French far right leader loses immunity, faces charges
French far right leader, Marine Le Pen, could face criminal charges for inciting racism, the BBC has learnt.
The French authorities opened a case against Mrs Le Pen in 2011 after she likened the sight of Muslims praying in the streets to the Nazi occupation of France.
As a European Parliament member (MEP), she enjoyed immunity from prosecution.
However, this protection was removed by a European parliamentary committee in a secret vote this week.
Uh, I'm not a lawyer, but isn't there something a little fishy about prosecuting somebody retroactively for what they did even though it was perfectly legal when they did it?
BBC chief political correspondent Gary O'Donoghue says he has been told that the vote to remove her immunity was "overwhelming".
It will need to be ratified by the full parliament, but that's expected to be a formality, our correspondent says. ...
The move clears the way for the French authorities to pursue a case against the leader, who steered her party to a record 18% showing in the first round of last year's presidential election.
So, this is rather like the U.S. government prosecuting Ross Perot, who got 18.7% of the vote in 1992, the next year for campaign statements -- if Perot had been a Congressman and had made them on the floor of the House.
Mrs Le Pen made the remarks at a party rally in 2010 in the southern French town of Lyon.
She said that Muslims using the streets to pray because mosques were overflowing was an "occupation" of French territory.
Praying in the streets was banned in Paris in 2011 in response to growing far right protests.
A reader writes:
Talk about naked political bloodsport. They're going to charge her with a retroactive crime for comments she made when she had immunity from prosecution.
Also, notice the BBC finds it worthy to note that this was a widely supported and popular move amongst her fellow MEPs. What does the popularity of a decision have to do with whether it is sound?
The Left is going nuclear against its opponents.
I wonder if these types of tactics actually work or do they transform the targets into Obie-won-Kenobi - strike me down and I shall become stronger.
Her father cultivated a mythos around Joan of Arc, who is (or ought to be) the patron saint of nationalism.
Posts
114 comments:
Meanwhile, across the channel.
This suggests that they are shit scared.
The Crimethink cops are reving up here as well:
http://patterico.com/2013/06/01/a-call-to-any-tennessee-readers-attend-the-meeting-on-how-the-feds-might-prosecute-those-who-post-inflammatory-documents-about-muslims/
It's not retroactive. The fact that she had immunity doesn't mean that whatever she said or did couldn't be illegal. It just means that she can't be prosecuted for it without the European Parliament allowing it first.
Europe is only five years of seeing a full resurgence of Nationalism, the 'Left' is going full nuclear on its oponents because they don't have any other option.
The powers to be want a Federal Europe at any cost.
Sooner or later, the commoners will rise up against this kind of tyranny. In a kind of irony, I could foresee a kind of anti/reverse French Revolution.
The West is experiencing the natural consequences of the intersection of Liberté, égalité, fraternité, and multiculturalism/diversity/Third World immigration to First World countries.
It cannot last. Serious pushback within 10 years?
I warned you all.
MEPs have immunity from prosecution?!
I'm not sure if that might not be the worst thing here. Although prosecuting someone for having advocated a ban on something that is now banned is pretty amazing.
At this point I don't think France is capable of siring a politician who would advocate for the repeal of the absurd laws that make this kind of harassment and prosecution possible. Sarkozy, ostensibly somewhere to the right, favored a law making it a a crime to 'deny the Armenian genocide.'
Of course France has long had laws against 'denying the Holocaust'. Which they define however they choose.
This is the type of over reach that tends to backfire on the Left. Silly move on their part.
She shouldn't apologize and she shouldn't pay the fine. She should go to jail if need be and play heroine like Joan of Arc.
But there's no need to mention Nazis. Just compare it to the Moorish invasion of Spain.
Secret votes to remove immunity retroactively for the crime of unpopular speech. Sounds fair.
Of course prosecuting someone for an act that wasn't a crime at the time of the act contravenes every principle of sound jurisprudence. But when has leftism ever been about justice? Leftism is today what it has always been: a will to political power.
We can expect this sort of thing to increase as the disastrous results of leftist policies become more and more blatantly obvious.
Note the "secret vote". Does that mean that the names of the voters were secret, or that the outcome was secret? Either way, it is not good. Maybe the voters were threatened with hate speech prosecution if they voted the wrong way.
This is really disgusting.
No freedom in France.
The thugs are in power and anyone who disagrees is railroaded.
The West has been hijacked. The parasites are in power.
This isn't like Ross Perot because Ross Perot wasn't leading a growing anti-establishment political movement (yes, yes, I know, but really he wasn't). I think it's more like prosecuting leading members of Tea Party groups--a real attempt to control the terms of debate.
If they do prosecute her for this she'll get 25% of the vote the next time she runs for president.
Ex post facto
Latin for "from a thing done afterward." Ex post facto is most typically used to refer to a criminal law that applies retroactively, thereby criminalizing conduct that was legal when originally performed. Two clauses in the US Constitution prohibit ex post facto laws: Art 1, § 9 and Art. 1 § 10. see, e.g. Collins v. Youngblood, 497 US 37 (1990) and California Dep't of Corrections v. Morales, 514 US 499 (1995).
Ex post facto laws
[Latin, "After-the-fact" laws.] Laws that provide for the infliction of punishment upon a person for some prior act that, at the time it was committed, was not illegal.
Ex post facto laws retroactively change the rules of evidence in a criminal case, retroactively alter the definition of a crime, retroactively increase the punishment for a criminal act, or punish conduct that was legal when committed. They are prohibited by Article I, Section 10, Clause 1, of the U.S. Constitution. An ex post facto law is considered a hallmark of tyranny because it deprives people of a sense of what behavior will or will not be punished and allows for random punishment at the whim of those in power.
Ex post facto Law: France
The expression "Ex post facto law" translates to "loi rétroactive" in French. In France, any ex post facto criminal law may be applied only if the retroactive application benefits the accused person (called retroactivity "in mitius"). An example of this rule would be a case where a weaker sentence is now applicable but was not previously applicable. See also the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen.
So maybe they'll argue that they're punishing her for her own good.
So. Steve isn't going to talk about the Cheerios commercial? White people are just going to leave that down the memory tube?
There's an article from mid May that said that Marine is polling ahead of President Hollande. I'm not sure if her being criminally charged would serve as an impediment to her running for future political office.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2326724
http://redflagnews.com/headlines/unreal-california-elementary-school-named-in-honor-of-murderer
Maybe the media should not only get rid of 'illegal' but 'criminal'.
