Comments for Do the French want this? at http://www.rivierareporter.com , comment 1 to 12 out of 12 comments http://www.rivierareporter.com Sat, 22 Nov 2008 06:25:26 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.2 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-405 These days it applies to eveywhere! - Walgren Fri, 31 Oct 2008 12:26:52 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-397 There's only one word for life in the UK. Dysfunctional. But the same word applies to France! - Elgan Wed, 29 Oct 2008 10:29:23 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-388 To add science to this report, I would site Aamer Sarfraz et al [2008] who found that English patients who abused alcohol had lower referral rate for future intervention, younger age group,severe alcohol abuse and less chance of a psychiatric follow-up. While the evidence for English youth and binge/severe drinking is well documented, low referral rate and follow-up may reflect different structure of local services. Drug and alcohol service is a part of mental health services in Lille, but in Dartford, like elsewhere in England, this service is independent and tends to depend on self-referral. This may also explain, albeit partially, the lower frequency of drug and alcohol abuse as a reason for referral in Dartford as some of these patients would be assessed at the A&E and discharged with advice regarding self-referral to drug and alcohol service without referral to psychiatric or NHS substance misuse services. It may also reflect the absence of integrated services for dual diagnosis as proposed by the English government. - Ann Marie Mon, 29 Sep 2008 15:37:25 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-378 Mike P, Your cinema guard is nothing new - it happened to me in a small town outside of Glasgow years ago. One thing that never happened was being asked to empty the contents of my rucsac in a supermarket....which seemingly is the 'norm' here. So many times in the Intermarche on blv gambetta in Nice...i've refused only to be met with some attitude. I always ask the assistant what is in their bag. - Shortia Mon, 15 Sep 2008 21:59:10 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-377 The sole purpose of this particular 'guard' seemed to be to stop people getting past the foyer without tickets, which they would only have done if they wanted to use the filthy toilet or the scruffy overpriced junk food bar. They would not have been able to get into the actual cinema without a ticket so it seems pretty pointless. Ironically after I'd come out of the toilets on my way past I sarcastically thanked him for so graciously allowing me to use the facilities whereupon he told me he could 'ban' me from buying a ticket! It is exactly this type of bullying and abuse that sums up so much of what is wrong with the UK. - Mike P Mon, 15 Sep 2008 13:45:29 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-376 Are there really security guards in British cinemas? Is there a real need for them? I have never seen guards the Nice cinemas on avenue Medecin and I have never seen a need for them either. Supermarkets and Fnac, yes. For shoplifting, no doubt. - Walgren Mon, 15 Sep 2008 13:22:34 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-375 I just now got the reference to La Trinité which I hadn't understood before. I too am pretty sure Mr Renfrew isn't writing from there but La Trinité is the exception not the rule, any more than Brixton or Bradford are the rules in England. The points Mike P and G Renfrew make are not exceptional. The cinema guard story illustrates just one typical example of what many normal British people have to put up with in my experience. As Mr Renfrew points out, millions of them are so disgusted that they leave and they tend to not regret it on the whole. How bad can a country be when so many of its own people see leaving it as their only hope for a decent life? I can understand why many Eastern Europeans come to Britain seeking a better life (France has quotas, I think) but we shouldn't have to. I would live in Britain again if it was the way it used to be when I was in school there. We were once such a good and decent nation. Whatever has gone wrong? - PammyK Mon, 15 Sep 2008 10:55:22 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-374 OF COURSE France is not perfect. No where is. There are some areas (like Ariane or Clichy) which are much worse than others, just like in England. In the past 10 years I have lived in middle class areas in both the UK and France and my parents and sister still live in Norwich and I visit them almost every month (thank you Stelios!). I see a lot more public misbehaviour, yobbery, drunkeness and street crime there than I have ever experienced here. My personal experience is that the French are sometimes aloof, rude and unhelpful but they are also less violent and better behaved in public than the English (I can't speak for Scotland as I've never been there). All you have to do is live in a non-posh UK neighbourhood for a while and absorb a few government figures (as announced in the serious media like BBC) to see that alcohol abuse, teenage pregnancy and many other social problems are more prevalent in the UK Than almost anywhere else in