The French take on La Fayette

[Onasander]

How do the French feel about La Fayette, and do they comprehend how deeply indebted their survival during the 20th century was built upon (and very near thrown away) the goodwill La Fayette built up.

 

I look at him, and Tocquerville.... do Europeans even take notice of such thinkers anymore? Did they ever?

[guy]

Unfortunately for him, Lafayette was a rational and thoughtful moderate in Revolutionary France. He quickly become an enemy of the revolutionary state and was forced to flee France. At least he didn't lose his head.

 

 

guy also known as guy

[Onasander]

Anyone and everyone was a enemy of Revolutionary France.... half the reason the US didn't ally with it. 

 

I'm talking about TODAY. France survived two world wars, and even the cold war despite its constant efforts to self destruct. 

 

Are the French aware today, or larger Europe at large, to what they owe him? A big part of why we ever even bothered to go over in the world wars was a sense of debt to him. 

[guy]

Honestly, I don't think most Americans remember Lafayette, either:

 

http://www.pbs.org/program/lafayette/

 

The French, at least, have ideological reasons for forgetting Lafayette:

During his lifetime, Lafayette was also an extremely popular figure in France, but the violent turning point of their revolution left him forever a compromised and controversial figure to his own people. Today he is reviled by certain extremes in French society. Many on the left or the working class regard him as a self-serving aristocrat, a monarchist who was never fully committed to the people. To the right, he will forever be a subversive traitor to his king and class.

But for the most part, in France and America today, he is simply a forgotten man, one whose extraordinary accomplishments have now faded from memory.

 

We Americans have no excuse, however, except for intellectual laziness.

 

 

guy also known as gaius

[Onasander]

Most people with a interest in history know the name here, Im a philosooher before a historian, but I havent neglected engadging in historical discussions with enthusiasts..... we tend to know our founding fathers here.

 

Then again, there are some who think here pure dribble. Ive seen Europeans intellectually fail too, but I think the general world tendency is expatriots tend to be smarter, while the dummies stay back home.

 

I think those with a passing understanding of history know La Fayette and Tocquerville, as they are taught in school here early. Tocquerville America is given to students in middle school here. I brought the old reqiem snd the french revolution as well as On Pauperism with me to Iraq (latter is largely unknown admittedly, gave it to our battalion XO who was interested, figured making him smarter instead of me was a higher priority).

 

All I see from France is the trinity of Nietzsche, Freud, and Marx. They dont even look to their own roots, nor the best of their men.

 

I cant help but get the impression French Civilization is based on the concept of the superiority of the other..... and that other is seemingly always identified in the worst, most self defeating voices of the calls of the other.

 

I like reading Voltaire, I knew French guys who quote him by heart in San Francisco..... but it was like we were talking about two different people. I spoke of a flower blossoming, while they spoke of the wither.

 

Really strange, given they were veterans of the French Draft, and lived in America. We were not too dissimilar in background.

[caldrail]

I'd never heard of him. His significance apparently derives from involvement in the AWI on the American side rather than French politics, which is understandable I guess, but here in Blighty he's pretty much forgotten.