At this grim news my only emotion is gratitude that my late Dad and all my uncles who fought to liberate Europe, and who knew many good men who gave their lives and limbs and sanity in that liberation, did not live to see Europe un-liberate itself.
It's not retroactive. The fact that she had immunity doesn't mean that whatever she said or did couldn't be illegal. It just means that she can't be prosecuted for it without the European Parliament allowing it first.
Doublespeak Talmudic bullshit. Ex post facto law means you are being prosecuted for something that was legal when you did it.
@Dave Pinsen: Christianity in the West especially in the UK doesn't really stand for anything. It compromises too much. The only two Christian denominations in the West that remotely stick to their values are Catholicism and Mormonism. Mainstream Protestantism is all but dead in the West.
When you have Anglican Bishops denouncing folks who are against gay marriage as being akin to those who used religion to justify slavery it's time to turn off the lights.
One thing I respect about the Mohammedans is that they do not compromise, period.
They are certain in their righteousness in their cause. Which is why I find it so odd when Western commentators try so hard to "explain" the actions of Islamic terrorists. The terrorists, like the ones that slaughtered the soldier are very explicit as to why they are doing what they are doing. It's not a mystery.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2333167/The-Rt-Rev-Nicholas-Holtam-People-oppose-gay-marriage-like-Christians-used-Bible-support-apartheid-slavery-says-senior-bishop.html#ixzz2Umq3dxUT
So. Steve isn't going to talk about the Cheerios commercial? White people are just going to leave that down the memory tube?
Hey, first I've heard of it. I haven't seen a TV commercial in months.
Highly Offensive
A similar thing is playing out in Australia.
A 13 year-old football spectator called an (aboriginal) player an APE. The player was in ear shot, so he walked up to her, pointing at her as he approached, and then ordered that the police remove her from the stadium.
She was removed. Then she was detained for two hours. Now she is being subject to 'educational correction facilities.'
It them blew up because likable,self-made millionaire Eddie Mcquire made a gaffe on air. He will probably step down. He may even be arrested (if the player files charges).
I blogged about this here.
http://krgooder.wordpress.com/2013/06/01/the-adam-goodes-affair-modern-day-analog-of-the-catholic-church/
"It's not retroactive. The fact that she had immunity doesn't mean that whatever she said or did couldn't be illegal."
just terrible.
why do you think she had immunity as an MP? might it be because we want MPs to participate freely in a supposedly democratic process without fear of prosecution for politically relevant speech? but then 'immunity' really wouldnt accomplish anything if it could be revoked as soon as ones tenure as an MP ended, would it?
heck, that would be like saying american politicians can't take bribes while in office but they are allowed to cash in at goldman sachs or boeing or apple or KKR as soon as they leave office. that would be absurd!
Joan of Arc is called Jeanne d'Arc in France. The name was anglicized by the English.
The irony is that Jews have pushed for the prosecution of those who engage in "hate speech," but have had to flee France in large numbers because Muslims have made many areas unsafe.
Has Miami become more vibrant with the arrival of French Jews, or only with the mass arrival of Hispanics?
Sorry folks, there will be no revolt against the ruling classes, at least not an effective one, anywhere, in either Europe or the Americas. In the 18th century, a rioter or a rebel stood a fairly chance against the forces of power because the weapons at the disposal of each were fairly even, except for the canon, which had its drawbacks. The ruling classes, especially the kings still believed in Christianity to a greater or lesser degree, and did not wage total war against their peoples. Modern affluence is great, but your house and your car are an anchor if you are trying to swim against the tide. The only way out I can see is nations going bankrupt. But then that, as all of you know, raises a whole new set of problems.
Marine has gone wobbly, anyway. She failed to support the recent massive movement against gay marriage, and I believe FN has made concessions to Mohammedan groups and politicians, which will in turn encourage more demands. See Galliawatch for details.
My thinking is that only a miracle can save France, the De Villiers types will need a miracle to get voted in. Like Mr. Raspail says, "The carrots are cooked."
Gubbler, nice observation about the Moorish invasion. Marine should steal that.
Secret votes to remove immunity retroactively for the crime of unpopular speech. Sounds fair.
The crime of popular speech.
far right = civilized
If you oppose rioting violent immigrants, well then you must be a far right racist zealot.
If you oppose prosrate people blocking traffic, well then you are a far right extremist.
Nothing says bigot more than wanting a civil society for yourselves and your posterity.
Anyone questioning the current ruling elite is thereby declaring himself a criminal.
...Joan of Arc, who is (or ought to be) the patron saint of nationalism.
My paperback copy of Anthony Smith's National Identity has a painting of Joan of Arc on the cover.
"The French authorities opened a case against Mrs Le Pen in 2011 after she likened the sight of Muslims praying in the streets to the Nazi occupation of France."
An invidious comparison that insults the Nazis.
"However, this protection was removed by a European parliamentary committee in a secret vote this week."
Secret vote? Not very confident, are they? What's the use of Parliamentary Immunity if it can be retroactively removed at the whim of persons unknown taking a secret vote?
Western leaders and elites are in a very bad situation when it comes to mass immigration. To admit that they have been wrong for the last few decades, and then try to reverse it might be cataclysmic.
Of course, their own plans are also cataclysmic, just in a longer term. So, they will, as a short term solution, increasingly label the opponents of mass immigration as "evil" and try to restrict free speech for them including of course, criminal penalties.
Of course prosecuting someone for an act that wasn't a crime at the time of the act contravenes every principle of sound jurisprudence. But when has leftism ever been about justice? Leftism is today what it has always been: a will to political power.
Yes, I agree.
An internet commenter calling himself John S. Bolton used to say that the Left was about freedom for aggression. And he was right, too.
Again, according to the French (who invented the terms), the Right is the party of order, and the Left is the party of movement.
Ever notice how these establishment sites so often selectively don't have a comments section at all on articles like this? In 2013 there's no feedback allowed.
So Soviet. And we all know what happened with them in the end.
A 13 year-old football spectator called an (aboriginal) player an APE. The player was in ear shot, so he walked up to her, pointing at her as he approached, and then ordered that the police remove her from the stadium.
All humans are apes, by definition. This is just like what we get from our mass media -- stupid and evil.
If and when nationalists seize power in any country, their first move will be to seize control of the central bank. Everyone who is currently on the money printers' gravy train will be thrown off and the privilege of printing money and giving it to one's friends will then belong to the nationalists.
