Commentary

COMMENTARY: Muslims in France Face Worsening Climate of Hate Under Leadership of President Macron

For France, which colonized Algeria for more than a century, the idea that people from the former colonies should live the life they want seems unbearable. Many white French people seem to have a fear that those from the former colonies may want to treat the descendants of the European French in the same way that the colonial masters treated us. Assuming always the worst for its Muslim citizens says a lot about the country and its beliefs.

Published

5 years ago

November 13, 2021

Oakland Post

A demonstration in France by Muslims protesting their treatment under President Macron in 2020.

By Larbi Ben Krima

Editor’s Note: We are accustomed to hearing travel advisories telling us to avoid countries in the midst of civil war or government repression. Last month a Muslim civil rights organization warned Muslims not to travel to a country that many consider to be the birthplace of liberty. The author of this article, a French citizen, explains how France has become an oppressive place for Muslims.

I was born and raised in France to an Algerian family. I, like millions of other French citizens, heard about colonization and the mistreatment it created. There was some progress made, and now, piece by piece, that is being erased.

One year ago, in October 2020, French President Macron decided to launch his 2022 re-election campaign with a speech targeting Muslim people. He used terrorism as an excuse. Everybody in France knew it was really about politics, although the citizens of the world did not know that.

Macron’s government followed up by dissolving organizations that had criticized his Islamophobic government.

Schools, humanitarian NGO’s, mosques, publishing offices, and civil right movements with Muslim participants have been shut down by a government looking for Far Right votes in the next election.

France is still pretending to fight for rights around the world, but these rights are never really applied to its Muslim citizens, who are always seen as a Fifth Column and who always have to prove that they are French enough.

Every Muslim act is seen as a danger to the country. It seems that Muslim prayers threaten the French republic; Muslim food is seen as a challenge to the religion of other French people; and Muslim clothes are seen as an attempt to change France’s way of life. Most religions have special foods, and prayers and clothing. Having these customs should not be made so difficult for us after all these years. What’s the big deal?

That may explain why this country, which refuses to take accountability for its colonial past, can’t accept the kids who are born and raised here.

Quoting the world-famous psychiatrist and political philosopher Frantz Fanon, “It should not be said that such and such a country is racist, but there are no lynchings or extermination camps there. The truth is, all of this and something more is on the horizon.”

We can say that racism runs deep in France’s institutions and politics, cheered on by the media, with applause from a substantial group who likes what they are hearing.

This is a country where an openly racist media pundit has growing support in his campaign for president, just as Donald Trump did.

France, which always despised the USA, has now became one of the United States of Islamophobia, along with China and India.

A former great country, known for its ideals, France has used its former glory around the world. Recently, the world has come to know what a very small country France has actually become a country that should stop preaching to others what it obviously refuses to apply to itself.

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Arts and Culture

COMMENTARY: Black Music is the Sound of Black Freedom: Let Us Reclaim Both This Juneteenth

Black Music Month started when Black Music Association members Ed Wright, Kenny Gamble and his wife, journalist and radio host Dyanna Williams were able to persuade President Jimmy Carter to establish the observation on June 7, 1979.

Published

21 hours ago

June 9, 2026

Oakland Post

Robert Johnson (1911-1938) is thought of as the godfather of blues music, especially Delta blues. The 29 songs recorded by him during his short life have been of massive inspiration to guitarists and musicians over the last 80 years. Public domain photo.

By Wanda Ravernell

Black Music Month and Juneteenth are inextricably linked – Black music is the sound of our freedom.

From the plaintive moans of the enslaved Africans’ ‘sorrow songs,’ to the fields of Civil War battle where Black soldiers picked up abandoned bugles, to the upright piano played in juke joints on Saturday night and churches come Sunday morning, our ancestors’ innovation in the face of want, fear, degradation, and hopelessness has yielded genres of music imitated ’round the world.

In 2000, Congress made it official. In 2009, Pres. Barack Obama changed the name to African American Music Heritage Month and in 2023, Pres. Joe Biden changed it back to Black Music Month, two years after he declared Juneteenth a national holiday, the result of a movement led by Opal Lee.

Our ancestors battle for freedom over these last 400 years and the music that allowed them expression of their humanity deserved to be honored.

But we may be losing sight of the value of their sacrifices.

‘Sing a Song Full of the Faith That the Dark past Has Taught Us…’

Along with the long-known exploitation of Black musicians whose recordings were stolen by record companies, the commercialization of Juneteenth feels like another kind of theft.

I had never heard of Juneteenth until I moved to the Bay Area from my hometown of Philadelphia. I didn’t know it was one of many freedom festivals celebrated by descendants of enslaved people in the United States.

Emancipation Day was Jan. 1 in Pennsylvania, April 16 in Wash., D.C., May 20 in Florida, and Aug. 8 in Kentucky. But Juneteenth, June 19, has the most renown, known in Texas as the ‘colored peoples’ Fourth of July.’

It was marked by parades, beauty pageants, rodeos, backyard barbecues and church picnics.

Yes, church.

The formerly enslaved began the day praying in thanks for their freedom just as they had prayed for Jubilee – the day of freedom – when they had chains on their feet and hands. They ‘testified’ about their past suffering and how they had managed to overcome.

And they sang.

Although, we will not hold it this year, Omnira Institute’s Juneteenth Ritual of Remembrance recalled this part of Juneteenth with prayers in the languages of the African captives. In the middle of the ceremony, a soloist would lead us in singing “Many Thousand Gone” while we took turns reciting portions of the Emancipation Proclamation, the news of freedom that took more than two years to reach Texas – two months after the Civil War ended.

“Many Thousand Gone” was famously recorded by Black luminary Paul Robeson in 1947:

“No more auction block for me,

No more, no more

No more auction black for me

Many thousand gone.”

Other verses refer to the ‘pint of salt’ and the ‘driver’s lash,’ the realities of enslavement that they had survived.

‘Sing a Song Full of the Hope That the Present has Brought Us’

All of the genres of African American music have at their root songs like that, the essence being, as Stevie Wonder, wrote, “the joy inside our pain.” So Black music is not just music. It is our story, our history, our very strength.

During the Civil Rights Movement, which peaked 100 years after slavery ended, the people testified that it was the freedom songs – based on spirituals – that gave them the heart to march, face attack dogs, fire hoses, beatings, and shootouts with vigilantes.

The music reminded them that power was in the people. That music, our music, can do so again. We don’t have to accept the commodification of the products of our culture.

The power of those songs is showing a resurgence across the South as we battle again for the right to self-determination through the ballot box.

Those songs are the voices of our ancestors, voices forged in their blood, their sweat, their tears, joy and, above all, faith. Those songs, those prayers live in our blood and our very breath.

This Juneteenth, let us reclaim those holy voices expressed in Black music for ourselves. It is our birthright. It can neither be bought nor sold. No more. Never again.

Wanda Ravernell is the executive director of Omnira Institute, sponsor for 18 years of the Juneteenth Ritual of Remembrance and Oakland’s 11^th Annual Black-Eyed Pea Festival, which will take place on Sept. 12.