Sorry, French people, your World Cup win is not yours, so says Peniel Joseph
France’s World Cup win is a victory for immigrants everywhere
France’s electrifying 4-2 World Cup win over Croatia represents a victory for Africa and immigrants everywhere.
The team’s success is particularly noteworthy because of the way in which anti-immigrant sentiment, especially against migrants with African roots, has roiled French society over the past two decades. In 2005, racial and urban unrest gripped suburban housing projects outside of Paris in the wake of the death of two teenagers who were electrocuted in a substation after being chased by police. And just last month, riots erupted in the French city of Nantes, two hours outside of Paris, after a young Guinean immigrant was shot and killed after being stopped by the police.
Clashes over police brutality, racial justice and economic opportunity shape debates across Europe and the United States regarding who deserves the right to be a citizen. Immigrants with African roots populate all parts of French society, particularly the areas that require hard, at times poorly paid and dangerous labor. Many of these immigrants — and citizens — are connected to France and the larger European Union’s colonial past.
Good grief. These people. A goodly chunk of those “rioting” (burning cars is a sport that breaks out all the time by these people) was done by people who are illegally present in France. But, really, is anyone surprised that a leftist nutter had to go down this route? I would have been more surprised if there wasn’t a story trying to link the World Cup to SJW stuff like unfettered immigration. And, yes, they also have plenty of stories linking the World Cup and ‘climate change’. Moving on
France’s at times toxic debate over immigration anticipated America’s contemporary global debate over immigration, one that scapegoats the most vulnerable populations as thieves, rapists and murderers. England’s decision to leave the European Union, what’s become popularly known as “Brexit,” came in the wake of a xenophobic campaign that smeared immigration as spelling the death knell of a racially pure British identity.
We can no longer afford to pretend that immigrants entering any nation on earth are not fellow citizens seeking the opportunity to thrive and become citizens of a reimagined world community. France’s World Cup team demonstrates to all how immigration, at its best, holds the key to a liberated and more humane future for us all.
In other words, let them all in. Just not near where the liberals live. They don’t like that much.