The incumbent central bankers and their many influential allies will use every means at their disposal to prevent this from happening.
The Left will regret it. It will probably get very ugly when, inevitably, the pendulum swings back. French, of all people, should be aware of it. Yet another case of learning absolutely nothing from history.
Gubbler, nice observation about the Moorish invasion. Marine should steal that.
An apt comparison especially since this current invasion is being helped along by the Scots-Irish just like they did with the Moorish one.
Five Daarstens explains: Joan of Arc is called Jeanne d'Arc in France. The name was anglicized by the English.
"Chapeau means `hat.' Oeuf means `egg.' It's like those French have a different word for everything." --Steve Martin
This crime about to be committed against Marie Le Pen is what the Left has always resorted to: MOVING THE GOAL POSTS. This is why conservatives have gone breathless, and have kept falling behind and seeing their popular support diminish, in trying to keep up with the Left's inexorable so-called "progressiveness" which means, of course, nothing more than "moving the goal posts."
This is, in fact, precisely what non-enforcement of our immigration laws, what officially winked-at abuse of our refugee admission laws & policies, and what the Shmamnesty bill are all about: just more MOVING THE GOAL POSTS.
"Joan of Arc, who is (or ought to be) the patron saint of nationalism."
Joan of Arc has nothing to do with nationalism. In the 14th century the concept of nationalism did not even exist. The idea of a French people with a French nation, or any corresponding entity did not exist.
France considered by both high nobles to lowly peasants to be the personal fiefdom of the Capets. Just as England was considered to be the personal fiefdom of the Plantagenets. By no means was the king considered to be an "agent of the people" in the way that modern-day heads of states are. In fact the King of England did not even speak English.
Nor was the 100 Years a nationalistic struggle in the same way as say the Franco-Prussian War. It was a war over inheritance, the issues at play were little more than competing legal claims that were settled on the battlefield instead of the courtroom.
French soldiers did not fight to defend the nation of France or out of a sense of patriotism to their homeland. They fought because of far more concrete personal allegiances that they swore to their respective overlords. Calling any soldier in the 100 Years War a French nationalist, would be like calling programmers loyal to Sergey Brin Google nationalists.
The concept just plain didn't exist then. You won't find any piece of writing contemporary to the era that formulates anything that modern-day people would remotely construe as nationalism.
It's interesting how every single British/Euro politics news source seems to have shut down their comments section. Things are getting too hot over there to risk letting the public comment I guess.
Ironically(?) it seems like the only non-US source mentioning this story with a comments section is Al Jazeera. But they're only doing it for the same reason the Guardian used to have open comments on "bad news for the Right" stories, ie to allow gloating. Like the Guardian they'll drop it once they realize what a pain it is to moderate that sort of stuff.
Of course, in any civilized community, the absolute right of free speech for individuals is respected. Supposedly this is one of the basic tenets of a free, liberal society in which individual rights and freedoms are recognised and respected. You know, the usual trio of rule of law, democratic rule, and enforceable individual rights.
So much for the ordinary Joe Blow in the street, but even more fundamental and ancient than that was the view that parliamentarians, the legislators, the people who atually run things had an absolute right to free speech. The reasoning behind this is that if parliamentarians (who are directly elected representatives and thus the 'peoples' voice') are muzzled, then was is the point of setting up a parliament to govern in the first place?
And the EU has the sheer unmitigated gall to criticise China and Russia.
The French State(and the EU) is really scared of the successes of the protests against gay marriage. They do nothing when "urban youths" do rioting but many were put in "garde à vue"(preventive arrest) just for wearing an anti-gay marriage T-Shirt.
In France, many Traditionalist Catholics choose a military career and the State is very worried that many of the young protesters arrested are sons and daughters of high ranking military officers.
In France, this gay marriage thing is turning into the Dreyfuss affair of the 21st Century where the controversy itself is not as important than the fact that the two camps fighting the issue are France and Anti-France.
A 13 year-old football spectator called an (aboriginal) player an APE. The player was in ear shot, so he walked up to her, pointing at her as he approached, and then ordered that the police remove her from the stadium. "
Lets leave aside the legal aspects of a 13 year old girl being imprisoned for making an uncouth statement.
DVN to aborigine:
I would like to concentrate on the notion of manhood. Dude seriously?
A THIRTEEN YEAR OLD GIRL called you something objectionable and you a young male athlete in the prime of your life was so hurt by her statements that you didnt just not confront her or better yet her parents.But you called the police and pointed at her like a good little snitch because she hurt your precious feelings
Obviously what she didnt wasnt right but
1) She is just a child
2) He is not
PC is not just turning everyone into joyless,braindead trolls but its also turning men(especially minority men) into pussies
"Chapeau means `hat.' Oeuf means `egg.' It's like those French have a different word for everything." --Steve Martin"
I guess Im the minority but I found Steve martin to be painfully unfunny.
And speaking of the French, his Inspector Closeau was an utter travesty compared to the genius of Sellers
An apt comparison especially since this current invasion is being helped along by the Scots-Irish just like they did with the Moorish one."
It was the Vandals(Germanic tribe) who invited them to combat their brethren.
And Vandals were just as foreign to that region as the Moors.
I dont see you getting worked up over THAT!
Svigor said:
Doublespeak Talmudic bullshit. Ex post facto law means you are being prosecuted for something that was legal when you did it."
He may be a bullshit spouting PC left weasel hiding behind bad legalese but that doesnt mean you have to counter with anti semitic bullshit(no evidence whatsoever that the poster was Scots Irish)
Thankfully Madison wrote about Bills of Attainder in Federalist 44 and they're currently banned in all 50 states and the federal constitution. On the other hand Europe increasingly looks like a warning to the U.S.
Anon,
"When you have Anglican Bishops denouncing folks who are against gay marriage as being akin to those who used religion to justify slavery it's time to turn off the lights."
Speaking of which, Chris Caldwell's FT column this week is about why the French are marching against gay marriage: link
"You won't find any piece of writing contemporary to the era that formulates anything that modern-day people would remotely construe as nationalism."
Perhaps that's why it took a semi-literate teenage peasant girl to come up with up with the essential concept to solve the 100 Years War:
"You, men of England, ... go back to your own country..."
She had the following message shot by arrow into the English camp:
"You, men of England, who have no right to this Kingdom of France, the King of Heaven orders and notifies you through me, Joan the Maiden, to leave your fortresses and go back to your own country; or I will produce a clash of arms to be eternally remembered."
