Season 2 Episode 1 - ATTENTATS (ATTACKS)

Welcome back! This is the first episode of Here There Be Dragons season 2. This season we're listening to Parisians tell their stories of fear and identity in the city of lights. 

You might remember the horrifying news we’ve heard from Paris as terrorist attacks rocked the city. Three attacks in the past two years. The one on November 13th 2015 left 130 people dead and 413 injured. These attacks lead to increased media attention and speculation about whether France’s capital was safe, what to do from there and who to blame. 

In this episode we'll hear Parisians talking about how the attacks affected them and how they see their safety in the city in their wake. 

Script

Jess 0:00 

Hello and welcome to the second season of Here There Be Dragons. I’m your host, Jessica Myers.

[MUSIC]

We’ve been working over the past few months to bring together a very special season for you. Last season, we focused on the stories of seven New Yorkers, their fears and identities in a fast-changing city. 

This season, with an expanded team, we’re hoping across the pond and exploring the city of Paris. 

I spoke to 32 residents of the Paris metro region. We chatted in bars, in cafés, in parks, in their homes, their offices, their studios, where we chatted about their experiences with fear and identity in the French capital.  

You might remember the horrifying news we've heard from Paris as terrorist attacks rocked the city. Three attacks in the past two years, the one on November 13th, 2015, left 130 people dead and 13 injured.

These attacks led to increased media attention and speculation about whether Frances’s capital was safe, what to do from there and who to blame. Although the attacks in Paris happened over a year ago, the shock they left in their awake is still visible throughout the city.

For places like place de République and around affected bars like the Bella keep, and the putty Kamboj. The candles, graffiti signs and flowers left after the attacks have been swept into the National Archives.

The Bataclan, the concert hall where the most brutal attacks happened, has recently reopened plaques now moralized the dead, replacing spontaneous shows of grief.

[MUSIC]

But even now, residents still struggle with how to return to normal…

ALISON 1:39

… I think it's probably spinning. It's probably getting to the end of its… Yeah, I can try and slick. I can try and switch it off…

Okay, I'm My name is Alison, California. And I'm 48. I'm a journalist and translator and I grew up in Somerset, England. And I came to Paris. But when I came to Paris, I really felt this is the place that I want to live.

I was actually very near to the Belle Equipe shooting just a couple of streets away and was locked in a bar there. I felt this terrible sense of grief.

And then following day there was this mass movement to go to place de République so I went out. I felt a little bit scared. Yeah, I felt “is this absolute suicide to go to this mass square?” If the terrorists want to do another attack, they're obviously gonna choose there. But I looked around and saw all these other people going there and I thought yeah we do have to do what we have to do, and it was also really healing to be there with all these people.

I felt some people had been really brave as well to turn up saying I am a Muslim and I'm against violence. So, I was a bit annoyed at how it was represented by the media because they just went round looking for white French Parisians to interview. What I saw was really what Paris is, people from everywhere, from lots of different religions and lots of different colors of skin and that's what Paris is for me.

FRANK 3:23

“C’est… je dois aller bosser quoi…”

[Translation]

To a certain degree we’re obligated to continue like before. Life in the city doesn’t allow us to do otherwise. Life continues. With or without terrorists.

Of course, we look at who boards the train or passes in the street, you look even when people have large bags. Maybe that's what’s really changed: we take a few more precautions, are more careful around people who behave strangely.

Also, if they’re bearded right, the big cliché but it's inevitable. It's with the best non-racist intentions. That’s the pattern that’s circulated daily in the media.

STEFFI 3:58

“En fait je crois que le lendemain des attentats du 13 je suis sortie, je suis sortie de chez moi le lendemain…”

[Translation]

The day after the attacks on the 13th I went out. I stayed out all day. I walked for half an hour.

It was important for me to walk. It was important for me to tell myself that what happened is serious, but at a global scale, it was going to happen. It had to happen and it's serious and tragic for sure, but I do not want to shut myself in.  My country isn’t at war, there’s no war in the streets, there’s no bomb falling and no civilians dying around me every day. So I can’t behave as if my city was under siege. 

This is an isolated incident, that’s very serious. We pray that it doesn’t happen again, but if it happens again, it happens again. And unfortunately, we can’t do much about it.  

“…bah ça se reproduit et malheureusement on peut pas y faire grand-chose. ”

Jess 4:42

As Steffi, a 27-year old editorial consultant, just described, in the wake of the November attacks many Parisians felt a strong desire to be out in the city. In the days following the attacks while dignitaries marched in solidarity with France. Many locals showed their solidarity “en terrace” sitting in the famous open-air patios of bars and drinking in defiance. A demonstration of “the Gallic shrug,” proudly continuing business as usual even with a fear of danger. But this shrug isn’t new, nor is it the whole story.

