Nope. The Prime Minister right before him was also openly gay. Could US journalists be bothered to do a little research instead of parrotting one another on this topic?
I’m no expert on French politicians, but a very quick wiki/google search reveals that the former prime minister, Élisabeth Borne was implied to be a lesbian by a French publication that she later sued, denying their assertions. I would hardly call that “openly gay” and it’s pretty scummy of that publisher to invade someone’s personal life like that.
As for the comment on US journalists, the BBC was also reporting Gabriel Attal’s appointment using the language “openly gay” as early as 06:03 UTC.
As an American I have plenty of bones to pick with the media here, but your comment comes across as ill-informed, bashing on American journalists just because rather than for any substantiated reason.
I stand corrected and I appreciate it.
FWIW I’m both a resident of France, where I remember reading in L’obs (center-left weekly political-focused magazine that—usually—does quality reporting) that Elisabeth Borne has a female significant as if she had made no efforts to hide it. I’m guessing now that it’s one if those open parisian secrets (L’Obs has always been derided as being somewhat of a champagne socialist—here we say “caviar left”—outlet and it’s true that it targets mainly the concerns of the upper middle class and above), that Elisabeth Borne didn’t want to go national,
…And an American citizen who truly loves American journalism on the whole. In France there’s just nothing like The Atlantic, or Conde Nast publications, or NYMag, or even The Verge, or passionate Substackers; there’s hardly anyone as independent-minded Jesse Singal, or Katie Herzog, or Jonathan Haidt…
EDIT: Went back and checked said article from L’Obs, dated October 2022. It does in fact go no further than to mention “rumors of her homosexuality that floated around newsrooms”. Total case of brain dysfunction on my part, I can only apologize. And downvote myself in atonement.
Hey it’s all good dude, everyone makes mistakes. I appreciate the follow-up comment and constructive discussion.
Was she? The best info I could find is that people suggested she was a lesbian, but that if it were true, she had chosen not to come out.
Yup, you are correct . See this discussion: https://lemmy.ml/comment/7209860
Ah, merci
So we replace the latest straight incompetent piece of shit with a gay incompetent piece of shit. I guess it’s good for gay visibility and I hope it’ll bring intolerant behaviour down.
As for the youngest part, Macron is our youngest president and has been hell-bent on destroying our social system and having the far-right rise for the past 7 years and shows no sign of becoming smarter.
Smarter? He’s not doing this out of stupidity I think
Really wish we could stop with the “openly gay”. If you know somebody is gay, then they are out. If they aren’t out, you shouldn’t call them gay - with an exception for anti-gay bigots who should be called “probably gay bigot”. It’s minor thing, but I feel like this terminology fuels the right wing propaganda that gay people could just not exist if we weren’t so stubborn.
And I really wish people would stop being so self-centered as to request that news reporters use phrasing that be so imprecise as to be potentially untrue just to suit their whiny whims. You sound like you’re so eager to introduce this little speech code of yours that you’re asking the world to act and talk like non-outed gay people don’t exist and never did. How more backwards can you get?
“Speech code” lol. Calm down, Mary.
My guess is that it’s to avoid something like finding records of a past leader who is gay, and them then being the first
My issue with this is: why does their sexuality even matter? It’s their GD business
Eta: I also hate this with race and gender. “First woman to…” why? Why are we so focused on the color of people’s skin, their religion, what’s between their legs, or who they love?
I want to live in a world where a mixed-heritage lesbian woman is elected and no-one bats an eye, or mentions anything about it unless it comes up organically by the person elected. Otherwise the only legit question should be: is this person the best candidate for the job?
Ok Ill get off my soap box now
Here’s something you may not know: When you are gay, you have to come out constantly. That’s why famous people “announce” that they are gay. And let me assure you, gay people do not want to be the constant subject of public debate. We are the constant subject of public debate because people hate us and want us to die. And because people who maybe don’t hate us or want us to die are really obsessed with making sure that those people have platforms on social media and other mainstream media platforms. So, if it’s really wearing you down to hear about all these different kinds of people, maybe go yell at some bigots and the people who platform them?
Yeah, that’s gotta suck and I’m 100% not against people talking about who they are if they WANT to. What irritates me is the labels people are forced carry.
