“Collabos”, “Macron’s sheep” … Between the movement of “yellow vests” and the Covid-19, investigation into a France which is tense

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Cashiers, doctors, journalists … More and more professions say they feel strained and divided relations with their interlocutors in the professional context. This new form of radicalism seems to have developed in particular thanks to the movement of “yellow vests” and the health crisis linked to Covid-19. The investigation unit of Radio France investigated this phenomenon to understand where it comes from and why it is accentuated.

Flora Midy still remembers that afternoon in July 2021. That day, this young journalist on fixed-term contract returned to the France Bleu station in Belfort, after having covered a demonstration by opponents of the health pass. While inside, a group of hostile protesters show up at the entrance to the premises. One of them gives him a sign, sliding his thumb on his neck, as if to mimic a throat cut. She then hears the demonstrators shouting: “Collaborators”, “sold from the state”, they throw at him.

This type of invective has been classic for her for several months. “We are always told that we work for the state and the government, that the president calls and tells us what we can and cannot say.” The incident was repeated on Saturday, November 6, 2021, when anti-tax protesters entered the newspaper’s premises. Eastern Republican, still in Belfort.

Hélène Langlois, technician at Radio France, remembers the “act IX” of the “yellow vests”, which she covered in Bourges. “In my opinion, the protesters were really waiting for the media.” On banners they wrote “liars”, “collaborators” or “Macron’s sheep”. “It was to say to us: ‘Look, you are not welcome’.” Beyond Radio France, the list of recent incidents in processions is long: in Ajaccio, a photographer from Corsica Morning was beaten up; in Marseille and Bordeaux, image reporters journalists were attacked …

Since these events, the management of Radio France offers journalists to be accompanied by security agents during this type of event. This revolution in the way of working has become essential because the press is now physically on the front line. “What has changed is that law enforcement personnel are no longer the target”, says Loïc Poucel, in charge of security at Radio France. “These are other people, especially journalists.”

“It is enough that a report or an editorial line is not accepted by some for this medium to be driven out in the demonstrations.”

Loïc Poucel, Security Officer at Radio France

to the investigation unit of Radio France

In Charente-Maritime, Yannick Picard, correspondent near La Rochelle for the newspaper South West, believed its last hour arrived. He had written an article on the eviction of the treasurer of a municipal library. The latter sprayed him with a vial of liquid with the strong odor of White Spirit, before chasing after him with what the journalist mistook for a lighter. Fortunately, the liquid was not flammable. Yannick Picard was left with a great fear and a muscle tear. However, he has since felt that he is no longer doing his job as he should. “Occasionally, he says, I’m wondering. Do you have to put this word? Shouldn’t you put that instead? It has even happened to me that in a case, there was really a risk and that I should not write about it. “

This apprehension in doing his work as a journalist, the sociologist and researcher at the École des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) Jean-Marie Charon measured it, with a collaborator from the University of Le Havre, Adénora Ramat-Pigeolat. “The vast majority of those who have dealt with this type of protests told us that they discovered fear in their work., explains the sociologist. Every Saturday, they left to work with the ball in the stomach. Several also report intimidation and threats to their lives. “

Other professions also seem to suffer from this climate of mistrust, combined with a form of ambient aggressiveness. According to Carole Amanou, head of the cash register and customers sector of a Casino supermarket in Marseille, there are regularly problems at automatic cash registers, where the cashier host is in direct contact with the customer. “It is sometimes complicated because some have the mask under the nose or on the chin. Sometimes the tone rises and we suffer insults.”

“During Covid-19 we ‘fed’ France. Unfortunately, that was quickly forgotten.”

