babylaoui: Marriage for all: A civil war in France?

Wilfred You may have heard about almost daily demonstrations, almost riots, in Paris and all over France. France is that European country above Italy and was the home of "Libert?, ?galit?, Fraternit?."

Fan of Discodamaged, Loran Concourdel sent in this article explaining what the French are up to, getting so excited about gay marriage.... It is a hilarious excellent summary of the situation and the hateful antics of the pathetic catholic church and associated fascists. Loran, we salute you!

Loran writes:

I'm French, gay and living between Paris and Berlin. The actual French debate and church hysteria surrounding opening civil marriage to all citizens became a recurrent questions from my Berliner friends these past few weeks.

Since 1999, same sex couples have been able to have their union recognized by French law. Well, almost? This contract is called the PACS and must be signed in front of a judge (like you are criminals), couples are not allowed to celebrate their union in the town hall and it does not give any rights concerning inheritance, mutual taxes, adoption or the legal relationship between parent and child. It was once again a treacherous way to categorize Gay and Lesbians into second class citizenship.

Then the struggle began to the extension of civil marriage to all.

Foot soldiers: Click the headline to read more

In France, marriage is defined by the "code civil" which was written during Napoleonic era by a certain Cambac?res, openly gay, who took great care to give marriage a non-sexual definition (the word couple is not restricted to male and female union). Nevertheless, judges have frequently and abusively interpreted this law in a restrictive straight couple sense. This created an unacceptable discrimination against gay and lesbians.

Let us remember that the French constitution claims that all citizens are equal before the law.

Since AIDS came into our lives, 30 years ago, how many friends have we seen being thrown out of their home after the death of their companion by hateful families? How many children have been raised in love by same sex couples? All this with violent disinterest from French society.

These past few years, the fight for equal rights became the major theme of Gay Prides. But the UMP (Union pour un Mouvement Populaire, founded an led by 2002 as a merger of several centre-right parties under President Jacques Chirac in 2002) has run France since 1995 and they never cared for social progress of any kind. Unfortunately the socialist paranthesis that has seen Lionel Jospin as prime minister from 1997 to 2002, didn't allowed any progress in this direction due mainly to his openly psycho-rigid bigot temper.

Then last year the French people elected Fran?ois Hollande with his 'promise number 31' of the opening of marriage to all. He chose to enact this with a new law. According to Robert Badinter (former minister of justice under Mitterand, who dragged France into modernity by cancelling death penalty in 1982 and decriminalizing homosexuality ) it would have been much simpler to change to code civil and state that a couple could be straight as well as gay or lesbian. But, we do not like simplicity in France. So the long process of law writing began and we gave time to the opponents of this fair progress to organize themselves, find funding, and start lobbying against our rights. Again!

Who are these noisy opponents?

At first we were expecting the usual ones: catholic church and extreme right organizations (who have been married for a very long time, lucky them!) in addition with conservatives from the UMP. But the time given was well used and we've seen the unexpected apparition of a third party headed by a certain Frigide Bargeot [Editor asks: Is Frigide Bargeot any relation to the fragrant Brigitte Bardot? Loran replies, sort of, you stupid ignorant islander.] Despise her traditionalist catholic background, she was a long time party girl and an annoying drunk in some of the less hyped gay bars of Paris - everybody finds a way to rebel against their origins. There she was until on the election of Benedict XVI in 2005 she had some mystical crisis and fell in love with the new pope, even creating a "Benoithon" to support this anti-charismatic head of church. So be it ! As the very obedient girl she is, she started to make the new pope's causes her own. Target:?Our devilish desire to be accepted as full citizens.

So long to the party girl, let's start lobbying.

Right after the presidential election last year La Bargeot started to gather all opponents to gay marriage (bishop conference, extreme right organization, traditionalist catholic, UMP) and did a good job turning those intolerant bigots into a fake happy-looking crowd. She certainly went to many gay prides and learned how festive parades and positive messages are more effective than the strict hateful sad demonstrations those organizations were used to.

In parallel, Islamic council and Jewish representatives also called people to mobilization against this crime against their own gods. And so Gilles Bernheim (Grand Rabbi of France) even wrote a book fully dedicated to demonstrate the evilness of the project. Since then, this book has been proven to be a copy and paste of previous writing of different authors. The Rabbi has since resigned and was also proven to have used a fake university diploma in philosophy. Some people never know when to shut up! We certainly won't miss him. Islam is in a fragile position in France, due to an anti-semitic killing last spring by a French god-fool in Toulouse. So they are keeping a low profile on the marriage law. But you can be sure their hate against us isn't low profile at all.

What's left is Bargeot. And honestly, she did a successful job gathering something like 350 000 people in the streets of Paris. Pretending, of course, that the demos were anything but homophobic while keeping denying our citizens rights. Their main point is that the law will take from them the very meaning of their marriage (union of a male and female in the love of god and procreation). But they still pretend to love us and tell that we can not access the high level of their union because ours are sterile (I've check my balls this morning and I'm pretty sure I have all I need for that).

So we have those protesters, very well secretly funded by the catholic church and determined to keep on fighting even after the vote into law. But don't think they are only the tip of the iceberg, the iceberg is almost entirely visible. According to the last opinion polls here is what the French people think:
63% in favour of gay marriage, 5% without opinion, 32% against. 60% of people against are over 65 years old.