To the Continental ally of the English, she then had written:
"Great and honoured Prince, Duke of Burgundy, Joan the Maid requests of you, in the name of the King of Heaven, my rightful and sovereign Lord, that the King of France and yourself should make a good firm lasting peace. Fully pardon each other willingly, as faithful Christians should do; and if it should please you to make war, then go against the Saracens. Prince of Burgundy, I pray, beg, and request as humbly as I can that you wage war no longer in the holy kingdom of France ..."
The nation-state reaches back far into the origins of Europe itself and perhaps beyond. If Europe was not always a Europe of nations, it was always a Europe in which nations existed, and were taken for granted, as a basic form of the State.
When French people talked to Joan of Arc in despair, asking if they had to become English, this was a national question. When she told them no, the English would be driven out by command of the King of Heaven, this was an answer worthy of a patron saint of nationalism.
"Of course, in any civilized community, the absolute right of free speech for individuals is respected. Supposedly this is one of the basic tenets of a free, liberal society in which individual rights and freedoms are recognised and respected. You know, the usual trio of rule of law, democratic rule, and enforceable individual rights."
Chomsky obliterated French intellectual culture on the topic of free speech:
http://www.chomsky.info/articles/19801011.htm
http://www.chomsky.info/articles/19810228.htm
"Then we must conclude that the person in question believes that the petition was "scandaleuse" because Faurisson should indeed be denied the normal rights of self-expression, should be barred from the university, should be subjected to harassment and even violence, etc. Such attitudes are not uncommon. They are typical, for example of American Communists and no doubt their counterparts elsewhere. Among people who have learned something from the 18th century (say, Voltaire) it is a truism, hardly deserving discussion, that the defense of the right of free expression is not restricted to ideas one approves of, and that it is precisely in the case of ideas found most offensive that these rights must be most vigorously defended. Advocacy of the right to express ideas that are generally approved is, quite obviously, a matter of no significance. All of this is well-understood in the United States, which is why there has been nothing like the Faurisson affair here. In France, where a civil libertarian tradition is evidently not well-established and where there have been deep totalitarian strains among the intelligentsia for many years (collaborationism, the great influence of Leninism and its offshoots, the near-lunatic character of the new intellectual right, etc.), matters are apparently quite different.
Note first that even if Faurisson were to be a rabid anti-Semite and fanatic pro-Nazi -- such charges have been presented to me in private correspondence that it would be improper to cite in detail here -- this would have no bearing whatsoever on the legitimacy of the defense of his civil rights. On the contrary, it would make it all the more imperative to defend them since, once again, it has been a truism for years, indeed centuries, that it is precisely in the case of horrendous ideas that the right of free expression must be most vigorously defended; it is easy enough to defend free expression for those who require no such defense."
"n the Italian left-liberal journal Repubblica, Barbara Spinelli writes that the real scandal in this affair is the fact that even a few people publicly affirm their support of the right to express ideas that are almost universally reviled -- and that happen to be diametrically opposed to their own. My own observation is different. It seems to me something of a scandal that it is even necessary to debate these issues two centuries after Voltaire defended the right of free expression for views he detested. It is a poor service to the memory of the victims of the holocaust to adopt a central doctrine of their murderers."
the french love irony, right? putting people on trial for daring to use the word nazi in an analogy...
Perhaps that's why it took a semi-literate teenage peasant girl to come up with up with the essential concept to solve the 100 Years War:
"You, men of England, ... go back to your own country..."
She had the following message shot by arrow into the English camp:
"You, men of England, who have no right to this Kingdom of France, the King of Heaven orders and notifies you through me, Joan the Maiden, to leave your fortresses and go back to your own country; or I will produce a clash of arms to be eternally remembered."
DVN:I agree that Joan of Arc is a patron saint of nationalism..atleast to the French (as Blackadder in the Hanoverian era reacting to Francophilia in England says in disgust "we hate the French..was the person burning Joan of Arc simply wasting good matches?")
I think what the poster was alluding to was the fact that it was indeed a family squabble between "England" and "France"
Both these territories were ruled by French speaking monarchs of Norman blood.
What the 100 years war did was (re)create the seperation of English and French identities.
A better comparision would be the American Revolutionary War. Both sides were mostly English(or British) and spoke English language,followed English culture and customs.This did not prevent George Washington (who fought in the Seven Years War on behalf of the English) and Thomas Paine(which Hitchens described as the greatest Englishman and American of his era) from fighting the mother country.
Similary Joan of Arc may have been of the same stock of the King of England but this did not prevent her from fighting that king.
I think it was Bill Bryson in Mother Tongue who mentioned that under Henry II , the Anglo Normans who visited France for attending university were so mocked for their French that the "English" king was compelled to create a university with in England -Oxford
From wikipedia
The university has a long history. It grew rapidly from 1167 when Henry II banned English students from attending the University of Paris.[1] After disputes between students and Oxford townsfolk in 1209, some academics fled north-east to Cambridge, where they established what became the University of Cambridge.
I suspect The Right in France will do no more than The Right in the US about any injustice from The Left. On this side of the Atlantic it seems as long as any conservative can get any other conservative to agree their opinion about some outrage is justified they are happy to take another beating from The Left. When you ask "what will it take before you do something?" the answer is "this episode was bad, but if something worse happens then we will act."
In my mind it's been nearly all bad for years and all that happens is we keep moving beyond what was a red line recently.
I think we need to stop analyzing endlessly and work on an effective means of civil disobedience.
DR, I think that nationalism is as old as humanity. The ancient Greeks, for example, considered themselves to be a nation. At the level of folklore they conceived of themselves as descendents of a single man named Hellen. This was obviously a simplification, but a simplification of the truth. On average they must have been related to each other more closely than to non-Greeks.
The medieval Slavs told a story of three brothers named Czech, Lech and Rus parting to found three separate nations. For those who don't know, Poles sometimes call themselves Lechs. I think that story goes back to the 13th century in the written record.
The stories of single eponymous progenitors of whole nations occur in the folklores of all historical periods in all parts of the globe. The Old Testament is full of such stories. After the flood the Earth was said to be repopulated by Noah's sons. Basically, Yaphet beget Europeans, Shem Middle Easterners and Ham Africans. If the authors of the OT were aware of the existance of Mongoloids, they would have written in a fourth brother to explain them. The children of Yaphet, Shem and Ham were said to have begotten all the nations that ancient Jews knew about.
The stories of single progenitors testify to a conception of ethnicities as groups bound by descent. Which they are of course. These stories are simplifications of the truth.
