Presidential: what do feminist associations expect from candidates in the second round?

Emmanuel Macron once again wants to make the fight against gender inequality the “great cause” of his mandate. Marine Le Pen promises to get “in the way of anyone” who threatens women. How do feminist associations judge the programs of the two candidates in the second round of the presidential election? Several actors in the defense of women’s rights respond to France 24. For this presidential election, the association Osez le féminisme has worked on a “feministometer”. A tool that allows to measure the proposals in favor of women’s rights in the programs of the candidates. “We are ‘partisan'”, explains Fabienne El-Khoury, one of the spokespersons for Dare feminism, “but our association is political, because feminism is eminently political”, she admits. The activists have scrutinized the candidates’ program, their declarations, their vote in Parliament, in an attempt to obtain the most transparent result possible. For France 24, activists from Osez le féminisme, the National Solidarity Women Federation and the Women’s Foundation, as well as the founder of the Maison des Femmes, have agreed to look into the details of the commitments of the two candidates remaining in running in the second round. On the National Rally side (RN), the result, says Fabienne El-Khoury, is that “Marine Le Pen’s program is misogynistic”. “On violence against women, she offers nothing effective, nor on unequal pay. She only mentions women’s rights under a racist prism, when it comes to using them to hit on The foreigners.” Women’s rights as a means and not as an end Marine Le Pen, whose electoral project sent to the mailboxes of the French gives an important place to women, makes no mention of women in the manifesto detailing her online program. On her campaign site, the candidate offers thematic booklets. But none are devoted to women. These appear in the “Family” booklet, where they are mentioned twice as mothers in the birth rate and GPA section. On the other hand, the president of the RN summons women in her booklet “Security”, in the chapters devoted to the fight against aggression, and more at length in a section on the eradication of Islamism. The far-right candidate thus devotes a large part of her address to the French to the fight against “harassers”, whose names she proposes to register in the file of sex offenders, but does not mention sexual assault or rape explicitly. . For Osez le féminisme, the use of words is no coincidence. “She rarely talks about all the violence against women, preferring to suggest that it is foreigners who are the cause of this violence by playing on stereotypes”, underlines the association. “Obviously, this kind of violence exists, but the figures unfortunately tell us that rapes mainly take place within homes, and affect all socio-economic categories and all societies.” Foreign women left aside Another proposal scrutinized by the “feministometer”, Marine Le Pen wants to double support for single mothers, while strengthening controls to avoid fraud. “A measure a priori feminist, but in reality stigmatizing”, denounces Dare feminism. “We help them, but we suspect them. This also implies that the administrative procedures will be laborious to access aid, which will reduce access to this right.” For Ghada Hatem-Gantzer, obstetrician-gynecologist, founder of the Maison des Femmes, which has been welcoming victims of violence in Saint-Denis, north of Paris, since 2016, “voting for Marine Le Pen is not an option for women”. “We treat a lot of migrant patients, some of whom are in an irregular situation”, explains to France 24 the one who is also the head doctor of the structure, a large part of whose funding is public. The far-right candidate, who wants to make immigration the great cause of her mandate, proposes to abolish State Medical Aid (AME) for adults while keeping an urgent care system. Currently, this aid allows foreigners living in France in an irregular and precarious situation to benefit from access to care free of charge with exemption from advance payment. “Many patients will no longer be able to treat themselves before their situation gets worse. It will be catastrophic. And we will end up with diseases at advanced stages, even more complicated to take care of. people die like that, from hypertension or diabetes! When you read his program, it makes you shudder”, reacts Ghada Hatem-Gantzer. A closeness with anti-abortion leaders “Marine Le Pen launches great declarations, but no trace of concrete measures for women”, continues Fabienne El-Khoury. “If she really wants to fight against violence against women, as she says, we expect her to invest money in women’s shelters, to encourage emotional life education and sex from an early age to arm young people, that it finances places of reception with psychological, legal and social follow-up, not that it confines itself to street harassment”, insists the spokesperson for Dare to feminism. The Women’s