Macron continues ...
Woke leftist culture imported from US is ‘racialising’ France, causing splits in society and holding back ethnic minorities, says President Macron
- President Macron said French society is becoming increasingly 'racialised'
- He pointed the blame at feminists and black rights activists for 'intersectionality'
- A new wave of young French activists are becoming increasingly socially vocal
- But critics argue their focus on race is opening unnecessary divisions in France
- Macron's comments come ahead of French presidential elections in April
An imported woke leftist culture is 'racialising'
France, causing splits in society and holding back ethnic minorities, President
Emmanuel Macron has claimed.
Macron said the political left's insistence on defining their countrymen by their ethnicity and depicting them as victims is causing rifts, and blamed social science ideas that have come from the United States.
'I see that our society is becoming progressively racialised,' Macron told Elle magazine in an
interview published this week, going on to say that he believed ethnic minorities have been placed 'under house arrest' by left-wing ideology.
He also pointed blame at feminists and black rights activists for seeking to define people according to their gender and their skin colour, arguing that such views cause rifts in French society and limit social mobility among ethnic minorities.
A new generation of younger French activists are increasingly vocal in denouncing the problem of racism in France and the legacy of the country's colonial past in Africa and the Middle East.
But their opponents see
the focus on race and the past as opening up unnecessary divisions and encouraging a culture in which minorities and women see themselves as constantly oppressed and discriminated against.
Movements against racism over the last year such as Black Lives Matter, which resonated in France after arriving from the US, have led to fears among some critics that the country is importing American racial and identity politics sometimes labelled as 'woke culture.'
Emmanuel Macron says woke leftist culture is 'racialising' France, causing splits in society