Newsgroups: alt.skinheads,alt.politics.white-power,alt.politics.nationalism.white,soc.culture.french
Subject: ADL: Skinhead International; France
Summary: The ADL's "Skinhead International: A Worldwide Survey
         of Neo-Nazi Skinheads"
Followup-To: alt.skinheads

Archive/File: pub/orgs/american/adl/skinhead-international/skins-france
Last-Modified: 1995/08/30

                        France

Journalists and other observers in France put the number jof
Skinheads today at 500, down sharply from a high of 1,000 to
1,500 in 1985-86. At the same time, a growing number of soccer
hooligans, aged 15 to 25, appear to have mixed with the
Skinheads and to have been influenced by neo-Nazi Skinhead
themes. They are known as "casuals," and may include some
Skinheads who have shed tradtional Skinhead dress and
hairstyle.

Skinheads have attacked North African Frenchmen, desecrated
Jewish cemetaries, and assaulted hournalists covering a
right-wing festival. They have joined with non-Skinhead soccer
hooligans to assault fans of North African descent at matches,
provoked violent clashes with the police, and scuffled with
other far-right groups at demonstratons. Some adult extremists
on the right have attempted to recruit Skinheads, meeting with
short-lived success. Major population centers - the Paris
region, Lyons, Lille-Arras, Marseilles - have the largest
concentration of Skinheads, who collect in bands of 30 to 40.
There have been smaller groups in Le Havre, Angers, Toulouse,
Perpignan and Brest.

The ideological themes of French Skinheads inlcude
glorification of the white race and hatred for Jews, Arabs,
North Africans, Freemasons, capitalism and communism.

                     White Rebel

_Le Rebelle Blanc_ (The White Rebel) appears to be the organ
of the Jeunesses nationalistes revolutionnaires (JNR,
Nationalist Revolutionary Youth), founded by one "Batskin"
(true name: Serge Ayoub), after he broke with the far-right
Troisieme Voie (Third Way), led by Jean-Gilles Malliarakis.
According to knowledgeable observers, the JNR numbers some 10
members, and the publication is not so much the work of
Skinheads as a JNR attempt to influence and recruit Skinheads.
(Another publication, _Skin Europa_, attributes to Batskin's
circle the following self-portrait: "Drunk, yes. Alcoholic,
no.")

_Le Rebelle Blanc_ contains neo-Nazi and Skinhead symbols. One
issue carried references to "the struggle against the
cosmopolitans," a codeword for Jews, and a cartoon showing
figures of Hitler's henchmen gazaing horrorstruck at a
caricature of a black. A photo of Skins in front of the JNR
flag is captioned, "Skinheads: the nightmare of the zulus."
The zine also carries advertisements for the German neo-nazi
group, the Free German Workers Party (FAP) in Muenster and the
German Skinhead band Werwolf.

                        Dark Side

Skinzines and Skinhead paraphernalia have been sold at two
shops in Paris: Dark Side (the name is in English), in the
14th arrondissement, and London Styl in the 18th. Dark Side
is said to be the creation of the JNR's Batskin. The shop was
bombed in late 1993 and subsequently reopened in the 15th 
arrondissement under the name Dark Lord. A U.S.-based skinzine
describes a compact disc sold through Dark Lord as a "must
have": in addition to music by French Skinhead bands, the
recording has a spoken introduction by Leon Degrelle, the
Belgian Waffen SS general who died in Spain March 13, 1994.

A French zine called _Le Cote Obscur_ (The Dark Side) appeals
to Skinheads, casuals and other soccer hooligans. One issue
contains a full-page ad for Batskin's Dark Side shop, and,
given the name, is probably linked to him. Each page is
bordered by a sort of Greek key design made of swastikas.
Cartoons feature riot police fleeing before a hail of bottles,
and Skinheads and hooligans beating people with baseball bats.
One page features a score system awarding points for running
down Arabs: two points for hitting a single Arab, six for a
couple, three for a pregnant Arab, four for a woman with a
stroller, and a medal for driving into a mosque during
prayers. There are also references to the "Jadaized media"
("media enjivees").

                     Organization

Skinheads appeared in France around 1980. By 1984, they had
split into two groups: neo-Nazis, and non-politicals, who were
chiefly interested in the music. The latter, who included some
black Skinheads, eventually drifted back into society.

Neo-Nazi Skinheads became targets for beatings by suburban
black gangs (the Skins' dress and hairstyle having made it
easy to identify them). this may have contributed to the
precipitous decline in the Skinheads' numbers, and the rise of
their successors, the casuals, whose numbers roughly equal the
Skinheads. There appears to be some overlap between the
Skinheads and the casuals.

