The other day I read about a restaurant that serves “Freedom
Fries” and “Freedom Toast” as a form of protest against the French.
In several places, people are getting together to dump out bottles
of French wine. It’s asinine and idiotic, but it is indicative of a
real trend. Anti-French sentiment is running pretty high in
uber-patriotic circles. Some have put forth that it is because the
French government doesn’t support us in the United Nations. I don’t
think that theory holds water. Germany doesn’t support us in the
United Nations, but we’re not calling hamburgers “Liberty Steaks”
or sauerkraut “Liberty Cabbage” like we did in World War I. You
don’t see too many people trading in their Porsches and Mercedes
for Ford Tauruses. Russia doesn’t support us, yet nobody is
boycotting Russian vodka, calling Russian dressing “Freedom sauce,”
or suggesting that suicidal but patriotic individuals play “Freedom
Roulette.” Canada has refused to support us, but nobody’s dumping
Molson or Moosehead beer into the sewer. And as appealling as it
might be, nobody’s steamrolling Celine Dion CD’s. Mexico doesn’t
support us, but salsa sales have not dipped (sorry). A lot of
countries in the Middle East don’t support us, yet we burn just as
much oil while gas prices keep on rising. No, anti-French sentiment
was running pretty high well before the war business started. Why
do we reserve a special place of honor for the French?
In my quest to answer this question, I consulted French history,
to see if they’d ever done anything to us that we could still be
sore about. What I found was astounding. First of all, part of
France was once controlled by England. A civil war in France once
pit the North against the South. After World War II, France lost a
bloody and protracted war in Vietnam. The French think that their
language and culture is the pinnacle of Western civilization. They
also don’t like foreigners telling them what to do. In addition,
their flag is red, white and blue and their national holiday is in
July. Golly gee, France sounds an awful lot like another country
that I’m familiar with, but whose name escapes me at the
moment.
I found out another interesting tidbit as well. Despite what you
may have seen in that movie “The Patriot,” the American Revolution
was not won through the daring and courageous antics of Mel Gibson
and his ragtag band of guerillas. The Revolution was won because
France got involved and England wanted to avoid yet another global
conflict. Basically, if France had decided to stay home, today we’d
be Canada. Of course, if we hadn’t repaid the favor twice during
the last century, they’d be western Germany.
All this bickering with France is pointless and silly. I know
that a good “fifteen minutes of hate” can be a good diversion from
the real world, but when we start making jackasses of ourselves in
the process, it kind of loses something. So the next time you feel
like pouring out a perfectly good bottle of Beaujolais or ordering
a plate of “Freedom Fries” at your favorite restaurant, don’t. It’s
just too much like something the French would do.
Tony Odom is a graduate student in the history
department.