France

When Cement Meets Jihad: How Lafarge Turned War Into a Business Model

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From roughly 2012 to 2014, as Syrian Civil War turned northern Syria into a live-fire apocalypse, Lafarge made a calculated decision: stay open, stay profitable, and if that meant paying off armed groups—including ISIS and al-Nusra Front—then so be it. Business is business. Even if your business partners occasionally crucify people for sport. The company didn’t just stumble into this. Courts later described it as an organized system. Money moved. Deals were made. Raw materials, checkpoints, safe passage—all greased with cash. The same way you’d negotiate trucking contracts in Ohio, just with more AK-47s and fewer HR policies.

From Dionysus to the Edict: The Olympic Whiplash Nobody Planned

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In 2024, the world tuned in to Paris and was treated to a lavish, high-budget revival of pagan imagery—complete with nods to Dionysus, the ancient god of intoxication, ecstasy, and losing yourself so completely that personal responsibility becomes someone else’s problem. It was art, we were told. It was symbolism. It was “inclusive.” It was definitely not accidental. And it certainly wasn’t Christian.