The casuals use rabid support for their soccer teams as an
excuse for violence and extreme nationalism, sometimes verring
into neo-Nazism. Observers describe them as "little whites,"
who are outnumbered by African or Arab immigrants in their
housing projects, mainly located in the suburbs rather than
within the limits of large cities. They vent their resentments
by giving Nazi salutes and chanting "Sieg Heil!" at soccer
matches, where they deface the stands with swastikas and
anti-immigrant graffiti and assault the police and other
spectators.

Some of the individuals in the stands frequented by Skinheads,
casuals, and "hools" (hooligans) identify themselves as
members of Jean-Marie Le Pen's Front National; others
distribute fliers from the white supremacist Parti
Nationaliste Francais et Europeen (PNFE); still others say
they come to soak up the atmosphere and revel in the
camaraderie.

                        Crimes

In September 1993, Skinheads in Paris doused with gasoline and
set fire to two young Frenchmen of North African descent, at
who they yelled racist insults. The victims, who suffered
burns mostly on their faces and hands, were expected to
recover.

In January 1993, two Skinheads who had desecrated a Jewish
cemetery in Lyons four months earlier were sentenced to eight
months in prison. The pair had been drinking heavily after
watching a soccer match. They later broke gravestones in the
city's Jewish cemetery and daubed them with slogans such as
"Adolf Hitler is our father" and "Death to the Jews."

In the fall of 1993, there were serious incidents at the Paris
soccer stadium, the Parc des Princes, during a game between
Paris-St. Germain (PSG) and a visiting team. Riot police were
driven out of the Kop de Boulogne enclosed stands where
Skinheads, casuals and PSG hooligans congregate. A dozen
police officers and a police commissioner were injured. The
perpetrators appeared to be the Skinheads' putative
successors, the casuals.

During the Front National's 1995 St. Joan of Arc's Day parade,
held in Paris on May 1, a 29-year-old Moraccan immigrant was
murdered by drowning. Witnesses told police that three
Skinheads broke away from the parage and hurled insults at
Brahim Bouarram before one of the Skins threw him in the
Seine. The Front National denied any link to the killing. A
Skinhead, Mickael Freminet, 19, reportedly has confessed to
pushing Bouarram, but said he did not intend to kill him.

                     Foreign Links

There are reports of links between French and Belgian
Skinheads. French Skinheads have been interviewed by British
skinzines. Some French skinzines carry advertisements for
German and American Skinhead bands. Still, French Skinheads
tend to be ultra-nationalist, and are less eager than their
foreign counterparts to forge close ties with Skins in other
lands.

                        Music

The French Skinhead music scene is limited because bands are
unable to rent space on account of their record of violence.

_Skinheads Pour Eternite_ (S.P.E.) was a skinzine in Gentily
which folded in late 1991, after five years of publication.
However, it has continued distributing records, tapes and
magazines and has started releasing records on its own label.

French Skinhead bands have included Force de Frappe (a name
taken from the term for the French nuclear force), Kontingent
88, Legion 88 (88 stands for "Heil Hitler," H being the eighth
letter of the alphabet), Brutal Combat, Plastic Gangsters,
Evil Skins, Guitar Gangster and Urban Gones (both from Lyons),
and Viking (from Le Havre). The ideology of some of these
bands is unclear' not all are necessarily neo-Nazi.

Record labels include S.P.E., Lion Records, Bird Records,
Rebelles Europeens, and Bulldog Service. Rebelles Europeens,
of Brest, has been headed by Gael Bodilis and Brigitte Maljak,
who was a law student  in the early 1990's. Both were active
in the Front National Jeunesse (the youth wing of Le Pen's
movement), and Bodilis in the Troisieme Voie as well. Among
the label's offerings are titles by the English Skinhead band
No Remorse, with record jackets emblazoned with swastikas and
portraits of Adolf Hitler. According to the Paris newspaper
_Le Monde_, Rebelles Europeens was dissolved at the end of
1988, but quietly revived itself in July 1991 with Maljak as
president and Bodilis as treasurer. After resuming operations,
the firm was very active in producing openly neo-Nazi
recordings. During 1995, however, it has shown no signs of
functioning.

The French police have actively monitored and countered the
Skinheads with arrests, prosecution, and exposure. The
Renseignements Generaux (police intelligence division) has
applied a strategy of exposure in which information is shared
with journalists. Some observers believe timely and effective
law enforcement has successfully contained the French Skinhead
movement. (Anti-Defamation League, 30-33)





                          Work Cited

Anti-Defamation League. The Skinhead International: A Worldwide
Survey of Neo-Nazi Skinheads. New York: Anti-Defamation League,
1995. Anti-Defamation League, 823 United Nations Plaza, New York, NY
10017.

Home ·  Site Map ·  What's New? ·  Search Nizkor