You’ve heard there are some, shall we say, negative feelings among the working/middle classes in European countries these days, yes?
Something about austerity measures, mismanaged economies, something about being angry at banks and bankers and powerful people? It all dribbles out, and we don’t see much of it in the press here in the US.
After all, we’ve got our Tea Party factions and such to express *our* angry feelings against the establishment. Americans who self-identify as Tea Partiers also statistically have a high chance of having made fun of the French at some point in the last 10 years for being cowardly or submissive; usually in reference to our having “saved their asses in dubya dubya two.”
Well, turns out the French are actually leading the way recently in the types of ‘disobedience in the face of tyranny’ that we Americans so perfected, and the popular movement is spreading to other countries in Europe.
Note: We can debate forever about whether they’re expecting too much from their governments, whether they’re naive about how the system works and they’re just reaping the fruits of socialism, blah blah blah. Rising above that debate is the fact that people are getting screwed and banks are doing just fine, thank you. Sound familiar?
Anyway, as the conflict heats up, it appears that a popular movement to start a Europe-wide bank run by angry individuals is gaining steam. Swiss activist blog ASR (translates to “All Smoke & Noise”), lists 3 different events on Facebook (French, Italian, German) from various Eurozone countries, all of which have the same goal: withdraw their money from their banks and jointly terminate their accounts, all on December 7th. So far, they’re over 10,000 committed, and this appears to have begun very recently.
It’s an interesting development, and one I wouldn’t be surprised to see here in the US within a few months. Obviously, with the pace of financial news, it could even happen sooner. File this under “wait and see.”
Image via lilicomance on Flicker