Trevor Noah's spat with the French ambassador showed how Americans and the French see identity differently

The Atlantic

The Daily Show host was accused of siding with racist ideologies in France with his joke about Africa winning the World Cup. But the joke was also deemed offensive to France's ambassador because the French don't see themselves the way Americans do when it comes to identity. "In the United States, just about everyone’s hyphenated," explains Paris-based correspondent Rachel Donadio. "In France, or among parts of the French establishment, the notion of communautarisme, American-style identity politics in which groups derive identity and clout from their backgrounds, is seen as anathema, an affront to the French ideal that all citizens are equal in the eyes of the state, as I’ve written about here. It’s a hard-won notion of citizenship that comes from a history in which the ancien régime was overthrown to create a modern French state. It’s also an ideal—filled with ironies and inconsistencies that Noah could skewer in a way only an outsider to France could do."