at one stage during the parade, a group of soldiers marched before us on the champs-élysées - young men and women, tall and proud in their french military outfits - and all around us people were clapping and cheering. the man next to me screamed out 'bravo!', and i was suddenly lost in the moment - a gush of emotion rose up through my chest, my face burned and i felt tears welling in my eyes.
and then i snapped back into reality. what the fuck was i getting emotional about? this disgusting display of military might? this flexing of imperialist military muscle by a post-colonial world power? the whole thing dripped with violent, masturbatory nationalism, generating an atmosphere of love-me-and-fear-me police-state hysteria that infected everyone like a virulent disease. first we saw kim jong-il go past on an armoured vehicle (whoops, i mean nicolas sarkozy), and then it was just a cattle call of all the different planes, helicopters, tanks, trucks, troops and guns that the french state has at its disposal to hurt people.
but all was not lost. when you train hundreds of young men until their bodies are sculpted, and then squeeze them into tight military uniforms and leave them to parade about in front of you until your mouth waters, you find yourself surprisingly willing to enter into a love-me-and-fear-me master-slave relationship - as long as there's an exit strategy. and hey, when the planes flew over churning out plumes of blue, white and red smoke: that was pretty cool too...
4 comments:
What more does a queen need? Colour, movement, and some men in uniform. You had it all....well except for the nationalist sentiment.
Stephen
nationalism...it has surprised me as to how much exists in this country. my initial video was quite different - a collage of the military parade, images of war victims and sarko smiling. within 30 minutes i started getting hatemail and then a russian news agency or someone posing as one asked whether they could publish my video on their website, which freaked me out, so i had to get rid of it.
i got more hate-mail on a language website which i use for my french entries. hmmm...war is not sacred.
"at one stage during the parade, a group of soldiers marched before us on the champs-élysées - young men and women, tall and proud in their french military outfits ..."
I got this far and chimed in with "... who immediately retreated."
oh dear...make sure you don't say that in france! i've been taught a few lessons here about criticising a country i'm not from...it's tiger territory and best avoided unless you're willing to fight to the death!!!
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