A recent exhibition of pictures from occupied Paris has revealed a more relaxed image of the city
Posted on 05/26/2008 12:36:11 AM PDT by bruinbirdman
A new book which suggests that the German occupation of France encouraged the sexual liberation of women has shocked a country still struggling to come to terms with its troubled history of collaboration with the Nazis.
A recent exhibition of pictures from occupied Paris has revealed a more relaxed image of the city
Like a recent photographic exhibition showing Parisians enjoying themselves under the occupation, the book’s depiction of life in Paris as one big party is at odds with the collective memory of hunger, resistance and fear.
“It is a taboo subject, a story nobody wants to hear,” said Patrick Buisson, author of 1940-1945 Années Erotiques (“erotic years”). “It may hurt our national pride, but the reality is that people adapted to occupation.”
Many might prefer to forget but, with their husbands in prison camps, numerous women slept not only with German soldiers – the young “blond barbarians” were particularly attractive to French women, says Buisson – but also conducted affairs with anyone else who could help them through financially difficult times: “They gave way to the advances of the boss, to the tradesman they owed money to, their neighbour. In times of rationing, the body is the only renewable, inexhaustible currency.”
Cold winters, when coal was in short supply, and a curfew from 11pm to 5am also encouraged sexual activity, says Buisson, with the result that the birth rate shot up in 1942 even though 2m men were locked up in the camps.
The book has stirred painful memories. One French reviewer called it “impertinent” and another accused Buisson of telling only part of the story by focusing on the “beneath the belt” history of the occupation. Le Monde, the bible of the French intellectual elite, chided the author, who is the director of French television’s History Channel, for painting life under the occupation as a “gigantic orgy”.
People who lived through the occupation found it insulting to suggest that they spent it in bed. “It makes me really angry,” said Liliane Schroeder, 88, who risked her life as a member of the resistance and has published her own journal of the occupation. “It’s shocking and ridiculous to say life was just a big party,” she told The Sunday Times. “We had much better things to do.”
Schroeder nevertheless described her life as a messenger in the resistance as a “marvellous time” in which “people got on with life even if they weren’t laughing”. Young women were useful to the resistance, she said, because “when a young woman and a man sat in a café it did not look as if they were plotting. They looked like lovers”.
French sensitivities about the country’s wartime record were demonstrated last month when an exhibition of photographs depicting Parisians enjoying life under the Nazis included a notice explaining that the pictures avoided the “reality of occupation and its tragic aspects”. The photographs showed well-dressed citizens shopping on the boulevards or strolling in the parks. People crowded into nightclubs. Women in bikinis swam in a pool.
Buisson dedicates a chapter in his book to cinemas, which he describes as hotbeds of erotic activity, particularly when it was cold outside. “At a few francs they were cheaper than a hotel room,” he writes, “and, offering the double cover of darkness and anonymity, propitious for all sorts of outpourings.”
The French even had sex in the catacombs, the underground ossuary and warren of subterranean tunnels in Paris: war, Buisson argues, acted as an aphrodisiac, stimulating “the survival instinct”. He said in an interview: “People needed to prove that they were alive. They did so by making love.”
It has been claimed that prostitutes staged the first rebellion against the Nazis by refusing to service the invaders but Buisson called this a myth. The Germans, he claimed, were welcomed into the city’s best brothels, a third of which were reserved for officers. Another 100,000 women in Paris became “occasional prostitutes”, he said.
Elsewhere, members of the artistic elite drowned their sorrows in debauchery. Simone de Beauvoir, the writer, and Jean-Paul Sartre, the philosopher, were devotees of allnight parties fuelled by alcohol and lust.
“It was only in the course of those nights that I discovered the true meaning of the word party,” was how de Beauvoir put it. Sartre was no less enthusiastic: “Never were we as free as under the German occupation.”
De Beauvoir wrote about the “quite spontaneous friendliness” of the conquerors: she was as fascinated as any by the German “cult of the body” and their penchant for exercising in nothing but gym shorts.
“In the summer of 1940,” wrote Buisson, “France was transformed into one big naturist camp. The Germans seemed to have gathered on French territory only to celebrate an impressive festival of gymnastics.” The author said he did not want to make light of a tragic part of French history, but there was a need to correct the “mythical” image of the occupation. “In this horrible period, life continued,” he said.
“It is disturbing to know that while the Jews were being deported, the French were making love. But that is the truth.”
Now Buisson is at work on a sequel, about how women were punished for sleeping with the enemy. The provisional title is Revenge of the Males.
“20% of the French Resistance were Jewish, while Jews were only 1% of the total population.”
Interesting statistic. Do you have a source?
Suhls book from 1987 on the Resistance: “They fought back”.
http://www.amazon.com/They-Fought-Back-Yuri-Suhl/dp/0805204792
“That way the French would have stayed polite to foreigners.”
