French Strikes over Pension Age Increase

You’re verging on incoherence here. Apparently you interpret criticism of the content of someone’s opinion as a challenge to his right to express it. Perhaps you believe that free speech somehow entails freedom from criticism for that speech? Where would you get such an idea?

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Are we all in it together?

Too many different ideas.

I agree with you about the keyboard warrior comments but there is a nugget of something interesting in @Hemienu 's comment.

I am not an expert but I wonder with these protests whether there is an opportunity to view it from a different perspective. Not an us and them situation, which is where this thread seems to be going, but more of a question, how can this be resolved differently?

It was Hemienu’s reference to the idea of the liberal attitude that interested me. We are all indoctrinated into it and all live largely according to that paradigm.

After the 2008 crash it was deemed that the solution was austerity and more austerity. Nowadays, many people agree it was the wrong approach. And we all found out with the bung to the DUP that there was in fact a magic money tree!
.
Instead of working more and more and for longer and longer, maybe now is the time to seriously consider and implement new ways of doing things.

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At the end of the day is there a new way of doing things?
Finding enough money to keep body and soul together is about doing what you have to do to achieve stability.
Perhaps it is important to consider how important it is to self support.
An extra 2 years of work for the fit and healthy is not the end of the world.

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sorry, I’m just not to play silly games with you over semantics.

You are under a misapprehension due to the different meanings of “liberal” in Britspeak and American English. In the US “liberal” refers to the social democratic values common in the EU, i.e. strong safety net for citizens with respect to unemployment, health care, higher education, etc. In contrast, in Europe “liberal” refers to the freedom of corporations to do whatever they like, to one extent or another. In the US this meaning approximates “conservative” or in some contexts, “neo-liberal.”

So, in American usage it is Labour that is the “liberal” party, while the Tory austerity program was a corporatist anti-liberal policy. Our Democratic party comprises the “liberals,” broadly speaking.

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@ollie You are right, at the end of the day we need a new way of doing things.

Unfortunately we are very near the end of the day for mankind as we know it. Is that something you have noticed too watching the news?

And if we consider the strikes as being about values, then questions need to be posed as to how can we retain our values and also make changes. This is about much more than pensions. Granted there will always be troublemakers but I am talking about the majority of people who are striking who feel they are standing up for something.

One could say two extra years is nothing but one could equally say 30 minutes for lunch is more than enough.

2 extra years could save France. I do not bother with lunch as such. This is just a puncuation and someting which is necessary…apparently…an expectation

So did you mean liberal in the American sense? Just trying to understand what you meant.

Try getting a job for the extra two years because as I said earlier on, its easy to say two years is nothing ,but you have to have something in place to make employers take on older workers otherwise all you will be doing is paying out more in dole money and other benefits.

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True but there is such a thing as creating a new form of income.

When you were working as a chef I presume you were happy your customers felt differently about it?

From where?
It seems o me your arguement is I did it so can you.Do you really want to start a business at 63 I think not

Exactly. It would have been clearer if I had merely said “generous.”

And you seem unaccustomed to being challenged.

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Because they are so selfish they can see no further than the end of their nose.

I was about that age when i started the buisness.

In the UK?

Not sure what you mean really.
My customers enjoyed eating in my restaurant and they helped me achieve my 3 AA rosettes in the Automobile Association guide book…
Long story but I never expect outside assistance,

Yes in the UK
And when i left for France I gave the gov many thousands in corperation tax. Never
got any help financially when i got cancer. But I still believe it is survival of the fittest…and you just have to get fit.