Europe. All you have to do is watch British TV with its popular shows about Brits misbehaving at home and abroad to see how so many English revel in their own decadence. My God, some places in Greece and Spain are taking special measures just to tame the animalistic behaviour of British "tourists". Not the Germans or the Swedish or the Italians - just the British. And this rubbish is screened proudly on British TV! Who wants to watch shows that show their own countrymen drunk and vomiting and making sexual gestures on foreign streets? Apparently enough British people to do television shows about it. I don't know who's more disgusting - the degenerate that behave this way or the dumb British public that watches it. France and the French people have many faults but if you look at the whole picture objectively, they are better behaved and more civilised than the British. Mr Renfrew isn't voicing opinion. He's expressing something sadly obvious. Apart from the stupid British political correctness what is another difference between the countries? Crime and disgusting behaviour in Britain is often done by the British themselves (though not always). Look at the convictions in any credible English paper and you see many English names. Now look at the convictions in Nice-Matin stories. You don't see many Jean-Pauls and Michels but you do see a lot of Rachids and Mustaphas. Call me racist but it seems like much of the crime here is not done by native French people. Mike P is right in his evaluation of both countries. - PammyK Mon, 15 Sep 2008 08:15:39 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-373 Glasogw had its day though didn't it, rather like NYC, and has been massively cleaned up, whereas nobody seems to accept that Nice has a crime problem, and that is rather French, to ignore a problem (problem, what problem?) in the hope it will go away. I think this supports my view of UK to some extent "MPs, in a report to be published on Tuesday, paint an apocalyptic vision of worsening violent crime and family breakdown unless urgent steps are taken to halt an inevitable slide into delinquency for children from broken homes. " http://www.telegraph.co.uk:80/news/newstopics/politics/labour/2957368/Gordon-Brown-and-David-Cameron-urged-to-work-together-to-avert-social-breakdown.html?DCMP=EMC-new_15092008 - Mike P Mon, 15 Sep 2008 06:57:19 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-372 I agree with most of what you say there Mike - I just don't think Mr Renfrew is making these comments from his new home in La Trinite. I've seen more street crime in Nice than I ever did in Glasgow. Sure, the UK has its faults but to compare it to all the 'nicey nice' aspects of France is like comparing cheese with shit. - Shortia Mon, 15 Sep 2008 05:46:47 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-371 George Renfrew has taken snapshots of some of the worst aspects of UK life to illustrate his points. Everything he has said is true, he has not just picked on a few isolated incidents, and all that he has stated happens to an extent which many people find disturbing. France is by no means a Utopia and there is much to criticize and plenty of room for improvement, but in general the quality of life and amenities that most people enjoy in France is higher than that which most people in the UK have to endure. Britain has become a nasty violent country of government sponsored bullies making the lives of the innocent miserable whilst over protecting the rights of the minorities. Nobody dares to speak out for fear of being 'politically incorrect' or 'racist', people are spied upon as they put their rubbish out, and so it goes on. Just as an example, pimply 18 year old youths in cheap polyester uniforms posing as 'security' all over the place do nothing to curb the violence in the streets, they simply exceed their powers to make life miserable for decent people. Last night in a market town in Sussex one of the above mentioned tried to prevent me from using a toilet at a cinema complex, because I was not in possession of a ticket for the cinema. The fact that the rest of my party were standing in a queue to buy tickets did not seem to get through his shaven skull. Funnily enough though when I stood up to him and pushed past to go to the facilities, which by the way were filthy and smelly, he took no action. More people need to stand up to, and speak out against, all forms of bullying. Th French have their faults, unquestionably, but I do think they have a better attitude to life in most ways than that which has become so prevalent in the UK in the last 15 or so years. - Mike P Sun, 14 Sep 2008 20:14:22 +0100 http://www.rivierareporter.com/content/view/727/132/#comment-368 "functional illiteracy, street crime, gratuitous stabbings, drug use, private debt, personal bankruptcy, house repossession, car theft, domestic violence, child abuse, public drunkenness and teenage pregnancy?" Of course, France is a Utopian society and none of these problems exist in France. I find what Mr Renfrew says as just plain idiotic. I feel sorry for anyone that has such a dim view of their own country. I genuinely hope that Sarkozy can change this pre-historic lifestyle that exists in France. - Shortia Sat, 13 Sep 2008 19:46:14 +0100