The question left is Why?
Why so much hate? Why so many people in the streets for something that went without any problems elsewhere (I'm thinking more specifically of Spain and Portugal which are well know for a deep attachment to the catholic church). Being neither sociologist or anthropologist, I've found a beginning of an explanation in the interview of Olivier Bobineau, sociologist specialized in religious studies. Here is my translation of a part of his interview (original French text available here.)"The church is in agony in modern societies. It is in anthropologic shock. On one side you have a catholic anthropology that want to put individuals under control through the feeling of love that they pretend to control and incarnate. The catholic anthropology is this: an institution that wants to control love. It's a big ambition. On the other side, it just takes a little sociology, philosophy and history to understand that everybody agrees to acknowledge that the singularity of modernity is to separate institutions and feeling of the individuals. It is the separation of church and state, science and theology, private and public life. Once those institutions are separated from the feelings of the individuals, it allows them emancipation. On one side you have a catholic anthropology that want to control feelings and on the other side an anthropology that wants to separate them from institutions.

So, here's the shock: One of the two is gently winning. Only 2% of French population goes to catholic church on a regular basis. There are no priests anymore. This is why the church is in agony."

Last Friday, the law was adopted in the Senate; it will now go back this week to parliament for a final vote. There is no doubt of any kind that it will pass. This process was accelerated, surely to allow the first marriages to be celebrated before the gay prides in June. For 16 years, more than 500 000 people have been on the streets for the Parisian pride, not counting others cities. There is no doubt that the actual government fear that.

Since the Senate adoption last Friday, CIVITAS is organizing a funny praying demo, there are 60 of them.
Bargeot has promised, on television, blood to the president, finally letting her hate coming under the sun of the media.
She says she will continue the fight with all hateful extreme right and tiny catholic groups. They will surely continue to spread hate and intolerance. After all, this is all they know. Creating the perfect social climate for homophobic attacks as we've seen last weekend in Paris. Read here. http://www.rue89.com/2013/04/08/wilfred-olivier-agresses-a-paris-voici-visage-lhomophobie-241278
Since the Senate adopted the law, Venezuela and New Zealand have granted lesbians and gay marriage.

The fight for our rights has to stay an on-going priority, because we all know that when good men do nothing, evil flourishes.

Going deeper (!)

To be known
In France, since 1905, churches (of whatever confession) and state are separated by law, supposedly forbidding any kind of interactions between them. This is how we hoped to get rid of the oppression of the catholic church and it's authoritarian control over people's life. Since then, the French Republic is meant to be secular and free of all religious influence. Secularism is NOT a weapon against people's faith but a WARRANTY of respect for people's choices in spiritual matter. Religious affairs are handled by the ministry of the Interior, which is also in charge of police. However, still, religious forces are very active in lobbying. And of course, all monotheist religious representatives presented a united front against the opening of marriage to all citizens.

References
1905 French law on the Separation of the Churches and the State
Gesetz_zur_Trennung_von_Kirche_und_Staat_(Frankreich)

1- The Battlefield

UMP
The right wing, conservative, ultra liberal party. Chief of party: Jean-Fran?ois Cop? (He and his party are supporting actively the struggle against marriage for all, participating to the demos )
PS : Socialist party, now in charge with president F Hollande. Chief of party: Harlem D?sir.

S?nat (Senate)
High chamber of parliament in France.

Assembl?e Nationale
Lower chamber of parliament in France.

CIVITAS
Traditionalist Catholic organization with public links to extreme right organizations. Was a part of "La manif pour tous" at the beginning, but quickly separated from them.

Le Printemps Fran?ais
Name given to all the right extremist, participating in the anti extension to marriage for all citizens demonstrations, mainly composed of GUD (a student organization "Groupe Union Defense", training its members for paramilitary attacks) former members and neo-nazi scene allied with traditionalists catholics. Funded by the french catholic church via it's multiple underground organizations and headed by Beatrice Bourge.

Manif pour tous
Name of the organization created by Frigide Bargeot . Hypocrite movement pretending to be gay friendly.

Mariage pour tous
Name of popular movement supporting the extension of marriage to all citizens and rights equality in front of the law.

2- The Generals

Frigide Bargeot
Nickname of Virginie Merle [Tellenne?] (humoristic deformation of Brigitte Bardot and meaning literally Dumb Frigid). Traditionalist Catholic, attention seeker, desperate for public acknowledgment. Formely in charge of communication in RPR party (RPR is the older name of the UMP). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frigide_Barjot

Christine Boutin
Head of the Catholic "Democratic" party, know to Boutin pacs 99 have dared brandish a bible in a session of the French parliament (which is a major offense against the laicity of parliament). They are old time fighters against the opening of civil union to gay and lesbians couples in 1998/99. She was leading the 1999 demos against the PACS (first civil union accepting same sex couples in France) were hateful slogans were told : "Fag today, paedophile tomorrow" "Fags on the pyre" ?.

Xavier Bongibault
The so called "gay" alibi of the anti-marriage movement. Employed by Frigide Bargeot as a "personal assistant" and recently compared Hollande to Hitler on French television (I let you make a personal evaluation of his IQ ).

Beatrice Bourges
Leader of Le Printemps Fran?ais, extremist traditionalist catholic, thinks Frigide Bargeot is "too cheesy".

Fran?ois Hollande
Actual French president, socialist, elected with the promise of extension of civil marriage to all citizens (civil, when talking about marriage, is intended in opposition to religious.)

Christine Taubira
French minister of justice, in charge of the law for the extension of marriage.

3 - The Foot Soldiers

Loran Concourdel
Frenchman living in Berlin and Paris, also known as Fw Projekt https://www.facebook.com/fw.projekt. Author of this article.

You!