Zut alors! Quel chose a dire! :)
Frankly, the only time I have ever encountered a less than polite Frenchman was the occasional Parisian waiter dealing with a particularly obnoxious “Everyone of these characters really does speak English” American type!
Any American or British GI from that time (if you can find them) can tell you stories of the French gals selling themselves for cigarettes.
Out of the many tourists who routinely visited South Florida when I lived there (including New Yorkers, Brazillians, Isrealis, Venezuelans, etc.) the Germans were the worst. Always getting busted for loutish behavior (including indecent exposure) by the Miami Beach/Surfside PD.
Secular “beurettes”/Mahgrebines whose parents came from Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco are the hottest (and friendliest) women in all of France. I find the indigenous white French to be rather homely.
Resolved: In the aftermath of the next European war, the Germans have to keep the French.
>>Please keep that thought in mind as we continue to acquiesce to the will of islam. The Nazis would have been a far better taskmaster.
On that note, I have been saying for some time that Europe will again see concentration camps, quite likely in my lifetime (I’m pushing 50). The only question is Who will be running them?
I am not at all happy about making this prediction.
Agreed!
This is the most telling photo of Hitler that I have ever seen. Look how and where he is holding his gloves.
Are there any Dr. Freuds among us?
I remember every detail. The Germans wore grey. You wore blue...
I think the article says it all.
Sure there were a few brave Frenchmen, but overall — pfffft.
BuHuHaHa! It is funny to hear that from a American. Here in Europe we expect rather some more American concentration camps (Abu Guraib, Gitmo and a few other unspeakable names) on this sunny planet in the near future than new ones that are operated by Europeans. The nameless German crimes happened 63 years ago. Practically all responsible persons are dust and you can believe me that there is absolutely no interest among the European people to repeat such a non-successful period of time. We Europeans simply do not have any interest into concentration camps, extermination of Jews or war (this includes your wars) anymore. Although people like me have a little bit understanding for the need of your contemporary dungeons I have to say that you guys are therefore well advised to keep your mouths shut about "human-rights abuse" or "concentration camps" in Europe of today.
Best regards from good ole Europe!
A.B.
So what? The desire to have sex is something quite natural among young people. To fall in love with someone (even if he or she is a member of the occupying power) is one thing and to collaborate is another. Collaboration means to help the occupying force or its government in a active way. Having sex with a German soldier might have been fun for the relating French woman but it definitely did not help Adolf Hitler to win his crazy war.
To me it is hypocritical when Englishman or Americans adjudicate about occupied countries since this is a experience they never had. I am quite sure that the behavior in the UK would not have been that different if Hitler would have invaded. The only reason why the Brits can turn out "high morale" is the fact that they live on an island. Only this saved them from being invaded like the French (I do not believe into a special British heroism that would have been able to stop the German Wehrmacht in 1940 - just remember Dunkerque).
Regards from Germany
A.B.
How many were gassed in Gitmo?
Abu Ghraib sucked, and it’s pretty obvious it was a case of low-level sadist prison guards, who were being investigated when the story broke, and not national policy.
Comparing the two to the Nazis is you buying a lot of “Hate America First” nonsense from the Usual Suspects.
Good luck with your demographics. Get to work/play, if you’re that young.
It is not the question if someone was gassed in Gitmo or not. The point is that there are no concentration camps on EU-soil possible in the near future.
European values changed during the last decades. I.e. capital punishment or torture are outlawed while such practices are still accepted and in use in the US (i.e. capital punishment in Texas and/or "waterboarding" in Gitmo). Personally I have some understanding for your legal system, since the US had to go through stormy times after 9/11. Nevertheless the difference in values and human rights had the effect that the impression that America leaves to most Europeans is for sure not better than the one of Red China in the meantime. When the European MSM speaks about human rights they usually connect the issue with the US and/or the Chicoms. Of course this mood is pure populism, but it makes American remarks about "new European concentration camps in the near future" indeed quite funny.
Believe it or not, but those discussions in the last years did massive damage to the American profile. In the past most Europeans understood that the US and its government were standing for freedom and "the good side". This is not the case anymore.
Define “near”.
I suggest you look at Steyn’s “America Alone” and look at the demographics.
I think Euro societies have been too far away from having to deal with real evil for too long.
Abu Grabit compares to Operation Tailhook except there were some terrorists involved and some hate America press. Hardly worse than a frat initiation.
Gitmo is a prison. I think those released terrorists are biased, hardly a source for truth.
yitbos
The only folks who want the US to share the "same values" as the continent are the more upscale members of the Left, as well as a handful of kooks known as "paleoconservatives" who think that Europe is "Christian."
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