Carole Amanou, head of the cash register and customers sector in a Casino supermarket in Marseille

to the investigation unit of Radio France

This deterioration in the relationship between clients, users and professionals is also perceived by town doctors with their patients. Dr Charles Larrouy, general practitioner for 29 years in the 15th arrondissement of Paris, attests to this. “Many colleagues have retired earlier than expected with the pandemic. Some are burnt out because they find it difficult to bear the pressure of patients.” He says he feels a degradation of his status. Previously respected referent, he has the feeling of being perceived as a provider at the service of an increasingly demanding patient. According to him, the Doctolib platform would have accentuated this phenomenon. “Sometimes, he says, we see a patient making an appointment on a certain day at a certain time, canceling, then resuming an appointment and canceling it again. People don’t realize that they are taking the place of someone else who is also waiting for their date. It is selfishness and incivism. “

According to a study carried out by the psychological assistance platform of the Healthcare Professionals Association (SPS), 18% of the nearly 10,000 calls made in eighteen months were made by nurses. The phenomenon also affects doctors, according to another survey conducted by the National Intersyndicale des Interns. “In 2017, from the first to the last year of medicine, 62% of respondents declared developing anxiety symptoms”, comments the president of this union, Gaétan Casanova. “In 2021, with the same questions, that number has increased to 75%.” According to the National Council of the Order of Physicians, this psychological “fatigue” also affects ophthalmologists, dermatologists, gynecologists, cardiologists … and even psychiatrists.

Admittedly, there are political and social causes for this phenomenon: public services lacking in resources, professions in full evolution … These factors generate a loss of meaning and destabilize certain professions. There is also a feeling of inequality and the impression that we do not see the end of this pandemic. All this contributes to maintaining an anxiety-provoking climate and is not likely to appease.

However, there would be other reasons, depending François Jost, semiologist and professor emeritus in information and communication sciences at the Sorbonne. He first evokes a word that has been released against the press. “The hostility, the tension, the aggressiveness of politicians towards the media was something that was rather reserved for the far right for a very long time, he explains. What is quite disturbing is that we now see a whole series of political currents embracing this attitude. “ On another side, “the idea of ​​lying has become widespread”, he continues. Hence an increased mistrust of everything related to power and its supposed relays.

“In everyone’s consciousness, it has become absolutely natural to think that when you communicate, it’s to fake.”

François Jost, semiologist

to the investigation unit of Radio France

According to the semiologist, we must also take into account a modification of our relationship to knowledge: “There is an extremely clear cut between two conceptions of reality. For a journalist, reality is visible but also intelligible. However, you have people who consider, as the ‘yellow vests’ used to say. , that ‘what is true is what I see. You tell me that there have been deaths from Covid-19. Me, I have never seen one.’ “

This distrust and this aggressiveness seem to have been reinforced by the internet and social networks, which feed on emotion, controversy, buzz and cleavage. “The difficulty today is that with the slightest problem that arises, everything is broadcast at a much faster speed”, notes Serge Barbet, Deputy Director of the Education and Information Media Liaison Center. “WhatsApp groups or the use of Snapchat can make the sauce go up extremely quickly.” All the more quickly since, according to Cédric Passard, the internet would have another consequence: “People have developed certain critical abilities, certain skills, remarks the lecturer in political science at Sciences Po Lille.

“This sometimes leads them to believe that they are more learned than scientists, more authorized than others to talk about certain subjects, of which they are in fact a little ignorant.”

Cédric Passard, lecturer at Sciences Po Lille

to franceinfo

“This violence is a consequence of the fact that we are more and more turned towards our own ego while knowledge is more universal, adds François Jost. “We could say to ourselves: ‘There are people who know, I will listen to them.’ However, today, we say to ourselves: ‘I do not feel it like that’. “ This denotes a “reversal of values”, according to him. “It is to say, ‘Now you are the sheep and we are the ones who know.’ It is extremely disturbing that those who are vaccinated become believers in the mouths of some people when it is not about belief but knowing. “

How to reverse the process and restore credibility to political speech? How to restore trust between the press and citizens? How to regulate social networks? Identifying the problems seems easier than spelling out solutions. However, “there is an urgent need to come back to facts of rationality and reason, not to fall into the trap of a bipolarization of life through increasingly divisive debates, Serge Barbet alert. When one loses the very notion of the debate to start with the invective, there is no more reflection. “


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