Violent end of the year in Calais in discreet mode in La Voix du Nord
The last week of 2021 was once again marked by violence committed by migrants in Calais. The end-of-year celebrations were looking good: the regional daily The voice of the North Didn’t he invite his readers on the cover of the December 25 edition to a ” Christmas shared with migrants “?
In terms of conviviality, it is above all violence that has been “shared” by migrants in Calais. We take this opportunity to come back to the manipulation of public opinion aimed at presenting the reception of migrants as a moral imperative, “whatever the cost”.
Welcoming migrants, a moral imperative
The Journalism Observatory repeatedly presented the invariably pro-migrant activism of the “public” broadcasting service. To give just a few examples among others:
- “ The migrant crisis seen by Arte : the good guys and the bad guys », In July 2017,
- “ France Inter : no vacation for morning propaganda », In September 2018,
- “ info France or propaganda through tears », In August 2019,
- “ France Culture : promoting immigration at the heart of information », In February 2020.
Certain titles from the regional daily press are not to be outdone. The pro-migrant coverage of the regional daily The voice of the North Christmas Day owes nothing to chance. This type of activism has many supporters not only within the mainstream media, but also within the Church: for the Pope as for many bishops, the migrant is the new figure of the poor who must not be not only to help, but also to welcome unconditionally.
The Pope against the Europeans
The journalist and essayist Laurent Dandrieu brilliantly analyzed, especially during a conference given in 2017 and in a book entitled ” Church and immigration: the great malaise », The current speech of the Pope and certain bishops on the question of immigration. According to them, the imperative of Christian charity would imply the reception of all migrants, regardless of any political, religious and cultural considerations.
The sociologist Philippe d’Iribarne underlined in an article published in Le Figaro in November 2020 that the encyclical Fratelli tutti advocating an unconditional welcome from abroad is based only on one of the two figures of the foreigner present in the Bible.
This ideological as well as religious current leads to the fact that the migratory wave, mainly from Muslim countries, which threatens the identity of Europe, enjoys great benevolence.
It is in this context that the mainland media must, often reluctantly, resolve to cover the violence committed by migrants. And in this month of December in Calais, there is material.
A truck driver “victim of an altercation”
The newspaper The voice of the North finds it extremely difficult to describe migrants as aggressors. The daily tells us on December 19, that a ” truck driver saw migrants trying to get into his trailer “, When he parked, according to the public prosecutor of the Boulogne court.
The migrants were ” between two and five, according to testimonies », Adds the prosecutor. ” The driver got out of his cabin. One of the migrants hit him in the head. They all fled. The truck driver got back into the truck. His colleague noticed, five minutes later, that he was a victim of discomfort “. He died soon after.
What title did the regional daily give to the article devoted to this event? ” Aggressive migrants a heavy truck driver who dies “? You do not belive it. It will be December 20 ” An investigation opened after the death of a heavy truck driver in the area of the Epistle “. The declarations of the public prosecutor who are not in the conditional do not matter.
On December 30, 40 police officers injured: “Tensions between CRS and migrants in Calais Marck”
On December 30, CRS wanted to evacuate an illegal camp near a railway line in Calais. An encampment among many other migrants who are biding their time to enter the United Kingdom illegally.
How did the regional daily present the attack on migrants which resulted in 40 injured CRS? You have to go look at the 4th page of the Dec. 30 edition of the newspaper to find a court article titled: ” Tensions between CRS and migrants: forty police officers injured “.
Once again, it seems morally unacceptable to designate the aggressors, the migrants, and the attacked, the CRS. The indirect form makes it possible to avoid presenting a reality that is undoubtedly too crude: ” Clashes broke out and continued in this residential area. Among the projectiles, pieces of ballast, coming from the railroad tracks nearby “. Who threw the pieces of ballast? Mystery, we simply know the consequences: 40 police officers injured. A great exercise in bypassing the factual narrative and without detouring the aggression of the CRS by migrants whose the voice of the North also did not say at any time that they were illegally occupying land.
France-Blue, more raw
The radio France-Blue is much less modest in describing events:
“ A confrontation “of incredible violence” between CRS, gendarmes and migrants left “at least 15 wounded” this Thursday morning in Calais. The CRS say they were attacked by a hundred people armed with stones “. The results of the day are eloquent: “ At least 15 CRS were hospitalized according to a police source for bruises, injuries and a police officer is said to have a broken leg. Several migrants were also injured in the clash “. The contrast with the cover of The voice of the North is striking. Did journalists from both media attend the same event?
The mayor of Calais attacked by a “homeless”
On December 29, the mayor of Calais, Natacha Bouchart, wanted to go to a bank branch in the city. According to an article in the December 30 edition of The voice of the North, she “Was assaulted by a homeless man. (…) One of the customers who goes out, pregnant, falls while trying to avoid the bags in the entrance. The chosen one removes the bags from the passage, one of the men approaches and slaps him with the flat of his hand on the shoulder “.
Daily North Coastline is a little more precise on the group to which the individual who attacked the mayor of Calais belongs: “a group of homeless from Eastern Europe”. Would it have been incongruous for La Voix du Nord to designate these individuals as “migrants”? Or should this term only be associated with positive events?
In 2015, the mayor of Calais was full of praise for migrants during an interview with Current values : ” we have to live with the problem of migrants “in the best possible conditions”, because “it can be an exceptional cultural richness […] and the people of Calais will be able to get richer even further from these migrant populations “.
If Calais residents can appreciate the enrichment that migrants bring every day, among the mainstream media, La Voix du Nord is well placed to erase all the roughness.
The OJIM has devoted other articles to discreet media coverage of the violence committed by migrants in Calais: