Explanation: “We should bring back the guillotine” or similar is a common internet quip in response to billionaires doing billionaire things, when in reality the guillotine was invented to provide equal and humane deaths to people of all classes, and from there it was always a tool of the state rather than the people. Not the best euphemism for “we should depose the bourgeoisie.” In fact plenty of Revolutionary justice folks were themselves offed by the guillotine during the Terror.

  • PugJesus@lemmy.worldMEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    I mean… no? They erupted in response to the purge of the Girondins, which wasn’t very revolutionary.

    The Girondins who were purged for being too far-right for the Jacobins’ tastes? The Girondins who promptly made common cause in the Federalist Revolts with literal royalists?

    Unless you define the revolution to mean Paris, fighting against authoritarian centralisation of power seems very in line with the Revolution even if the leadership of the revolts did tend to have conservative sympathties.

    Interpreting the French Revolution, an incident sparked by the demands of a national congress for national standardization of representation in a centralized system, as anti-centralization is a very curious take; dismissing the conservativism of the leaders of the opposition is even more curious.

    That’s… uh… wow. You should revisit the French Revolution and surrounding wars, seriously.

    Are we going to ignore the deep interconnected nature of both the European aristocracy and the monarchist regimes of each polity?

    For reference, though, the civil war was based in pretty legitimate grievances against Paris authoritarian overreach,

    The overwhelming objection was not that Paris’s power was centralized - a matter they were more than happy to support when it suited them - but that the regime in Paris was too radical for their tastes.

    Like Confederates barking about “States’ rights”, all it ever really meant was “We aren’t in power and we don’t like that”.

    the purge of the Girondins for the Federalists

    The purge of the Girondins was a triggering event, but not the basis of the Federalist revolts, which occurred overwhelmingly by the support of the wealthy bourgeoisie which felt the Revolution had gone ‘too far’, in concert with royalist counterrevolutionaries.

    and religious oppression+conscription for the Vandee folks.

    “Religious oppression” here meaning “Not allowing theocracy to continue”. Sadly something a great many people regard as religious oppression - as seen in Christofascists in the US, and Islamists in Turkiye.

    As for the Revolutionary wars, France literally declared war first; everyone else wanted it to collapse in silence so they could focus on Poland. Neither of these were significantly affected by the aristocratic sour grapes.

    The threat to declare war was openly and freely made first by the anciens regimes, and armed bodies of emigres not only allowed, but supplied and supported as they built their forces on the borders of France.