Carlos P.

Your name is Jean-Marc, you’re 46, and you run a video game and collectibles shop in Nice, wedged between an optician and a real estate agency selling 1-bed flats for €410,000 “with sea view” if you lean far enough off the balcony. You know every GTA San Andreas cheat by heart. You tested all of them in 2005 on the PS2 in your bedroom at your mum’s place. You opened in 2011 with a state-backed loan at 4.7%, and the naive belief that passion eventually pays. It did pay, sort of. €1,900 a month in a good year, after the French tax office has eaten first, second and third. Your commercial rent is indexed on a formula nobody in the Republic actually understands. You sell Funko Pops at €17.99, sealed Pokémon cards, refurbished controllers. You let little Enzo, 12, pay in installments because he’s saving for a Switch 2. You close at 7:30pm and walk home because the harbor parking is €3.40 an hour. Saturday, there’s a protest “against the cost of living.” You also think living costs too much. You almost went. At 5:12pm, your metal shutter gets ripped open with a crowbar. Forty teenagers in tracksuits and crossbody bags walk into your shop like it’s a bonus level. They take the PS5s, the Dragon Ball figures, the till with today’s €280 and even the box of paper bags that say “thank you for your visit.” A guy in a floral shirt films it vertically for TikTok. You step outside and say “stop, this is my shop.” You get hit from behind. Then rocks. They laugh. Floral shirt guy is thrilled: good angle, good lighting. Sunday morning, the police tell you there are “1,400 arrests nationwide” and they won’t send a squad for some Funko Pops. Filing the complaint takes 2 hours 40. The officer types with two fingers on Windows 7. Monday noon, your insurer reminds you that your €1,140-a-year policy has a €3,000 deductible and a “riots and civil commotion” exclusion on page 31, font size 6. Saturday night, an MP explains on TV that “the anger is legitimate” and we “shouldn’t cry over shop windows.” He’s never owned a shop window. He has a state-funded apartment. Sunday, your limited edition Vegeta figures show up on Vinted. “Brand new, never opened, €39, pickup in North Nice.” The seller has 4.9 stars. Monday, the tax office emails you. They haven’t heard about the riots. They’ve heard about your payment deadline. You did everything right, Jean-Marc. That was never the problem. The problem is you were playing by the rules in a lobby where nobody else does. So stop believing in the State. It’s not coming to save you. It’s coming to collect. Stop voting. Every five years they hand you the controller, and it’s never plugged in. Go to the gym. Not for revenge. For you. Because when the system folds, the only asset nobody can loot is the one you built under a barbell. And make money they can’t see. Cash, side hustles, sats on a cold wallet in a sock drawer. Not your keys, not your coins. Not your shop, not your loss. Fuck the system, Jean-Marc. It already did it to you first.