Burn it down?

Rioting has been going on in Paris for almost two weeks now. Hundreds of cars and trucks have been destroyed; shops and buildings have been put to the torch as well. The French government cannot regain control; police are being attacked. Most significantly, the majority of the youths involved in the rioting are Muslims. You had to know from the moment this first started that Fox News was going to have a field day with this. Seemingly, all of the theocon predictions of a clash of cultures have proven to be true. Not even France is safe, and it was the largest opponent of the war in Iraq! We need to teach these Islamofascists a lesson! Round them up and deport them!

Please. First of all, only one person thus far has died. When Islamic fundamentalists are out to prove a point, they don't burn cars and attack cops with bats. Instead, they blow themselves up with a bomb in the middle of crowded civilian areas. Based on this, I was initially very suspect that these riots were a religious phenomenon. A quick internet research session has revealed the history of these immigrants. They have been stagnant for thirty years, and things aren't getting better for them.

Now, this isn't to say that their violence is justified, because its not. However, the impression I've been getting recently is not that this is the product of radical preachers rallying their subjects to start a religious war. Mass rioting has happened in America before, and it wasn't due to a religious conflict. This whole thing in France has been building up; the storm has been brewing for some time. Apparently, it just needed a spark to set it off (pun intended - I know, I'm horrible). The rioters mostly are teenagers, kids that are probably bored out of their minds all day, while simulatenously very annoyed that they are excluded from greater French society. Their rioting almost seems to be more of a result of their desire to prove that they have influence over something - in this case, they are proving that they can defy the French authorities and get away with it. That fact makes me pity them even more - they think they're proving something by defying the French government.