As a capital city, Paris has been the stage for the performance of political violence at many charged moments in the nation’s history. When the stakes of violent attack in Paris are political, citizen responses to that violence become political as well. The desire to return to normal is also a desire to prove that the violence and so the ideas that it represented were not strong enough to shift the nation. But in subtle ways they are.

For Franck and Jacqueline attacks from the recent past also pushed them to reflect on their responses in the present. For Franck, a 40-year-old architect, the recent attacks brought to mind the 1995 train bombings carried out by an Algerian extremist group.

FRANK 6:00

“…en 95 y avait eu des attentats…”

[Translation]

In 95 there were attacks in France and in the subway. At the time I had just arrived in Lyon and the only way to get around was   the subway. 

When I took the subway I thought to myself well here we are. If something happens. I have no choice. It took six months before I started taking the subway without really thinking about it. And it was kind of the same with November 13. 

Jess 6:25

For Jacqueline, a 94-year-old retiree, the attacks brought back memories of the bombings in the 60s during the liberation of Algeria from French colonial rule.

JACQUELINE 6:32

“Les attentats ont surtout été pendant la guerre d’Algérie…”

[Translation]

The attacks were mostly during the war with Algeria. One against Malraux, who was not home, the granddaughter of the super for his house had an arm torn off, she was a small girl who was maybe 5 or 6. It was very tense, but there was still a part of France that wanted the liberation of Algeria.

Before, they planted a few firebombs, now a guy driving a truck killed 80 people, hurt 210. We’ve never had anything like this before, but now everything is amplified. In every sense, in good as in evil. It also creates mistrust and it’s terrible because it is unclear who is doing it, it’s very complicated.

Jess 7:20 

In both of these cases, the French government implemented a security measure called le plan Vigipirate. Which translates to “watch out for pirates.” It’s the French equivalent of the terror alert that was used in the US post-9/11.

The state of emergency law that has been in effect since the November 13th attacks was written in the 1950s during General Charles de Gaulle’s presidency, in response the civil unrest Jacqueline just mentioned. It was meant to expand police power by setting curfews and authorizing extralegal search and seizure.

As colonial and post-colonial attacks, these bombings were considered a national issue, the painful transition away from the colonial past. However, the attacks in 2015 and 2016 were approached as international issues, even though the assailants were most born in France. After the attacks the French implemented an number of national and international security responses including a bombing campaign in Syria.

Fabrice D’Almeida, a history professor at the university of Paris Panthéon-Assas as well as a prolific author and creator of Le Siècle des Emotions, a documentary radio series about the emotional affects of history on the nation, spoke yo my co-producer Adélie about the strategy behind France’s response to the attacks.

FABRICE 8:36

“L'avantage de problématiser les attentats de Paris comme le produit …”

[Translation]

He says that the advantage of situating the Paris attacks as a product of international conflict is that it permits France to enter into the grand mythology of a civilization conflict. Meaning that we [the French] are Christians attacked by Muslims, and this reading confirms Muslim extremist world views. If we consider this [attack] as something that came from us [Franceqx], then we can consider how citizens can mobilize in terms of education, integration, and eventually local surveillance. If we consider this [attack] as something foreign, [then] the mobilization of citizens has to come through the military and external intervention.

“…militaire et par l'intervention extérieure.”

Residents that I spoke to did not feel reassured when seeing paratroopers and soldiers on the streets and in subway stations. Instead, they served as a constant reminder that the threat of danger could be anywhere.

FRANÇOISE 9:31

“Ouais, mais moi…”

[Translation]

Seeing paratroopers with machine guns on the street, doesn’t make me feel safe. First I think it doesn’t do much good, it’s more a show than reality. And then again it makes me think of the opposite of what it’s supposed to.

It should make me feel safe, but it reminds me that I might be unsafe. And policy rhetoric is obviously manipulated. So, there is a complexity to the way that this fear is used.

Fear can do violent things and it can trigger thoughtless dumb defensive reactions that are often destructive. But I think we have to have a little fear. If someone who has no fear, that is someone who isn’t human.

“Si quelqu’un qui a pas peur, c’est quelqu’un qui est pas humain quoi…”

Jess 10:11

For Dania, a 19-year-old student, seeing paratroopers felt uncomfortable not just because of the specter of terrorism but also because of the way they scrutinized her.

DANIA 10:21

Ok I'll probably be switching between French and English because depending on the subject I'm more comfortable in one or the other.

I will say though I was very uncomfortable for a long time, parce que quand je suis passée devant eux [Translation: because when I passed them], they would all check me out and talk about me, these soldiers.

I wasn't interpreting it as they're checking me out suspiciously, they're checking me out sexually.  

