No escaping 300,000 demonstrators

I now know what it’s like to be caught in the middle of a huge demonstration, and be unable to move. Well, almost. I was walking along the rue du Faubourg St Antoine early this afternoon, on my way to BHV when groups of demonstrators, in support of the national strike, began marching past. They were all converging on the Place de la Bastille of course, and I was headed that way too. I was so intent on taking photos that it was too late by the time I realised I was caught in the middle of the Place, surrounded on all sides by the demonstrators, almost unable to move.

But what a peaceful, amicable affair it seemed to be. Sure, there was chanting and speeches (several simultaneously), but I saw nothing unruly, no pushing or shoving. It took me about an hour to cross the Place de la Bastille. There were no cars anywhere, just a dense throng of people, vans selling food and drink, balloons, people climbing on the Bastille column itself, television trucks, families with children, babies, and dogs.

The General Confederation of Workers (CGT) estimated the crowd at 300,000, and I wouldn’t be surprised, although the police claim the figure to be 65,000 (the unions claim a total of 1.5 million demonstrated all over France).

What struck me especially when I was in the middle of the throng was the atmosphere of calm solidarity, and the passion for social justice, that today’s strike was all about. We don’t see this sort of thing in Australia any more. We’ve long given up any hope that a strike will make any difference to anything. Today’s strike is to protest against the erosion of the standard of living, and also the so-callled ‘workplace reforms’ that we ‘enjoy’ in the Anglophone countries.

I was surprised, though, to hear that what had been reported on UK television, and probably elsewhere, was the conflict and car-torching that happened much later in the day near the Opera, and linked to the ‘dispersion of the demonstrators’. These could not have been the people I saw, and are much more likely to have been professional agitors, or disaffected troublemakers cashing in on the publicity.

I’m very glad I was right in the thick of it for an hour. It gave me a good insight into the passion of ordinary workers for social justice, and the calm and reasonable way in which they express it.