There were lots of ethnic politics in the Middle Ages, and not all of it used religion as a proxy. The great universities were often divided by nations. German students at the Sorbonne, for example, were a part of the German nation.
The idea that nationalism was invented at the time of the French revolution is as false as the idea that race was invented by 19th century scientists.
Joan of Arc is called Jeanne d'Arc in France. The name was anglicized by the English."
Thank you for educating us uncouth knuckle dragging yahoos on this matter
I think that nationalism is as old as humanity. The ancient Greeks, for example, considered themselves to be a nation. The idea that nationalism was invented at the time of the French revolution [is] false
Recognition of the existence of nations, is quite different than "nationalism." Nationalism has become such an ingrained part of modern thought, so we forget that the way a medieval person used the term "nation" was refer to a group of people sharing cultural, linguistic, and ethnic heritage.
It did not have an political implications, unlike today where nation has become synonymous for state. So you have to be careful not to color older writings through modern lenses. Someone simply talking about "the German nation" is not arguing for German political unity, in the same way that a modern writer would be.
Nationalism very specifically refers to the belief that 1) people should be ruled by people from their same nation (i.e. linguistically/culturally/ethnically similar people) and 2) that the natural political divisions are national divisions.
Medieval Europe was the complete antithesis of this political division. Rulers frequently had little to no relation to their subjects. The King of France had more in common with the Emperor or Russia than he did with his own peasants 10 miles away from Versailles. Inheritance and and often did pass to far away branches from far-flung lands that had never even stepped foot in the realm that they assumed power in.
Political divisions had next to no relation to national divisions. Austria, Spain and the Netherlands were all ruled by the same house. Italy was fragmented into a hundred different splinter states despite forming a very coherent linguistic and ethnic area. Not only was this the natural state of affairs, but until the British liberals came along in the 19th century and started putting ideas in people's heads, no one even thought this state of affairs was strange.
The nation-state reaches back far into the origins of Europe itself and perhaps beyond. If Europe was not always a Europe of nations, it was always a Europe in which nations existed, and were taken for granted, as a basic form of the State.
No the nation-state has no precedents in Europe pre-1800. None, nada, zip. In fact its harder to think of a region of the world with less relation to the nation state than Europe.
The political foundation is totally and definitely rooted in feudalism. Feudalism is so central to the development of European states that most Western law is still only a few steps removed from feudal traditions. And feudal states are nearly the complete opposite of nation-states.
As I said above the core of nationalism is the belief that people should be ruled by those from the same ethnic or cultural nation as themselves. Feudalism completely repudiates this. It is a system where people can be suddenly find themselves ruled by an overlord with no ties whatsoever to his realm or tenure, merely because he was a distant relative with a convoluted claim of inheritance.
The political map of medieval Europe looked like shredded confetti, with enclaves and exclaves galore. Needless to say it bore virtually no correlation to the ethnic and cultural divisions of the continent.
"You, men of England, who have no right to this Kingdom of France, the King of Heaven orders and notifies you through me, Joan the Maiden, to leave your fortresses and go back to your own country; or I will produce a clash of arms to be eternally remembered."
It's important not load this with modern context. Nothing in this message is nationalistic per se. When Joan's saying that England has no right to France, it's like Apple saying that Samsung has no right to some phone patent. When she says that Heaven is against it, it's like Apple saying that Samsung is violating the UCC. The Divine Right of Kings is the idea that God always supports the rightful and legal heir to the throne.
Tony Blair's next?
"Uh, I'm not a lawyer, but isn't there something a little fishy about prosecuting somebody retroactively for what they did even though it was perfectly legal when they did it?"
It's okay. They had a secret vote.
I guess I'm the minority but I found Steve Martin to be painfully unfunny.
I found the Seventies to be painfully unfunny, but Steve Martin helped me bear it. I think some of his stuff still holds up, but de gustibus. For those youngsters reading, it's hard to appreciate it without knowing the horror that was the Seventies.
I think these arguments over whether Joan of Arc is really the "patron saint of nationalism" are just arguments over definitions. You could probably avoid a lot of it by charitably replacing Steve Sailer's "nationalism" by "national identity," a distinction that Anthony Smith makes in the book pictured here. Terminology in nationalism studies is frustratingly non-standardized.
By the way, I don't remember the book even mentioning Joan of Arc; her name's not in the index. But it's a nice cover.
Eugen Weber is credited with establishing that there was no French nation until the early 20th century in the sense that most French citizens didn't think of themselves as Frenchmen before then. Of course that's just one meaning of "nation." They thought of themselves as Alsacians, Britons (Brittany), Burgundians, etc. You didn't need a national identity to know that the English were foreigners.
>>Uh, I'm not a lawyer, but isn't there something a little fishy about prosecuting somebody retroactively for what they did even though it was perfectly legal when they did it?<<
Uh, not if you have more upper-body strength.
Anonydroid at 7:45 PM said: One thing I respect about the Mohammedans is that they do not compromise, period.
Hunsdon said: Izzackly. A large portion of our "Muslim problem" is that they take their religion seriously. The West used to---can you imagine how Andres Serrano and "Piss Christ" would have gone over under a liberal humanist like, oh, Sir Thomas More?
(I'll give you a hint: the same way Joan of Arc ended up.)
"So. Steve isn't going to talk about the Cheerios commercial? White people are just going to leave that down the memory tube?"
Jews push Afro-Aryanism against subhuman 'white boy'.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzEDtcfYGss
@steve - "Uh, I'm not a lawyer, but isn't there something a little fishy about prosecuting somebody retroactively for what they did even though it was perfectly legal when they did it?"
you're confusing the e.u. with a free, democratic, law-abiding state.
McSchwarzism(Jewish McCarthyism) blacklists another scholar.
DR: Joan of Arc has nothing to do with nationalism. In the 14th century the concept of nationalism did not even exist. The idea of a French people with a French nation, or any corresponding entity did not exist.
Nations in the forms we know them today did not exist in the 15th century? Golly, who knew?
DR, stop sperging out. We all know that Joan's elevation to French national heroine/patron saint was a standard bit of evolving, after-the-events myth-making. Only hysterical spergs like you think everyone's in the dark about these things. Most people also, unlike you, understand the whys and wherefores of symbols, and know why she became the powerful symbol that she did.
Now go sit in the corner with that other sperg who felt the need to tell us that Joan is really Jeanne. (Psst. You can rock his world by telling him that, no, no, it's really Jehanne!)
