Suspiscious Frenchies

Remember the joke by David Letterman? “France wants more evidence. The last time France wanted more evidence, it rolled right through France with a German flag.”

Or that line in the New York Times in February of 2003 about the WMD evidence that was so convincing that “only a fool — or possibly a Frenchman — could conclude otherwise?”

Not only the French are a bunch of cowards who surrender as soon as they can but to top it all, they’re imbeciles, stupid, and fools.

Now, don’t we all know that the French are never satisfied, they love to talk, criticize, discuss and argue to the point they always fail to act when necessary (in which case they surrender…). 

And what’s maddening is that they are trained to do so. It’s even part of their scholar curriculum.

You see, around the age of about 17, nearly all French students have to take mandatory philosophy classes, which could be described as the art of asking questions that never have firm and definitive answers. In fact, the French so much enjoy the pleasure of discussion that there are cafés in Paris and elsewhere dedicated to philosophical debates, opened to whoever wants to take part.

And then comes June when the dreaded baccalaureat has to be carried out. This year, as has been the case for the last 200 years, over 600,000 French youngsters had to spend 4 hours writing an essay related to quotes from Plato, Spinoza, Nietzsche or Descartes. 

Interestingly enough, this year’s subjects included the works of two English philosophers, John Locke and J. Stuart Mill.. And here are some of the ones they had to ponder over the years: 

“Are we chained to our time or is it possible to break free from the values that surround us?” (Est-on prisonnier de son temps, ou peut-on s’affranchir des valeurs qui nous environnent?)

“Are just and unjust mere conventions?” (Le juste et l’injuste ne sont-ils que des conventions ?) 

“Does sensitivity to the works of art require education?” (La sensibilité aux œuvres d’art demande-t-elle à être éduquée?) 

And one the Bush administration may have been well advised to think about:

“Is efficiency the only goal of action?” (L’action ne vise-t-elle que l’efficacité?)

But what makes the value of the essays isn’t so much the answers the students provide to the questions they’re asked but the ability to articulate reasoning, the capacity not to accept things at face value. Quite the opposite indeed. In fact, the more critical they are, the more valuable the work will be. 

This training and the exams they have to go through, is very much decisive in the French way of thinking. As for the rest of their lives, they will never be immediately and plainly satisfied with whatever story they’re told. 

So when the current American administration tried to persuade the whole world that there were terrible WMDs ready to be used by against America and the whole free world, the French were the most vocal. They just weren’t ready to swallow the lies that were presented to the world, notably at the General Assembly of the UN.

Yes, the French wanted more evidence. More convincing evidence, be it at the price of passing for imbeciles in American eyes. 

And yes the French love to talk and argue and discuss and criticize. But shouldn’t Americans be a bit more inquisitive and critical at times? Wouldn’t it be a good idea to have young Americans compelled to take a few philosophy classes? A la française?

Note 1: Being 2 centuries old, the French baccalaureate enjoys such a mythical status that every year, there are several people in their 60s' and even 70s' who attempt to pass, something they obviously weren’t able to do when they were younger.

Note 2: The picture is “Oedipus and the Sphinx” by Jean Dominique Ingres in Le Louvre.