In France it is difficult to speak “of ethnic-racial issues in a nuanced way”, lamented the French Minister of Education on Tuesday Pap Ndiaye during a speech at a historically black university in Washington. Addressing a panel of mostly African-American students, the minister, visiting the United States on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, reverted to his academic garb, outlining the differences between France and the United States in the fight against racism.
“The French State is officially indifferent to the color of the skin,” recalled this historian, a specialist in American minorities, of a Senegalese father and a French mother.
“It’s a great idea, of course, (…) but reality requires a more concrete approach,” he continued, noting, in fluent English, that “in France there are inequalities, discrimination and different forms of racism.”
“The concept of race is still very sensitive in France”
To address it “effectively” in the world of education, we must “identify the poorest neighborhoods and invest more in their schools,” he said. This response “clearly emphasizes social inequalities” because “the concept of race remains very sensitive in France,” she noted, facing students accustomed, on the contrary, to policies targeting the database of ethnic statistics.
An unthinkable practice in France, where “extreme right-wing organizations are currently powerful” and where it is, according to him, “difficult to deal with ethnic-racial issues in a nuanced way.” “I can attest to the price that must be paid when one dares to speak about it,” continued the minister, accused by the National Group of being “a militant racist.”
But, he said, “that will not stop us from actively working to develop a more inclusive culture in our schools, so that no one feels excluded because of their gender or skin color.”
“The French are not racist!”
After Pap Ndiaye’s intervention, the right and the extreme right harshly criticized the words of the Minister of Education. Speaking of “communitarian delirium”, Les Républicains François-Xavier Bellamy MEP writes that “the ‘concept of race’ is not ‘sensible’ in France, it is simply contrary to what our country is founded on”.
Pap Ndiaye “would do better to take care of high school students who, in France, have not had French classes since January”, criticizes Reconquista MEP Gilber Collard.
“He talks about race” while “France is universalist, misunderstands and arrogantly ignores races. This man holds a discourse that raises races, it is at least a racialist discourse”, he expressed for his part declared in CNews the president of the Reconquest Éric Zemmour. “No, Minister, the French are not racist!” Senator LR Bruno Retailleau wrote on Twitterasking the Prime Minister to overrule the Minister of Education.
Source: BFM TV