Jess 10:48

After the attacks in Paris and in Nice, the popular line in the French media was that these terrorist acts where attacks not on people but on the French way of life. But for people who fall outside of the stereotype of this lifestyle, young and white expressing freedom through consumption, the message was confusing. Many young French people chose to resist, by going out to bars and proving they wouldn’t let terrorists change their way of life. But what about French people who don’t live like that, or can’t?

After the state of emergency was implemented, police officers no longer had to go through a judge to search private property. Since then, restaurants, religious spaces, and homes of primarily Muslim residents have been searched without warning by armed police officers. This has left Muslim residents in a difficult position. How do they show solidarity? How does France show solidarity to them? Both Dania and Yasscene, a 23-year-old student from Morocco, told me about their concerns. Here’s Dania again.

DANIA 11:49

It's also because I'm arab mais jure il y a des gens [Translation: but I swear there are people] that feel uncomfortable around minorities Surtout maintenant avec tous les tous les attacks terroriste [Translation: especially now with all the terrorist attacks], I've noticed if there's someone who looks Arab on the metro people will look at them as if they're threatened or suspiciously and I've noticed that. I think it was the other day we were in the metro and there's a family, they were Muslim and they were on the metro and they had like suitcases with them and tout le monde a regardé [Translation: everyone watched] like suspicously like what are they doing why do they have suitcases. Tandis qu'avant [Translation: While before] that wouldn't be at all something people would be phased by. Which is very sad.

YASSINE 12:31

“qui est un peu différente de ce que les médias ils veulent que ça soit…”

[Translation]

So a woman who wears the veil and goes into a subway with a backpack, we start looking at her: "Maybe she has a bomb. I don’t know what she has in this bag, what will she do.” More and more, it happens that people will say to them, "Yeah, go back to where you came from.” So it went up a notch, this thing about profiling people: he’s a Christian, he’s a Muslim, he’s a Jew.

It's a kind of divided and it gets worse. What I really noticed is that it gets worse and worse, and you need a solution for that. Because the problem is that they can’t control people like that, it’ll explode one day.

“le problème  c’est qu’ils peuvent pas contrôler comme ça, ça va péter un jour. ”

Jess 13:08

There has been a ground swell of criticism about politicians manipulating the meaning of the recent attacks to advance their own agendas. Both Mawena, a 26-year-old founder of the media platform Blacks to the Future and Frank, a 42 year old economic development manger, are immigrants to France, Mawena is from Benin and Frank who grew up in East Germany. Both are concerned about the current political conversation.  

MAWENA 13:37

“Je suis assez d’accord et en même temps c’est rigolo. Après les attentats de cet automne…”

[Translation]

I have a friend who was celebrating her birthday and they were completely shot up, she’s still in the hospital, she lost friends, she has friends who are seriously injured, an amputation.

And it's true that no one emphasized the fact that she’s black and her friends were. These attacks affected young people, people who were the most open, in theory. There’s the sense that the younger generation shouldn’t be so idealistic, this isn’t a world of Care Bears. After recovering, the party line was they attacked our lifestyle, but that’s kind of disgusting, it was a defense of capitalism and that was horrible, but I think there’s an understanding that you have to whip out the scary scheming political debate: this is Islam against the West. There’s also a way for politics to use that, which allowed them to extend the state of emergency.

Now I really feel like we’re in this process of political manipulation. It's strange because France wants to be so colorblind when in fact it’s not, everything is much more difficult to analyze. In the US, everything is clear, black, white, Latino, you know what the communities are. Here the one new category now is just Muslims, the black sheep that everyone has to hate, we never talk about black as it relates to black people, so we erase that all the time, everywhere, absolutely, you're unable to identify a problem in a racial way.

Jess 14:58

I asked Frank whether he saw any similarities between the security he experienced growing up in East Germany during the cold war and the security responses he sees in Paris now.

FRANK 15:10

“…le seul lien qu’il…”

[Translation]

The only link that exists between the two is that now I fear that the State will fall back on pure protectionism. It’s always the same discussion around security, individualism, freedom, and security in the end. I fear that the State will become unreasonable. I'll say something horrible but it’s a good illustration. With so few attacks, I’m ready to take this level of terrorism, if that leaves me my personal freedom.

“…en gardant ma liberté à moi.”

Jess 15:33

Françoise a 58-year-old architecture professor, thinks the political conversation surrounding the attacks is a small part of a larger global trend.

FRANÇOISE 15:43

[Translation]

As we grow older, we feel more vulnerable. One of the big reasons why French society is so terrified of everything is because it’s an aging society. And Western societies are all aging, compared to new countries. We feel more threatened when we get older, we feel more fragile.

Western societies are all aging compared to new countries. Perhaps they  have arrived at a moment of their golden age, their height, the peak of their influence, it’s crumbling, collapsing, so it all contributes to a feeling of impermanence, that maybe the end of a world is beginning, which has begun to make us feel less stable.

