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Mathieu Slama: "The vaccine obligation deeply contradicts the republican principles"

2021-12-02T18:50:07.512Z


FIGAROVOX / TRIBUNE - Considered, notably by Ursula von der Leyen and the new German government, compulsory vaccination no longer seems inconceivable in Europe. The lack of debate and the application of increasingly coercive measures worry the political analyst.


Consultant and political analyst, Mathieu Slama works for several media, notably Le Figaro and Le Huffington Post.

In January, he will publish

Adieu la Liberté

(Les Presses de la Cité).

Each season has its variant, and with this variant comes the inevitable discourse of fear and the authoritarian policies to which we have become accustomed for almost two years. The Omicron variant is no exception to the rule. The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said on Wednesday 1 December that it was time for the European Union to "think" about compulsory vaccination, in the face of the epidemic rebound and the emergence of the new variant. . Austria has already taken the decision on compulsory vaccination, which will be effective from February. Germany has decided to tighten restrictions on unvaccinated people by imposing virtual confinement on them, without access to non-essential shops, restaurants, places of culture or recreation, Angela Merkel announced on Thursday.

The problem is the ease with which European governments betray their own Constitutions, and put in place freedom-killing measures in the context of states of emergency which therefore go beyond the democratic framework.

Mathieu slama

As for France, it continues to tighten the noose around the unvaccinated by further shortening the validity date of the tests (now chargeable), and by pursuing its scapegoat strategy which consists of raising the threat of re-containment and to blame the unvaccinated.

Gabriel Attal, government spokesperson, responded this week to a question on re-containment: "

nothing can be excluded

".

The public debate around this great authoritarian movement which runs through all of Europe suffers from the focus around the vaccine issue. Let us say it again here: this vaccine is good news, and the European governments have for mission to convince the citizens of the benefits of this vaccination, in particular the most fragile and the most at risk in the face of the virus. To convince, and not to coerce. Once this subject has been removed, let's get to the heart of the problem, which is not the vaccine.

The problem is the ease with which European governments betray their own Constitutions, and put in place freedom-killing measures in the context of states of emergency which therefore go beyond the democratic framework. The problem is the way in which we have become accustomed to these exceptional measures, and in which they are more the result of a social demand than of the arbitrariness of the governors. The problem is the difficulty of having a debate on these crucial questions, and the aggressiveness with which any questioning of the health order is greeted. The problem is in the way in which governments threaten their own people with authoritarian confinement, and this "for their own good". The problem is in the dangerous designation of a scapegoat for the crisis,the unvaccinated, fracturing public opinion and fueling a fire that the rulers pretend to want to extinguish. The problem, finally, is the way in which France betrays its most sacred principles without there being any policy to be alarmed.

Read also "European countries are getting used to the state of emergency dangerously"

What is happening in France is important, because our country is the cradle of European democracy, and it gave birth to the most decisive concept of our political modernity, that of citizenship.

And it is this very important principle that is faltering under the effects of the health crisis.

What distinguishes the Republic from the Ancien Régime, and what therefore constitutes the great discovery of the revolutionaries of 1789, is the idea that the French are first and foremost citizens, and that this citizenship guarantees them inalienable and imprescriptible rights. .

Since the Republic is indivisible, citizenship is also indivisible, so that in France there are no sub-citizens, second-class citizens or privileged citizens.

Citizenship is not divided, and all citizens have the same rights.

One could not describe a philosophy further from that of the revolutionaries of '89, who had carved in stone the fundamental rights to avoid, precisely, that a regime could one day call them into question under the effect of a particular situation or situation. 'a crisis.

Mathieu slama

In this regard, health policy as it is conducted today constitutes a major political revolution, which contradicts the principle of inalienable rights as well as the essential principle of the indivisibility of the Republic.

We are experiencing an unprecedented paradigm shift, where access to full citizenship is now determined by a vaccine, and where rights are granted to certain citizens while they are withdrawn from others based on their behavior.

One could not describe a philosophy further from that of the revolutionaries of '89, who had carved in stone the fundamental rights to avoid, precisely, that a regime could one day call them into question under the effect of a particular situation or situation. 'a crisis.

Here is the major betrayal of our leaders in this health crisis.

And here is the reason why the sanitary pass is an unacceptable and dangerous measure in its very mind, regardless of its effectiveness.

As for the vaccination obligation, it would come to the same thing, since it would be a question of punishing, in one way or another, the citizens who decided despite everything not to be vaccinated.

Read also Mathieu Slama: "The unvaccinated is the scapegoat for the health crisis"

How is it that Republicans of all stripes validate what is perhaps the greatest betrayal of our Republican principles in over half a century? How is it, finally, that we are now ready to sacrifice our principles on the altar of effectiveness in the fight against the virus, while yesterday we held the opposite discourse in the face of terrorism? Today, we are giving in on absolutely everything to the virus.

Freedom is not a conditional right, a right authorized by power according to our behavior and which would distinguish good citizens from bad citizens. Let us quote here a great republican, Clemenceau, who recalled in his "Speech for freedom" that in the Republic, no principle is superior to that of freedom and that everything follows from this simple and essential idea: "

In the monarchy, the authority comes from above; it is a delegation of divine power; freedom, I would be very embarrassed to define it; she does not exist ; let us say that, from time to time, the sovereign may have fits of tolerance. In the Republic, freedom is the common right of everyone; and authority can only be the guarantee of everyone's freedom

”.

It might be time for Republicans from all sides to wake up, and understand that what is playing out today is not a simple parenthesis in our democratic existence, but a change of political paradigm and the end of a political paradigm. model which made the pride of France - and which we deny today in deafening silence.

Source: lefigaro

All news articles on 2021-12-02

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