I think it's fair to say that the average American is politically to the right of the average French person. Many scholars think that this left-right difference goes back to the origins of the two modern nations. In spite of this little girl's French-revolutionary Phrygian cap, the American and French revolutions had little in common. The American revolution threw out a now-seen-as-foreign power and united the new country in an independent version of the same system. The French revolution overthrew other Frenchmen, creating a divide that still exists today.
Americans who were loyal to the British king, who didn't like the new country, left-- mostly to Canada. They were called Tories (not the same as British Tories) in our history books, and were so reviled that I was astounded when I discovered in Nova Scotia that many Canadians were proud of being descended from them. Now, imagine that all the Tories stayed. Well, that is a bit what France is like.
It always made me laugh when President George W. Bush talked about Président Sarkozy as if they were fellow rightists. The typical French voter on the right has views that would place him solidly in the ranks of mainstream U.S. Democrats. Likewise, when French leftists hailed the election of Barack Obama as one of their own, I knew they would shortly be very, very disappointed; for practical political purposes, Président Sarkozy and President Obama are two P's in a pod.
Maison de la Radio
So I was amused to see the latest left-right skirmish at Maison de la Radio (a spectacularly hideous, usually filthy white building on the banks of the Seine in the 16th arrondissement). Like most French radio stations, Radio France Inter is a taxpayer-funded, publicly owned radio station that is part of Radio France. In France, as in the U.S., the mainstream of journalists and intellectuals tends leftwards. Two well-known French radio journalists of the station were just fired* by their Sarkozy-appointed boss for going too far ("inhumanity") in their political comedy programs-- in which one of them, Didier Porte, remarked several times in a skit about former "right" Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin that he was sodomizing President Sarkozy.* The other, Stéphane Guillon, lashed out to an assembly of his supportive colleagues protesting the decision, "France Inter is a leftist radio station that behaves like the worst rightist business." [France Inter est une radio de gauche qui se comporte comme la pire entreprise de droite.]
*In France, you can "thank" or "disembark" someone to fire them!
**However the word he used, enculer, although insulting, is much more commonly heard in France. It also got Nicolas Anelka fired off the French national soccer team at the World Cup.
A interesting article about it: http://www.causeur.fr/france-inter-une-radio-de-gauche,6783
Posted by: Jul | 07 July 2010 at 23:15
I like the analogy concerning the two revolutions, it also explains a lot of darker periods in french history, like the collaboration, when this minority of anti-democrats seized the power by forming the Vichy government. Those factions are always lurking in the shadows, working for the demise of the republic.
For your analyse of the France Inter events, I tend to disagree, the real drama is that Sarkozy can't even stand people making jokes about him, he is just a crybaby, always pretending to be the victim of mean leftists.
Porte and Guillon just did their jobs of public buffoons, who sadly had to work for a left-traitor boss : Pillipe Val, once head of the satiric newspaper "Le canard Enchaîné", and now Sarkozy's lapdog, ready to do anything to please his master.
As always, the Power is making "place nette" two years before the elections.
Posted by: Zapan | 08 July 2010 at 15:12
Looks like there is a slight majority of private channels (which is admittedly not that much), at least in term of market share.
http://www.observatoire-medias.info/article.php3?id_article=280
And @zapan, Philippe Val worked for the trashy newspaper Charlie Hebdo, not for Canard Enchaîné. You can see a Bio here:
http://www.republique-des-lettres.fr/10826-philippe-val.php
Posted by: Aaron | 25 July 2010 at 23:42