Walking on the winter before elections through the bourgeois bohemian “Canal St Martin” in Paris, you will be able to see around two hundred red tents that have been placed on both sides of the channel since last December. On every small red tent lives a homeless that has endured the harsh conditions of the French winter, with an inscription on top of the tent that says: “Sans Domicile Fix”, which stands for “without fixed address”.
The tents are part of a demonstration placed together for an organization called “Les Enfants de Don Quichotte,” with the purpose of calling the attention to the issue of homeless of not only the French people, the media, and the actual French president Chirac, but also to those who are campaigning to replace him on the power.
Since then, hundreds of people have spent the night with the homeless, sharing their callous conditions as a sign of solidarity to their cause, to the point that the issue was included on the New Year’s speech of the President Chirac, in which he promised to increase the funding to improve the condition of the homeless. But even if the actual French president fails to fulfill his word, almost all the candidates campaigning to replace Chirac have signed the group’s petition.
Although the issue of homeless in France is relatively mild as the New York Times has called it –“…the numbers of the entire country are quite similar of those that hold only a city like Los Angeles…”- the invective and romanticism of the organization, as well as the non-violence of their actions have placed them in the center of the French discussion to the point that a reliable solution appears to be coming.
But with the positive answers that “Les Enfants De Don Quichotte” has received in such a small period of time, one feels compelled to ask; what is wrong with the issue in Vancouver? Why whereas the French movement satisfy their demands without any violent means, the Vancouver movement that has more or less the same demands, does not receive the massive support that the issue has received in France.
The answer to this question might have at least three components.
The first part of the answer could be the time that “Les Enfants de Don Quichotte” choose to place the tents on the border of the channel. Because they did it at the beginning of December, a time when, whether you like or not, people’s sensibility is really touched by this kind of circumstances for the proximity of Christmas.
The second part might be the place where they have installed the tents, because they have not done so, where the French homeless usually spend their nights, but on an exclusive sector where like it or not you have to see them.
Finally is the non-violence of their actions. Starting with the poetic suggestiveness of their name, “Les Enfants de Don Quichotte”, state from the beginning that there is an utopical air on their proposal, although that, they continue with it.
There is a lot to learn still for the Committee in Vancouver, and for all those organizations around the world that trying to bring attention to social issues only receive repression and police, instead of political attention.
The tents are part of a demonstration placed together for an organization called “Les Enfants de Don Quichotte,” with the purpose of calling the attention to the issue of homeless of not only the French people, the media, and the actual French president Chirac, but also to those who are campaigning to replace him on the power.
Since then, hundreds of people have spent the night with the homeless, sharing their callous conditions as a sign of solidarity to their cause, to the point that the issue was included on the New Year’s speech of the President Chirac, in which he promised to increase the funding to improve the condition of the homeless. But even if the actual French president fails to fulfill his word, almost all the candidates campaigning to replace Chirac have signed the group’s petition.
Although the issue of homeless in France is relatively mild as the New York Times has called it –“…the numbers of the entire country are quite similar of those that hold only a city like Los Angeles…”- the invective and romanticism of the organization, as well as the non-violence of their actions have placed them in the center of the French discussion to the point that a reliable solution appears to be coming.
But with the positive answers that “Les Enfants De Don Quichotte” has received in such a small period of time, one feels compelled to ask; what is wrong with the issue in Vancouver? Why whereas the French movement satisfy their demands without any violent means, the Vancouver movement that has more or less the same demands, does not receive the massive support that the issue has received in France.
The answer to this question might have at least three components.
The first part of the answer could be the time that “Les Enfants de Don Quichotte” choose to place the tents on the border of the channel. Because they did it at the beginning of December, a time when, whether you like or not, people’s sensibility is really touched by this kind of circumstances for the proximity of Christmas.
The second part might be the place where they have installed the tents, because they have not done so, where the French homeless usually spend their nights, but on an exclusive sector where like it or not you have to see them.
Finally is the non-violence of their actions. Starting with the poetic suggestiveness of their name, “Les Enfants de Don Quichotte”, state from the beginning that there is an utopical air on their proposal, although that, they continue with it.
There is a lot to learn still for the Committee in Vancouver, and for all those organizations around the world that trying to bring attention to social issues only receive repression and police, instead of political attention.
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