Brutal scenes as French cops refuse to let Vesters protest in front of Parliament, even though they had a permit to do so.
That is explanation for essentially all the conflicts between cops and protesters in 2019: protesters get trapped, in violation of their human right to demonstrate, hyper-armed cops use their weapons, protesters respond in a civic rage and in self-defense.
Turnout was down overall, but again, the fact that anything was organized at all was a huge, huge break with vacation-loving French culture. Of course, the media searches for any reason to insist that the Yellow Vest movement is abating, and they do so here.
Jan 12 - 'Battle of Turnout Figures' as France returns from vacation
The government claimed only 50,000 protesters marched, but the true figure was closer to 300,000.
Firstly, why are these numbers important? As a cop told me: this is a country of nearly 70 million people, so cops are never going to stand down unless there are 10 or 20 million people in the streets. He's right. The people who foolishly think the cops are going to see the political light and "switch sides", and also the people who think the Yellow Vests are just a hair's breadth from getting Macron to resign, should re-read that.
A secondary point here is how very special and vanguard the Yellow Vests truly are for getting out on the streets: France was not anywhere close to a revolution which overcame their neo-imperial security state, but there sure were a large amount of people who were willing to try.
So numbers do matter, and that's why the MSM's parroting of an absurd official line (from their cozy newsroom) is so galling.
However, we should still accept that cops can actually be not reactionary. The poorly named "Union of Angry French Cops", France's third-largest cop union, consistently defied the Interior Ministry to give their own tally, mainly because the ministry was just outrageously low. The "Yellow Number" also made its 2nd appearance at this demo, and you can find all 3 of these crowd estimations here - the odd one out is the Interior Ministry.
The union believes the divergence is due to the fact that rural villages are constantly ignored by the government and media. The union has members actually stationed at places like rural roundabouts all day: they count the number of different people who arrive at a demonstration, and then leave, only to be replaced by new protesters.
It should be easy to see why the ministry's figures are so absurd: why would the government routinely mobilize 80,000 policemen for what they are claimed from Valentine's Day onwards was less than 47,000 protesters? (See January 27 note.)
Back then I couldn't help but see the Yellow Vests as the harbinger of the bursting of the West's "Everything Bubble" which Quantitative Easing has created. Who would have predicted that "QE Infinity" would be unveiled in September?
Jan 19 - Calm day in Paris for Act 10
It's important to remember they weren't all days of pitched war, but a lot certainly were until late March. Act 10 was mostly peaceful in Paris, but not elsewhere. Death toll at this point - 10 people.
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