Normally we think of Quasar energy as productive, but this isn’t necessarily the case. Just as Black Holes can give or take away, Quasars have a dual nature as well. Among the brightest and furthest objects in the universe, Quasars are the powerful, exploding origins of proto-galaxies; what they represent is pervasive manifestation, whether for good or ill.

Quasars magnify whatever they touch, bring it into bold relief, emphasize and embellish it. They are like a beacon on a hilltop, a flashing neon sign, a huge cosmic arrow pointing the way and saying, “Look Here!” Sometimes this over-emphasis may be positive, sometimes less so.

The latter is apparently the case with the recent rioting and unrest in France, which has spread to other countries in the region. In this case the culprit appears to have been Uranus, known for its disruptive, rebellious nature, coming to its direct station, exactly on the Quasar at 6 Pisces.

This degree highlights a difficult Mars/Pluto square in France’s natal horoscope, transforming it into a more rigid and inflexible T-Square. Although Uranus has contacted this degree before, and the square and opposition it forms from there are not exact, the Quasar’s influence combined with the extra power of the station seems to have been the catalyst for the eruption of violence which rocked the French capitol and provinces for several weeks in late October and November 2005.

The rioting began following the deaths of two youths who were evading police in the Paris suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois on October 27, and peaked the nights of November 4 through 7, when a total of more than 5,000 vehicles were torched, and attacks made on public schools. By November 8 the unrest had spread to over 300 towns in rural France and into neighboring Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany, and French President Jacques Chirac had declared a state of emergency, with police granted additional powers of search and seizure. Curfews were enforced and expedited trials for offenders helped process a backlog of almost 2000 mostly black and Arab youths who had been arrested. The government stated they would deport non-civilians who were convicted.

Uranus’ signature is easy to read, not only in the violence and rebellion, but in the tragedy which sparked the conflagration. On October 27, the day Uranus retrograded back onto 6 Pisces, the degree of the Quasar where it would subsequently station, two youths who were returning from a soccer game encountered a police dragnet, a circumstance quite common in Paris’ largely immigrant, slum-like suburbs. Minority youths are often detained for questioning without probable cause for as much as four hours, and sometimes need to be retrieved from the police by their parents, so the group the boys were traveling with broke up and scattered as the police approached.

Bouna Traore, a 15-year-old of Malian extraction, and Zyed Benna, a 17-year-old of Tunisian ancestry, hid in a wired compound protecting a high-voltage electrical transformer, and were accidentally electrocuted. Uranus’ rulership of electricity leaves no doubt of the involvement of this celestial with this incident.

When the circumstances became known, hundreds of youths in Clichy-sous-Bois rioted, burning cars and shops in the northern suburb of the City of Light. Email and text messaging spread the word, until by the October 31, nine Paris suburbs were agitated, with assailants firing on police and using gasoline bombs. By the 2nd of November, the riots had engulfed more than 20 towns in the Paris region, by November 5 Paris itself was in flames, and by the 6th the unrest had spread to almost 300 towns in virtually every region of France. On the 9th France’s National Assembly voted to enact a State of Emergency for 12 days, giving the government enhanced powers to deal with the rioters and expedite justice. The rioting was the worst France had experienced since the late 1960's when Uranus and Pluto joined in the heavens to produce massive social unrest globally.

It was a combination of Uranus and Pluto which disrupted the peace of France this time as well, as from its station degree of 6 Pisces, transit Uranus opposed France’s natal Pluto at 3 Virgo (Fifth Republic chart, 10/5/1958), evoking the destruction. That Pluto sits atop a Pulsar, which often indicates a high public profile or newsworthiness to an event, and the rioting did, indeed, make big international news.

The square to France’s natal Mars at 2 Gemini added literal fuel to the fire, and brought out a rather broad conjunction from Mars to a Maser, which at 7 Gemini was thus in a much tighter square to transit Uranus. Maser energy is explosive, erratic, and very difficult to control; it can easily overwhelm a person or a situation.

The trine from transit Uranus to France’s natal Jupiter/Neptune conjunction at 3 and 5 Scorpio identified the perpetrators, an ethnic and religious minority which had never been assimilated into France’s mainstream. Calling themselves “Beurs,” these discontented youth are predominantly French citizens, the descendants of immigrant workers from France’s once far-flung colonial holdings in Africa. Like many blacks in America, they feel themselves discriminated against and have formed their own subculture within France’s general population, which sees them as outsiders and outcasts. Only nominally Muslim, these rioters do not seem focused on a political or religious agenda, but instead on more socio-economic concerns.

Although the political right in America has characterized the unrest as a religious conflict, yet another indicator of Islam’s inability to assimilate and get along with the West, the roots of this conflict seem to be more racially-based discrimination than the unleashing of a Holy War.

By the 17th of November, France was described as “quasi-normal,” with less than 100 car burnings nightly, as the unrest died due to more than 3000 arrests and a stronger police presence, with 10,000 reservists called up and garrisoned primarily in the immigrant ghettos. More than 9000 vehicles and hundreds of buildings had been torched in the three-week riot.

Uranus came to station on the 15th, and on that exact date, despite the improved situation, the National Assembly voted to extend the State of Emergency for a further three months. The decision was made by the Council of Ministers that morning and approved in the Assembly by a vote of 346 to 148 that afternoon (the Senate gave its official imprimatur on the 17th). The law, dating from 1955 but never previously enacted, gives the French government quasi-dictatorial powers normally associated with a state of civil war, allowing for mass arrests, search and seizure without warrant, the banning of demonstrations and censoring of the press. In his initial plea for the State of Emergency, President Chirac stressed the “strictly temporary” nature of the request; the three-month extension, however, puts it on a more formal footing.

As in the aftermath of the World Trade Center attack on 9/11 and the recent bombings in London, governments which have traditionally been thought of as the pillars of Western Democracy have chosen to restrict the rights of their citizens on a pretext of preventing further violence. France is only the latest to dim her light.