Franck, Ahmed, Clarissa

(B2) Behind the three names of the police officers affected during the Charlie Hebdo attacks and surroundings, at the beginning of January, there is a last sign sent by the authors of Charlie. Like some kind of new sign of fate. The three police officers killed – Franck, Ahmed, Clarissa – truly represent the diversity of France, from Normandy to the Caribbean Islands.

Beyond the victims, it is somewhat French society that is affected. There exists among the aggressors, a gap, a misunderstanding that it will be necessary, quickly, to try to understand and resolve. How do apparently integrated people move on to such hateful acts, going through delinquency and prisons if necessary? How hundreds of people living in France no longer recognize themselves in what makes the Republic? How messages of hate or death are uttered immediately after an article, even a simple information on Israel or the Arab countries?

The question here is not a problem of law, police, intelligence, repression. It is a question of seeing if discrimination or racism on a daily basis do not generate a medium-term reaction. It is a question of seeing why our prison system produces no effect but on the contrary hollows out, reinforces hostile convictions. It is a question of seeing how to stop rampant racism which today poses a real problem of integration. The real answer to what could have led to the attacks will be much more difficult than a question of reinforcing certain means, techniques. There is a certain French society with flat encephalograms that will urgently need to be revived.

(NGV)