Reply #1: Different kind of "racism" though [View All]

The nuance here is that the influx of cheap labor has displaced some of France's workforce, and the savings that employers realized by hiring cheaper foreigners DOES NOT "trickle down" into local economies. You can't buy a loaf of french bread with trickle down.

Generous immigration policies encourage a shift in the cultural profile too - all of a sudden in a country that has largely been relatively secular for the last century, obscure islamic religious customs have to be observed, no cartoons of the prophet, and a rise again in sectarianism.

In America the issue with racism was xenophobia. In Europe, in some cases, the sentiment is that the foreign culture is moving the culture backwards, so in many minds it's "culturalism", not "racism", and it's justified.

I don't personally agree with that attitude, but it is understandable that cultures resist change, especially change that seems to be towards violence, fundamentalism and poorer standards of living.