“…qui a commencé et qui nous fait nous sentir moins stable.”

Jess 16:22

Even before the attacks, immigration was a central political issue in France but in the weeks after the discussion came to a head. Should France close its borders to immigrants and refugees? But because of colonization, immigration in France is complicated. Many of the immigrant populations in France have been there for well over a century.

Having experienced the heaviest losses during the World Wars, the French government set up programs to attract young men from the colonies to work in French factories. Similar to the programs in the US, which brought laborers from Mexico to the Southwest in the 1940s.

In order to house these new populations, the government began enormous social housing programs in the Parisian banlieues, suburbs just outside the city. The projects that were built starting in the 1950s are called the Grands Ensembles, les cités, or simply les tours – the towers. These projects housed not only immigrant groups but the white working-class French settlers who were expelled from liberated colonies. As the immigrant population grew so did racist sentiment against these housing projects. Today many are run-down and have reputations for crime and violence.

In 2005 police neglect led to the deaths of two young boys, sparking a series of revolts demanding better local services. Since then, social housing firms like Paris Habitat, have started programs to improve Grands Ensembles. But when it was discovered that some of the assailants in the recent terror attacks had lived in the Grand Ensemble, public opinion soured even further. Saida, a manager at Paris Habitat, has had problems with public opinion of the northern banlieue Saint Denis.

SAIDA 18:03

“…sur Saint-Denis…”

[Translation]

Saint-Denis has a complicated reputation, particularly with the November 13th attacks in which the assailants at the Bataclan all lived in Saint-Denis. There’s a prejudice against that neighborhood despite everything that’s been done in the city to improve citizen’s daily lives.

Jess 18:24

For Jean-Claude, a professor in urbanism who specializes in social housing research, the desire to connect terrorism to housing projects like the Grand Ensemble is over simplifying. 

JEAN-CLAUDE 18:37

“…la majorité de la population immigrée…”

[Translation]

The majority of the immigrant population living in France, was born and grew up in these Grand Ensembles, because that was the main purpose, often those you see today in Islamic radicalization movements, or Islamists, are children of the 2nd or even 3rd generation immigrants in France.

They were born there. They are also French, and they are the children or grandchildren of the workers who were brought in the 1960s or in the 1970s to work in industry in France. They were part of the population for whom the Grand Ensembles were built. They were born there, and for many they are still there.

But I don’t think that’s a factor in the insecurity of the Grand Ensembles such as it is. There were much more significant things, much more specific to the Grande Ensembles in 2005 when there were revolts within these neighborhoods, cars were burned... There really was a stigma against those neighborhoods , concentration of poverty, concentration of exclusion in these areas.

Terrorism, that was a problem that, in my opinion, goes far beyond urban issues and public housing. It's simply true that one of the first reactions the French government had, after the first attacks in January of last year, the Prime Minister said: "We have created apartheid.” That was the word that was the Prime Minister used. 

In these neighborhoods, we have to begin to resolve this problem by better organizing what we call social mixité by making sure the new residents of these neighborhoods will not only be poor people. That, to me, seems like an exam serrated reaction and a bit simplistic.

Terrorist movements probably have as part of their root cause a desire for identity. To highlight an identity to people who, otherwise, are largely excluded from the workings of society, through unemployment ... and need to identify with something. In part, no doubt, they identify with Islam, but it is not a given that they’ll all become terrorists.

“…mais c’est pas pour autant qu’ils vont tous devenir des terroristes.”

Jess 20:30

Security goes beyond what the State can do to make us feel safe. It’s more than police, more than curfews, more than terror warnings. It’s also how residents interact with each other. And yes, the state does have something to do with that but so does history, family, social status, race, gender, religion, and immigration status. They all collide to give us our perspectives of the city, our ideas about what and where a threat to us might be. We’ll delve into those ideas over the course of the series. Starting next episode where we’ll talk about diversity or mixité as the French call it, and how it intersects with residents understanding of safety.

Thanks for listening. This has been Here There Be Dragons, I’m your host Jess Myers. I’d like to say a special thank you to my sponsors at MIT Council for the Arts who made this season possible. Thank you also to Cory Lee Jacobs for the music in this season, check out his trio Octopus 2000 on bandcamp. I’d also like to introduce you to a new member of the team, co-producer Adélie Pojzman-Pontay. You’ll be hearing from her in the episodes to come. Be sure to subscribe and rate us on iTunes, Soundcloud, and Stitcher. If you want to leave us a comment email us at htbdpodcast@gmail.com or follow us on twitter at @dragons_podcast. And lastly, if you joined us last season you’ll know that every interviewee draws their personal maps of safety and danger, check those out on our brand new website htbdpodcast.com where you’ll find a number of treats including a glossary of French terms you may be curious about. Join us every other week for more stories of fear, identity, and urban life.