"In my town of 6,000 inhabitants, the Rassemblement National [RN] candidate came out on top in the first round, with 45% of the vote. I tell myself that this means there must be RN voters on my street, very close to where I live. I think about it all the time. It creates a kind of curiosity and suspicion that I'm trying to combat. I have talked very freely about my vote for the [left-wing alliance] Nouveau Front Populaire and my left-wing convictions to people I meet in the bakery or on the street, but they don't answer me. There's a sort of awkward silence, a feeling of unease. I don't try to find out who they voted for. It's better not to get angry with your neighbor! Well, in my close circle, I know that nobody voted RN. I'm selective about my friends' ideology.
I find it so hard to understand how anyone could be convinced by this party and want to put Jordan Bardella in power with his no-holds-barred rhetoric. It's out of the question for me to blame people for their vote. They certainly have their reasons. They felt ignored, abandoned, denied or disrespected. I'm angry, but it's fading on its own because, deep down, I feel powerless in the face of it all. On the other hand, I'm still angry at the representatives of the RN, who are full of hot air. And I'm angry with Macron.
I never watch television, except on election nights, because I need to see faces. So I was sitting in my living room with my partner when the dissolution was announced. I even told myself that he was knowingly handing us over to the RN. It sounds a bit conspiratorial to say it, but it's such madness.
On Sunday evening, for the results of the first round, [French television channel] France 2 posted a countdown. When I saw the results, I said to myself, "OK, here we go." I still have a slim hope that the RN won't get an absolute majority, but maybe that's just denial. I keep telling myself that people are going to wake up, that it's unreal. On the radio – I listen to France Culture and France Inter, even though I despair when they talk about the Nouveau Front Populaire as the extreme left – I hear talk of a vote of support for the RN. How can anyone subscribe to what I consider to be such crude lies? Have we all become so ignorant?
I'm not despondent, except in the face of talk that there's nothing we can do to resist. I'm convinced that we can still do a lot. Even if I feel powerless, I want to believe that it will be possible to fight. I've always been committed and an activist. As I've gotten older, I've become even more so. I raised my two daughters on my own, so I had to get down to basics. Today, they are adults. One lives in Nantes and often goes to the demonstrations. When I play out the worst-case scenario in my head, I imagine that future demonstrations will all be violently repressed, and I'm afraid for her.
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