Like Iran from 1980-83 (Iran had the world's only other state-sponsored Cultural Revolution, obviously modelled on China's), like China from 1965-74, France wants several years where everything is brought to a halt in order to engage in mass discussions, with the aim of drastically updating French democracy and French culture in order to accord with more modern political ideals.
Capitalists cannot tolerate such a halting. Not only because it would lead to a reduction in their power, and not only because modern political ideals must be Socialist Democratic and not Liberal Democratic it is also a cultural thing: "keep calm and carry on" is the fundamental ethos of conservatism worldwide.
The two Cultural Revolution have said: "To hell with this halt! Now waitaminut". what on earth have we become and should we keep being like this?" Both CRs also led to miniature civil wars, as reactionary or fascist forces, and insanely radical and democratically unwanted leftist forces (like the Mojahedin-e Khalq MKO), were pushed out.
And, after the halt, as the trajectories of both China and Iran show amazing success. They started over (revolution), then stopped (cultural revolution), then restarted anew yet again.
A Cultural Revolution China and Iran prove does something the US and French Revolutions did not do: put into power the formerly-oppressed class of people, which is also the majority class. These four revolutions all eliminated monarchies, but only the former two put the oppressed in charge.
(I do not call the French or American aristocracies "oppressed", as they previously colluded with the king and shared in the ill-gotten gains, call me a radical, I guess.)
The Yellow Vests are this oppressed class which deserves to lead, and which would certainly lead the country better than France's current leaders. Everybody in France knows this, but they feel powerless to make it happen. The Yellow Vests are also everyone in France knows this as well as the majority class. The conditions for Cultural Revolution for Trash Revolution are as clear as the yellow vests of garbagemen who wear reflective gear to avoid traffic.
Yes, the Yellow Vests are not solely the result of an untreated urban divide, but anyone following them knows that this is one of the primary causes of the movement.
Those who have been following this series will know what I mean: what should rural "Jimo County, France" be demanding in their nascent French Cultural Revolution?
It's a genuine political question to ask: is the future only for cities?
Modernized countries need to honestly ask themselves: should humanity's goal be to empty the rural areas of people?
Are rural areas that bad? That depressing, boring, backward and hate-filled?
The rural-urban migration of the past century is universal, but do we not need any rural inhabitants? Will robots, drones and computers allow everyone to live in supposedly-superior urban areas? Are the values which flourish in rural areas more often than in urban areas not necessary for human culture any more are these values only hindrances to human progress?
Because if the answer is: "No rural areas will always have some people; farming areas will never be so efficient as to not need human involvement; rural people actually do learn a useful thing or two about life which city people don't learn," then we have no choice but to tackle the urban-rural divide as much as other key societal divides.
So, when we realize that we must clearly affirm that, "Yes, we need rural areas," that necessarily implies a huge overhaul of value systems in the modern capitalist West, which has become hugely urban dominated. The aspects of this dominance the financial futures exchanges, mass media, only-urban cultural hubs, the denigration of a collective ethos inherent in rural communities, etc. are so obvious and so numerous that I don't need to list them here. The path of history shows that the era of Thomas Jefferson's ideal of farmer-citizen-soldier have been totally jettisoned in the West, probably due to the industrial/electrical/digital revolutions. However, China's CR showed how necessary it was to re-balance the scales in favor of the country life.
What is more interesting is to discuss how specific policies of the China's CR could be translated to the West. The Iranian CR was the democratically demanded introduction of Islam into governance, which resulted in what is clearly Iranian Islamic Socialism (out in book form this summer, Inshallah), but I don't think the West is interested in religion-based ideas anymore they have deluded themselves into thinking that religion is always regressive, never progressive. (The West prefers secular zero-theism which is actually the bleakest and most egotistical version of monotheism, because zero is not a plural number, after all.)
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