Could the same thing happen here?
I just read the DOJ is considering making a federal offense any criticism of Islam and Muslims on social media.
Things are moving along quite nicely.
"The French authorities opened a case against Mrs Le Pen in 2011 after she likened the sight of Muslims praying in the streets to the Nazi occupation of France."
She should have brought up the name of Charles "the hammer" Martel, who fought off the invasion on France, Europe. If not for Martel France might already have been a Moslem nation.
From Wikipedia
" A Muslim France? Historically, it nearly happened. But as a result of Martel’s fierce opposition, which ended Muslim advances and set the stage for centuries of war thereafter, Islam moved no farther into Europe. European schoolchildren learn about the Battle of Tours in much the same way that American students learn about Valley Forge and Gettysburg."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Martel#Battle_of_Tours
It's like the film Spartacus; if everyone commits and confesses to the same 'crime', the authorities will be powerless to prosecute everyone, and so either the law or the rule of law must be abandoned. All that's needed is some organisation.
A great English language site/blog covering the latest in French self-destruction, from a French New Right perspective:
http://galliawatch.blogspot.com
DR, about nations wanting to be ruled by their own:
This was the chief motivation for the ancient Greeks fighting the Persian Empire. The hostilities started when the Greek cities in Asia Minor revolted against Persian rule. Peninsular Greeks gave them aid. Persians decided to solve this problem by conquering all of Greece. Greeks (well, most of them) united for the first time in written (as opposed to mythological) history to oppose this foreign invasion.
The Wikipedia on the name of the Holy Roman Empire:
"In a decree following the 1512 Diet of Cologne, the name was officially changed to the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation (German: Heiliges Römisches Reich Deutscher Nation, Latin: Imperium Romanum Sacrum Nationis Germanicæ),[14] a form first used in a document in 1474."
It's my impression that ancient and medieval man wanted political boundaries to reflect ethnic ones, wanted to be ruled by his own, but that this could rarely be translated into reality. The selfishness of the rulers and the ease with which walls and knights' bodies could be defended before firearms were perfected - those things worked against the creation of large, stable states. The Holy Roman Empire wasn't much of a state, but its naming was aspirational. It tells us that Germans wanted to live in a nation-state.
When Frankish kings wanted to divide their realm among their sons, they sent these sons, as children, to the parts of the kingdom that they were going to inherit, so that they learned to speak the local language natively. This looks like an attempt to meet their subjects' aspirations half-way.
The greatest irony is that we would be hard pressed to find a Muslim who was offended by being associated with Nazis.
"...The Left will regret it. It will probably get very ugly when, inevitably, the pendulum swings back..."
Why do you think it is inevitable? What evidence is there for the "pendulum" analogy in this situation?
How is making comments critical of Muslims "racist"? Muslims are not a race. Islam is defined by its universalism.
Laguna Beach Fogey wrote: "Could the same thing happen here?"
Wake up. It's already happened here. Campus speech codes are rigidly enforced, nearly all of them backed, in cases brought to courts, by juries and judicial rulings. So-called "hate crimes" laws abound. Obama has prohibited federal officials from speaking of jihad, Islam, and Moslems. Officialdom and Enemedia-Pravda roundly support the totalitarian notion of "hate speech," and they come down like a ton of bricks on anyone whose speech violates the ever elastic, constantly-goal-post-moving "definition" of "hate speech."
Can you say, "Jason Richwine"?
Auntie Analogue said...This crime about to be committed against Marie Le Pen is what the Left has always resorted to: MOVING THE GOAL POSTS.
AA, excellent as always. It's become obvious that whenever a political hack decries some tactic of his opponents, he is generally complaining that they have appropriated his own favorite tactic. Thus, the Clintons used to complain about "the politics of personal destruction" when that was their favorite approach. Obama complains about "petty partisan bickering" when he is the pettiest partisan bickerer ever.
The Left likes to move the goal posts or "bars" and so it accuses the right of moving or "raising" the bar. In 2008 Michelle Obama constantly complained that they (white people) were always raising the bar for people like her. They did it at Princeton and they were doing it during the campaign. What she really meant, of course, is that they were not lowering it and that was unfair.
This is from her stump speech:
“We’ve learned that we’re still living in a time and in a nation where the bar is set, right? They tell you all you need to do is do these things and you’ll get to the bar — So you go about the business of doing those things — You start working hard and sacrificing, and you think you’re getting closer to the bar, you’re working and you’re struggling, you get right to that bar, you’re reaching out for the bar, and then what happens? They raise the bar. Raise the bar. Shift it to the side. Keep it just out of reach. And that’s just what’s been happening in this race.”
I think we can all agree that the Obamas have been kept down by people always raising the bar on them.
In the past two months I have been in both Lyon and Marseilles -- and France has a very serious problem. Lyon is all Arabic and African outside the city center (which is still french). Marseilles is equal parts Arabic, African and French in the center, and the suburbs are all Arabic and African. The country is a good way toward being lost.
It was the Vandals(Germanic tribe) who invited them to combat their brethren.
And Vandals were just as foreign to that region as the Moors.
I dont see you getting worked up over THAT!
There are no Vandals to get worked up against. They are extinct. Meanwhile the Scots-Irish, who enthusiastically cooperated with the Moors, are still working against the interests of Europeans today. If there were Vandals promoting the multicult in 2013, I assure you I'd be just as disgusted with them.
The answer to your question is "No." That our constitution prohibits ex post facto laws just reflects that Europe never saw anything wrong with them.
A gift, I think, to Mme. Le Pen.
"The political map of medieval Europe looked like shredded confetti, with enclaves and exclaves galore. Needless to say it bore virtually no correlation to the ethnic and cultural divisions of the continent."
Second sentence... that's what I call a rhetorical stretch! Wow!
"It is a system where people can be suddenly find themselves ruled by an overlord with no ties whatsoever to his realm or tenure..."
Unlike our western countries today... yeah....
Oh I forgot, we in the West WANT to be demographically overwhelmed!! We crave it like cuckold porn. Must be because nations exist or don't exist or did not before 1800 ... I get confused about that point sometime.
Can't really trust the words of any e-mailer who can't spell "Obi-Wan"
DR said: Nationalism has become such an ingrained part of modern thought, so we forget that the way a medieval person used the term "nation" was refer to a group of people sharing cultural, linguistic, and ethnic heritage.
