the flags down I would have been arrested. I think this would have been ironic.
If anyone can explain what the fuss was all about you can read about it here.
Despite the inconvenience I love the fact that France allows its citizens to air their grievances so publicly and annoyingly. It will have cost millions in lost productivity, will have led to several insurance claims (including my parents) and will have seriously inconvenienced hundreds, if not thousands, of people. But that is all better than living in a country where such dissent is not tolerated.
To contrast with the above I would like to offer…
the Russian facing jail time because he wrote on Facebook that he didn’t believe in God
a Saudi court has sentenced a man to 2000 lashes and 10 years in prison for expressing atheist views on Twitter
the US student facing 15 years hard labour for stealing a North Korean propaganda poster
I am very grateful to live in a society that doesn’t judge me for what I think. I suspect that we grumblingly tolerate these outbursts of rage against the system, despite how much they inconvenience us personally, because we appreciate how lucky we are to live in a free society. Long may it last!
Question…
There is only one question – what was the protest at Nantes airport (and la Rochelle) about? There has been nothing on the news here although I know there was some nasty violence in Nantes on Thursday night – here’s the link. Use your superior linguistic skills to work it all out for me!
Comments