Like “wow a woman was finally able to achieve what men can achieve” or “wow this gay man was finally able to acheive what straight men can achieve” and that’s the part that annoys me
Eta: I think it’s meant well, but it implies that there’s something “special” about these people that allows them to climb the ranks previously reserved for a select group of people
So to truly be inclusive, things like “race” and gender and sexuality should be looked at as variations of normal, the same way hair color or height is looked at
2nd edit: Ok, sorry, but just to clarify I’m not harping on straight, white, males here. Swinging the pendulum the exact opposite way doesn’t help, either. I’m seeing this more as a societal thing that I’d liked to see changed
It has to actually become a common thing for it to not be a big deal. You can’t put the cart before the horse.
Sure, but before things can become commonplace we need voices advocating for the direction of that change. That’s my goal. To be a voice.
Also, irrelevant to you, but: I might need a new Lemmy account. Connect isn’t working for me and I can’t find which e-mail I used to sign up for Lemmy. Super annoying, because I keep needing to search for the posts that I commented on, and then find the comments themselves in order to reply. My inbox just gives me errors about not finding the posts… but they’re obviously still here
My issue with this is: why does their sexuality even matter? It’s their GD business
With an historical background of certain groups of people being excluded on the basis of discrimination, it makes sense for these things to be newsworthy, as they serve as a “Look, this group of people can rise through the ranks too, and there’s nothing wrong with it” general announce.
I want to live in a world where a mixed-heritage lesbian woman is elected and no-one bats an eye, or mentions anything about it unless it comes up organically by the person elected.
I agree with the sentiment, but that works better as an end goal than as a stage we should or could immediately switch into. There’s still plenty of bigotry nowadays, and celebrating how it’s slowly fading away helps to clean up the bastions where it remains.
Eventually the world will come to a point where sexuality, race and such isn’t called out, it becomes irrelevant to mention, as all is accepted. I hope anyway.
I wish. Currently it seems like were going to the exact opposite direction and special focus is being put on people’s race and sexuality. This headline is a great example; highlighting his sexuality and young age. I bet he’d rather be recognized for something he can actually take credit for.
I think, if the person in question is comfortable with such, it’s okay to mention like ‘first X as Y’ as it shows some progression and awareness that anybody can now achieve anything and can encourage other people with the same or similar traits.
But yeah, hopefully once we get past that, we can get back to people being recognised for what they do, rather than what they look like or who they would prefer to fuck.
What we call race today are arbitrary and irrelevant traits like skin color, but wait until genetic engineering takes the lead and we have different actual races with objectively superior races.
It is no one’s responsibility to help you stay in the closet, and “openly gay” is useful and relevant to distinguishing whether or not someone is in the closet, which is pertinent to this topic.
No it’s not? Either it’s common knowledge someone is homosexual or they’re not, “openly” really adds nothing to the conversation. “openly” implies they should be ashamed of it, hence the comment you were answering to.
Idk, I like it. It’s an acknowledgement that some may have been closeted and we can’t know. It’s always felt to me like a statement of “we have always existed at every level of society”
There’s also a suggestion implicit in the phrase that the person is not attempting to hide or downplay their identity, that they’re proud of themselves and represent me. It’s a very nice change from phrases I saw growing up.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
In a typically bold bid to revitalize his second term, President Emmanuel Macron named Gabriel Attal, 34, as his new prime minister, replacing Élisabeth Borne, 62, who made no secret of the fact that she was unhappy to be forced out.
If France is by no means in crisis — its economy has proved relatively resilient despite inflationary pressures and foreign investment is pouring in — it has appeared at times to be in a not uncharacteristic funk, paralyzed politically, sharply divided and governable with an intermittent recourse to a constitutional tool that enables the passing of bills in the lower house without a vote.
Borne, as is the prerogative of any president of the Fifth Republic, and had done so on social media in a way that, as Sophie Coignard wrote in the weekly magazine Le Point, “singularly lacked elegance.”
His order, which applies to public middle and high schools, banished the loosefitting full-length robe worn by some Muslim students and ignited another storm over French identity.
She dismissed the appointment of Mr. Attal as “a puerile ballet of ambition and egos.” Still, the new prime minister’s performance in giving France a sense of direction and purpose will weigh on her chances of election.
Mr. Macron wants a more competitive, dynamic French state, but any new package of reforms that further cuts back the country’s elaborate state-funded social protection in order to curtail the budget deficit is likely to face overwhelming opposition.
The original article contains 1,137 words, the summary contains 243 words. Saved 79%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
