French are abandoning left and right - why can't we?

UNINTENTIONALLY, Emmanuel Macron has achieved something remarkable.

- NIALL McCRAE

The French president, re-elected last year after left-wing political parties urged voters to reject his opponent Marine Le Pen, is in dire straits.

An avowed globalist, Macron has upset almost everyone in French society with the increasing costs and curtailments imposed on ordinary people's livelihoods. Heckled whenever he appears in public, the aloof and arrogant Macron takes refuge in the Palace of Versailles, while at enormous rallies on Place de la Concorde, he has brought the Left and Right together.

When Macron introduced punishing green taxes in his first term, a populist movement in the style of the Poujadistes of the 1950s erupted. The Gilets Jaunes (Yellow Vests) became a massive national phenomenon marching not only in Paris, but in towns across France.

Predominantly of lower middle-class or working-class strata, middle-aged, and white, they received negative media coverage, either ignored or smeared. These were the people who courageously marched against the severe covid-19 regime, and they were portrayed as mad conspiracy theorists and climate change deniers.

They often faced left-wing counter-protestors.

Now the cause of the Gilets Jaunes against contemptuous authorities has been taken up by broader French society. Furthermore, their rousing anthem 'On est là' is heartily sung by demonstrators of every class and creed. Originally a football chant, it was reworded as a protest against Macron.