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Passers-by, armed policeman in front of the cathedral in Lille
Photo: Michel Spingler / AP
One of my French cousins is a math teacher and writer.
He is an anarchist at heart and rides his motorcycle on the country roads in every free hour.
Politically, he belongs to the left-wing liberal branch of the family, and he voted for Emmanuel Macron in the last presidential election.
Unlike the traditionally left, post-communist members of the family, he never speculated on the collapse of capitalism and the establishment of a soviet republic, but was always convinced that the public use of reason, a decent school system and more alert parties could somehow cope with all difficulties.
But it has been sounding different for some time.
He has lost his political optimism.
The murder of a teacher, of visitors to the Basilica of Nice, the shots at a clergyman in Lyon - he no longer interprets such events as exceptional, but as evidence of the inexorable collapse of French society.
He's no longer interested in who gets up in which party.
There is little hope for a government whose relevance decreases the further one moves away from Paris.
And shows a decreasing enthusiasm for Europe: If possible, he and his wife travel to Canada on vacation.
More space for motorcycling, fewer people.
All presidents since Jacques Chirac have been political one-hit wonders
He lives in the very south of France, on the Mediterranean.
Sooner or later the example of the nightly street battles in the provinces comes up in our political discussions: Didn't I read about the fact that street battles raged for days in this or that middle town between clans and cliques of various religions and origins?
Between Albanians and Arabs, Chechens and Sinti and Roma, Africans and Chinese?
And without the police showing up.
Sometimes it sounds like he's just making it up.
But when, in June, the German newspapers reported about the battles between Chechens and
Beurs
(French people of Maghrebian origin) in tranquil Dijon, he triumphed.
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When we last met in the summer, he was more concerned than ever.
He even discovered a certain sympathy for the television agitator Éric Zémmour, who, in the pose of the educated citizen, uses the means of enlightenment to incite people against one another.
What my cousin likes about him has little to do with politics.
Rather, it's Zémmour's radically bad mood.
He doesn't gloss over anything, but delivers
hardcore
, and thus gives expression to a pessimism that you often hear and feel in France.
What particularly annoys the French are the always perfectly formulated appeasements from Paris.
In no other country does the media and political user interface deviate so strongly from perceived reality.
And every little thing leads to a lasting loss of confidence: when the republic had to admit that it had lost a reserve of masks, it turned into a major scandal.
Because everyone is convinced that the central state is responsible for supplying its citizens with masks.
All presidents since Jacques Chirac have been political one-hit wonders, declaring that France is looking up.
Thus the opposite impression has solidified in the notoriously anarchist-minded people - that it is going downhill.
Then fit, happy people in their mid-fifties are standing in front of you, visibly enjoying their early retirement on the Atlantic coast, getting off their racing bike and complaining that it has never been so bad.
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In truth, the country is developing very differently, but nuances and differentiations barely penetrate.
The picture has to appear well-composed, the political magic formula has to be right and in the next week a new problem, a new scandal, will displace today's.
Does anyone still remember the gilets jaunes, that violent, suburban protest movement against the car ecotax?
The topic has disappeared, the people have stayed.
In many reports, the great loneliness and the lack of social ties of the yellow vests were described as the cause of their anger.
This is still a big, unspoken problem.
Parties as playgrounds for careerists
The power of milieus and neighborhoods has rapidly declined and nothing else has replaced them.
The parties play no role as institutions of political decision-making, they are playgrounds for careerists.
In any case, the party landscape is in constant motion, the once most powerful groups no longer play a role and the current ones are often enough clubs to celebrate their boss.
Churches and trade unions suffer more than in Germany from a double loss of membership and relevance.
The media are taken seriously but are economically fragile or too close to the government and annoy their audiences with a limited Parisian perspective.
Those who live anywhere else than Paris rarely travel there, the city is simply too expensive for the French.
And those who live and work in the greater Paris area have to earn so much money that they rarely get excited about where they live.
Friends my age who live in Paris often use psychotropic drugs to get through the days and nights.
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When the extreme right began its rise in the eighties of the last century, a self-confident and diverse counter-movement called SOS Racisme was founded.
Her slogan was "Touche pas à mon pote", in German: Don't mess with my buddy.
At that time universities and industrial companies were equally the basis of this movement, the experience of working together by people of different origins and skin colors strengthened the determination.
Because the republic has no denominations and faith is a private matter, politics could cheat around explosive topics.
Such a movement would no longer be possible today, the experiences of education and work are too fragmented.
Desindustrialization, decentralization and specialization have led to the development of individual educational and work experiences; the community that empowers the individual to tackle unpleasant questions has become rare.
Even the French government seems to have given up all efforts to be an image of the diverse society.
A white male expert type predominates, no matter how good intentions, no matter how good the reasons and means - French people find it difficult to develop trust.
Where and by whom should major questions be clarified?
The parties, churches, trade unions and the media are not in good shape to do this.
But the serial zapping of the unpleasant questions leads to a dizziness that puts the whole country in a cultural frenzy.
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Therefore, there is a lack of resources to face the current situation and the various threats.
And there is something else, a kind of repressive idealization: because the republic has no denominations and belief is a private matter, politics could cheat around explosive topics.
The gradual rise of anti-Semitism, which is fed by right-wing as well as Islamist sources, was preferred with the means of the Sunday speech, i.e. not actually combated at all.
The hatred of Jews does not fit into the French self-image, so it was ignored.
Likewise, the fact that political and radical Islam was able to spread in the milieu of the banlieues and among the French of Maghrebian origin.
That could be disguised as a religion - and the state wasn't responsible for that.
And the further you go back into contemporary history, the more such repressed and locked-away topics you will find: relations with Algeria, for example, which are full of myths and legends on both sides.
The only institution where present-day analysis, determination and freedom are equally present is literature.
In France, as in so many unfortunate countries, it plays an essential role.
The comical misanthropy of Michel Houellebecq, the sharp analyzes of Annie Ernaux or the poetic enlightenment by Leila Slimani are currently the forums in which France finds itself.
Just like my cousin hopefully maybe too: he will retire next year.
Then he moves to the country and becomes a writer.
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