Block Everything

“Due to social unrest, the Musée d'Orsay is closed,” a sign might have read on Wednesday, when tourists were not able to admire the works of Courbet. The great revolutionary painter would have surely looked on with sympathy at this shutdown laden with irony, and at the movement that paralyzed Paris on Wednesday with the rallying cry of “let’s block everything.” There were some thoughtless vandals, to be sure. But the protesters were mostly young people, very many women, many immigrants, and red banners were everywhere. Some say the movement originated among the sovereignist right, active on social media. Although that is possible, there was little sign of them on the streets on Wednesday.