Hunsdon said: In the West, DR, in the West. In the Soviet Union, your passport had separate entries for citizenship and nationality. I know that several of the successor Central Asian states continue this practice, and strongly suspect that Russia does as well.
If you were a ethnic Kazakh living in Kazakhstan, your nationality would be Kazakh, and your citizenship Kazakhstani.
If you disagree with me, it is a crime. Brilliant. Watch for Obama and Holder to use that one.
Whether she had immunity or not is irrelevant. What is important is that what she said is true.
And, true or not, she would have every right to say it in a free country, which France, evidently, no longer is.
I pray that her immunity is taken away, that she is prosecuted, and that she is convicted.
Then the National Front vote will double at the next election.
DR said 6/1/13, 11:14 PM
You lost. Give it up already, your arguments ring hollow.
The answer to your question is "No." That our constitution prohibits ex post facto laws just reflects that Europe never saw anything wrong with them.
The Napoleonic Code expressly forbade them.
Nationalism has become such an ingrained part of modern thought, so we forget that the way a medieval person used the term "nation" was refer to a group of people sharing cultural, linguistic, and ethnic heritage.
"Indian Nations"(referring to tribes of "Native Americans")was a common term used by old-timers when I was a kid.
"The Controversial Topics of Wikipedia;" by language:
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/05/the-controversial-topics-of-wikipedia/
Look at #9 in English.
Some smarty pants typed: "You won't find any piece of writing contemporary to the era that formulates anything that modern-day people would remotely construe as nationalism."
Now, admittedly the author is obscure but perhaps this ditty might qualify as a counter example?
This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle, This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise,
This fortress built by Nature for herself Against infection and the hand of war, This happy breed of men, this little world,
This precious stone set in the silver sea, Which serves it in the office of a wall Or as a moat defensive to a house, Against the envy of less happier lands,--
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England.
It's important not load this with modern context. Nothing in this message is nationalistic per se. When Joan's saying that England has no right to France, it's like Apple saying that Samsung has no right to some phone patent.
So .. you say that Joan was a proto corporate lawyer rather than a proto-nationalist ... and also that we should not load this up with modern context?
Maybe Le Pen could challenge the legitimacy of the decision. Someone told her that the committee's secret vote went against her. How does she know that's true? Maybe someone miscounted. Maybe someone lied to her. It would be the legislative equivalent of poling the jury.
She should push for the secret vote to be opened. Sure, everyone who voted thought it was secret, and it was at the time. They had no reason to think that the secrecy would stay in place retroactively.
It's interesting how every single British/Euro politics news source seems to have shut down their comments section. Things are getting too hot over there to risk letting the public comment I guess.
The Daily Telegraph has done a lot of this in the last week.
They use the Disqus comments system, Steve is registered though I've not seen him comment at the DT.
The comments at the DT are amazing, on immigration, on the national question (when comments are allowed) our side has swept all opposition from the field. A diverse range of opinion all the way from anti-jihadi to outright WN can be seen but left and right liberal supporters of the status quo barely get a look in anymore though they have the moderators covering for them to some extent.
There will be NO ZERO ZILCH NADA NONE revolt against the European elites, mass immigration, jihad in the streets, or anything else.
Why?
Duh. Because women (well White women) don't want it. Think of that Cheerios commercial. Now, oh what sort of mixed race family was that, again?
Oh yeah. White woman (not the first such family btw, Lexus has done that at Christmas for years) and Black male and Black kids.
If you are a woman, and semi-attractive, you can move up by being the kept woman of the conqueror, your genes go on, often in better shape with more privileges than before all the men of your race were slaughtered or enslaved. More than one Christian female slave bore an eventual Sultan. Besides, multiculturalism puts an end to all that nerdy technology, and other icky stuff, that women detest like baseball stats, SABREMetrics, Linux, and anything well technological.
For women, its like living in a dystopian future with hunky violent men, or a Twilight fantasy. Look at all those Muslims praying, and most women figure, that's the future, that's the winners, and they WANT them to win to give them the sexy dominance they crave.
If France imprisoned Le Pen and banned the FN, most French women would enthusiastically cheer that as they did the Germans marching down the Champs Elysee decades earlier. Most French women in Vichy had a great time and ended up as the mistresses of the conquerors. It is ALWAYS so.
And no, ethno-centricity has always been weak among Westerners. Ancient Rome even before the Republic, in the 600 BC era, was allowing non ethnic Romans to become well, Romans.
I sometimes think the euro-elite, and maybe the US elite as well, are so terrified of war between white Western nations that they would rather see them all commit suicide. Maybe that way they'll at least save themselves... Sort of the Fabian dream, but driven by fear, not some vision of utopia.
No the nation-state has no precedents in Europe pre-1800. None, nada, zip
Eilzabeth I's England was not a nation-state? Please discuss that.
I think that the intent of Mr. No Nations Back Then is that globalism and open borders is the long term trend, nationalism only a brief historical episode in the longer time scale.
The usual Leftist Inevitable Historical Trend party line ...
How is making comments critical of Muslims "racist"? Muslims are not a race. Islam is defined by its universalism.
Reading Guardian.co.uk and other British web sites, I notice that anti-Muslim statements are often labelled "racist." Using the word "racist" in that way seems to be common usage in British English now. Successful British Newspeak.
http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2013/06/02/there-will-always-be-an-england/
with cons like this...
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incitation_%C3%A0_la_haine_raciale
The law is from 1972, it may be abridging freedom of speech, but it is NOT retroactive.
Reading Guardian.co.uk and other British web sites, I notice that anti-Muslim statements are often labelled "racist." Using the word "racist" in that way seems to be common usage in British English now. Successful British Newspeak.
At the Guardian noticing anything other than the wonderfulness of gay marriage, immigration and non-whites is racism.
Ive been banned there most recently for comments about Golden Dawn. For displaying what can only be thought of as second or third order 'racism'.
What horrifying statements did I make?
For the Guardianistas what passes for incisive political debate on this matter is gleefully telling each other that the GD symbol is like a swastika (possibly).
All I did was point out that if it was reminiscent of a swastika then Greeks are well aware of that - and they don't care. And that not caring surely represented the real problem for leftists, if all thay can do is shout "Nazi!" or "racist!" and people stop paying attention, what do they do next? Maybe address the underlying issues - never! Well, nobody on the Guardian wants to hear that sort of talk, so Im banned - yet again!
As I said above the core of nationalism is the belief that people should be ruled by those from the same ethnic or cultural nation as themselves. Feudalism completely repudiates this.
