I love France, I really do, but goodness me there are sometimes when I think the politicians and the chattering classes really need a good talking to. France is in the thrall of the Roman Polanski extradition and it has been amazing to see not only luvies, but also politicians here (including the Foreign Minister, and to a certain extent President Sarkozy) say that the fact that a paedophile, who has been on the run for more than 30 years, has eventually been caught is a bad thing! Please don't get me wrong, I think the man is very talented, and yes of course this is somebody who has known real tragedy in his life. Talent and sympathy, however, provide no justification for the denial of justice, particularly for a crime such as this, where he has, lest we forget, admitted a certain amount of culpability.
I should by now have become cynical enough where the French media and intelligentsia are concerned to realise that, despite all the noise they make about "les droits de l' homme", "la justice", "la solidarité", "la république" etc, these are in fact ideals to be aspired to by us little people, the ordinary citizens comprising around 99.99% of the population, as espoused by our cultural and intellectual superiors inhabiting the increasingly incestuous spheres of academia, the media and politics that make up a large proportion of what is effectively the ruling elite of France . This great caste of cultural shepherds, the aristocracy of the 5th republic, never tire of telling the French what they should be thinking and how they should behave. But woe betide anybody that contradicts their humanistic gospels as certain writers and thinkers have discovered, for the caste will at best make every interview you ever give a cross-examination; a trial not only of one's work and opinions, but of one's very soul. At worst such people will be forgotten about or actively ridiculed.
Behaviour like this is bad enough, but it would be just about digestible if the members of the caste were the fine examples of virtue they undoubtedly would be if they ever followed their own advice. The problem is of course, as a group, they never have and they never will, and it is this arrogance that can be found in any decrepit debauched ruling class. The case of Roman Polanski is a fine example: where might I ask is the social justice in not letting a convicted sex offender be accountable for the crimes he has been convicted of committing; why for example in a news report lasting for five minutes on French TV's main new broadcast yesterday, did a woman representing a society for abused children talk for less than 30 seconds?
One line that has been rolled out by the French establishment, including the culture secretary Fréderic Mitterrand, is that the crime took place so long ago that Polanski should effectively be pardoned. This ridiculous notion is actually considered to be fair by many in the French establishment. Poor Ronnie Biggs, if only the Great Train Robbery had taken place in France he could have come back from Brazil ages ago with complete impunity! Apparently, selective amnesia is the "just" thing to have in cases like this, and it is the backwards Anglo-Saxons, this time in the form of les américains, who have the temerity to continue chasing the director when it should all be brushed under the carpet (although criticism of Anglo-Saxon legal systems is a little rich when it comes from the direction of a country that has only recently adopted the idea that one is innocent before being proved guilty).
"But there is surely more to it than that" you may ask, and you'd be right. Some French commentators have actually come out and said that such impunity is justified as Polanski is a great artist. But now have we reached the point where artistic talent trumps justice? And in any case I hear you ask, "Who is to decide what is art and if it is good or bad?" In the case of the French intelligentsia the answers are so obvious that they are self evident. A publicly pronounced decree of what is good or bad art by a senior member of the caste is quite naturally the right opinion as no sane person would have tastes or opinions to the contrary. But this argument could be extended further to any form of human endeavour. Not everybody puts art up on a pedestal and the importance of a profession is often relative to the regard in which it is held by the person making the assessment.
This reasoning alone would be absurd enough; i.e. to guarantee Polanski's liberté by denying the principle of égalité for all
before justice thanks to an absurdly misplaced sense of fraternité with a tortured and creative spirit. Unfortunately I believe the real reason is far more odious and is an example of an abuse of trust that all ruling classes in all types of society far too often perpetrate. Even if it is only in the subconscious of the French intelligentsia and politicians, rather than actively occupying their thoughts, the patronising notion that the little people are of a lesser stock, and it is they who must obey the rules and the noble principles on which the republic was founded on, runs rife in the heads of the French aristocracy. Sadly, in France it would appear justice is partial to the tastes and passing fads of the elites. I must have missed that noble concept when recently reading up on the principles of the revolution!
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