Foundation and four of the main French associative networks for the defense of women’s rights questioned, in a forum at the JDD, the presidential candidates, listing 10 measures to be adopted in an emergency plan to fight against inequalities between women and men. At the origin of this call, the president of the Women’s Foundation, Anne-Cécile Mailfert, assumes not to have proposed to Marine Le Pen to sign the text. Asked by France 24, she explains: “Marine Le Pen is not, and will never be, on the side of women, because she is a figure of the far right. And wherever the far right has taken power, women’s rights have receded. She is certainly a woman, but let’s see who she allies herself with [Viktor Orban, le Premier ministre hongrois, Jair Boslonaro, le président brésilien]who are his supporters [Gilbert Collard, Éric Zemmour, NDLR]. She discovers herself as a feminist five years after #MeToo. She understood that the fight for women’s rights had become essential in France and as she is a populist, she says what people want to hear.” Many associations fear that the far-right elected official will attack on abortion if she is at the head of France, although she has not spoken openly about committing herself against the right to abortion. an extension of the deadline from 12 to 14 weeks, adopted by the French Parliament in February 2022. “We rely on the experience of feminist associations which are currently experiencing this in other countries, such as Hungary, where the far right is in power”, explains Françoise Brié, the director general of the National Solidarity Women Federation, specializing in the reception, support and accommodation of women victims of violence in France. The words she uses have meaning, analyzes Fabienne El-Khoury, who recalls that the elected official has often ocked the “comfort abortion” and continues to convey a discourse dramatizing abortion, specific to anti-abortion. Emmanuel Macron does “never go far enough” Regarding Emmanuel Macron, Anne-Cécile Mailfert says she sent him the call for an emergency plan in favor of the fight against gender inequalities. “He told us that he agreed with most of our proposals. But we are waiting. He has not signed it yet.” The LREM candidate has declared that gender equality is once again the “great cause” of his next five-year term, because there is still “a lot to do”. But for the associations questioned, it still has to prove itself. Françoise Brié welcomes a number of advances, particularly on the legislative level, citing for example the ban on the use of family mediation in the event of intra-family violence adopted in 2020. For its part, Dare to feminism welcomes steps that go in common sense, but “never far enough”, such as extending the limitation period for sexual crimes committed against minors from 20 to 30 years old, while activists are also calling for imprescriptibility. activists welcome the extension to 28 days for the arrival of a child, while regretting that Emmanuel Macron opposed a more ambitious European directive. One billion euros for gender equality “It must be recognized that under his presidency, we talked a lot about the fight against gender inequality, which he declared to be a major cause of his five-year term, but overall there is a lack of means to enforce the measures at all levels: police, justice, associations”, considers Françoise Brié. “The High Council for Equality between Women and Men (HCE) recommends 1 billion euros, but the budget allocated during the five-year term did not exceed 340 million: we are well below”, is indignant Dare feminism. “What we expect of him is precisely to devote this billion euros to respect for women’s rights and to adopt a framework law that follows the recommendations of the High Council for Equality”, adds Fabienne El- Khoury. The “feminism washing” of Emmanuel Macron The spokesperson for the association, who judges the candidate on his mandate, says he is frustrated, believing that the outgoing president has made “a lot of false promises and unfulfilled communication effects means”. “The feminist victories of the past five years have been snatched from her by the force of lobbying by associations.” In the field of equal pay, Osez le féminisme even accuses Emmanuel Macron of having engaged in “feminism washing”, which means “displaying a feminist label, like ticking a box, when the work and the investment are not there”. In the viewfinder, “the promotion under the mandate of Emmanuel Macron of an equal pay index in which companies all have good marks, even if they do not respect the law”. Finally, the promotion to the Ministry of the Interior of Gérald Darmanin in July 2020, when he was accused of rape, does not pass decidedly with associations for the defense of women’s rights. In this case, for which the Minister was never indicted, but only heard under the status of assisted witness, the Paris public prosecutor’s office requested a dismissal on January 13, 2022, which nevertheless leaves the way for a reopening of investigations.