What was Charles Martel if not a nationalist in practice, way back in the 8th century? Your idea that feudalism and nationalism are mutually exclusive is utter garbage. As is your contention that there was nothing like a nation state prior to 1800.
Martel was in practice king of the Frankish state, though he eschewed the title. His son was king. And yet he was a Frank, uniter of Franks, responsible for repelling a Muslim incursion into Europe. A nationalist if ever there was one, which is why Marxist so-called scholars have done their best to erase his presence from the history books.
I am also heartened to see that since I last checked, wikipedia has really fleshed out its article on Martel since I last checked (probably 5 or 6 years ago), when there was maybe a scant 3 paragraphs or so. The same flowering of (white) nationalism that is making its presence felt in MSM comment sections is also working its tendrils into information sources like wikipedia.
People keep telling me that things are hopeless, we are to be sent to the gulags etc. No. We are East Germans before the fall of the Berlin wall, and almost no one realizes the wall is crumbling.
Doublespeak Talmudic bullshit. Ex post facto law means you are being prosecuted for something that was legal when you did it.
But it *wasn't* legal when she said it (at least if the authorities are correctly interpreting the 1972 "Loi Pleven"). She simply enjoyed parliamentary immunity that meant she couldn't be prosecuted for violation of the law, unless her immunity were removed.
If the rules for removing immunity were on the books when she made her statement, then there's no retroactive criminalization, any more than there is in the case where a diplomat is stripped of diplomatic immunity so he can be prosecuted (see, e.g., http://www.spokesman.com/stories/1997/feb/16/diplomat-stripped-of-immunity-after-fatal-car/).
In the U.S., members of Congress enjoy immunity from prosecution or suit for anything they say on the floor of the House or Senate (and, under governing judicial interpretation, in the course of their official duties). There is no procedure for stripping a congresscritter of such immunity, which means that if the constitution were amended to allow such stripping, and a member were then prosecuted for statements made on the floor of the House before the constitutional amendment, *that* would constitute a retroactive prosecution, and yes, there would be something fishy about it.
Doublespeak Talmudic bullshit. Ex post facto law means you are being prosecuted for something that was legal when you did it.
But it *wasn't* legal when she said it (at least if the authorities are correctly interpreting the 1972 "Loi Pleven"). She simply enjoyed parliamentary immunity that meant she couldn't be prosecuted for violation of the law, unless her immunity were removed.
If the rules for removing immunity were on the books when she made her statement, then there's no retroactive criminalization, any more than there is in the case where a diplomat is stripped of diplomatic immunity so he can be prosecuted (see, e.g., http://www.spokesman.com/stories/1997/feb/16/diplomat-stripped-of-immunity-after-fatal-car/).
In the U.S., members of Congress enjoy immunity from prosecution or suit for anything they say on the floor of the House or Senate (and, under governing judicial interpretation, in the course of their official duties). There is no procedure for stripping a congresscritter of such immunity, which means that if the constitution were amended to allow such stripping, and a member were then prosecuted for statements made on the floor of the House before the constitutional amendment, *that* would constitute a retroactive prosecution, and yes, there would be something fishy about it.
"But it *wasn't* legal when she said it (at least if the authorities are correctly interpreting the 1972 "Loi Pleven"). She simply enjoyed parliamentary immunity that meant she couldn't be prosecuted for violation of the law, unless her immunity were removed. " - immunity as I understand it means that once it is removed you from that point on can be prosecuted for various things. Otherwise it would kind of cheapen the idea of immunity in the 1st place. Likewise imagine all the suckers that agree to immunity from prosecution deals, we can just strip their immunity later and prosecute them like that.
if immunity can be retroactively removed, then perhaps we need a new word for this type of immunity.
"No the nation-state has no precedents in Europe pre-1800. None, nada, zip "
You need to read the book that illustrates this post.
Or, as a shortcut, try to find a copy of Gorsky's 'the Mosaic Moment' floating about on the interwebs.
If MEP immunity were anything like the Westminster tradition of parliamentary immunity, which I think is similar to the US Congressional tradition, she would have had to make the remarks on the floor of parliament in order to be immune.
Since she didn't, I see no reason she should not be subject to the same laws as other French people, however stupid or unjust they are.
Unless we are all going to take the view that elected officials should have universal exemption from laws that bind others, everywhere.
As to the clause about the parliament agreeing first, what is so unusual about that? I am pretty sure even the US has circumstances in which proceedings against certain kinds of officials require prior signoff by some other institution, which will hopefully have guidelines telling it when and how to comply. And, again, what the parliament was asked to agree to was the prosecution of one of its members under circumstances when a private citizen would also have been prosecuted. How is that not proper? Again, she did not speak on the floor of parliament.
And lastly, it is certainly not ex post facto law. ex post facto law is punishing something after the fact that was legal when performed. What she did was plainly ILLEGAL already when she did it, and parliament was plainly being asked to allow her prosecution for this already illegal act. Which, again, should only be considered parliamentary immunity by an Anglo- Saxon when said on the floor of the house.
This is obviously not ex post facto law. Nor is it contrary to parliamentary immunity as we understand that term, unless we are assuming officials are exempt from the law everywhere.
DR at 1114:
Popular "Nationalism", no. But at upper echelons of society the idea of common cultures had started to emerge and to have some political significance, alongside personal and dynastic allegiances, and these ideas could be used to rally support even lower in society. The Burgundians, though many of that Duke's lands were outside the French realm, could be rhetorically shamed for allying with the English Crown. Opposition to the Englich claim to the French throne, though their claim had some dynastic validity since the French had largely cooked up the application of Salic law as a cynical defensive measure, could also be rallied by both dynastic arguments and by claiming the English ruler was an alien. English rule even in Normandy was challenged in this way.
This was indeed the very time that an early idea of "France" was being constructed, for all the land's diversity, and indeed specifically constructed to bolster Capetian [Valois, strictly, since the English were also claiming the Capetian succession]claims against the English. And there was something on which to build, too, as the idea of being Franks had not entirely died.
The English were actually ahead on this, since the idea of the community of the realm underpinning the judicial and parliamentary systems was well advanced by this time. And the Kings of England by this time spoke Middle English and carried on some administration in it. Certainly the Henrys, kings in Joan's time, spoke English as well as Latin and French.
"What she did was plainly ILLEGAL already when she did it" - then they should have prosecuted her right then and there, and wouldn't be going through the motions of removing parlimentary "immunity" to prosecute her.
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