Tell me how you see “the extreme left”, I’ll tell you who you are. On the occasion of the release of the first issue of its quarterly, devoted to immigration, the identity media black book slipped into its pages a poster aiming to map nothing less than the French “extreme left”. “They are all there, or almost: thanks to Black book, the extreme left will no longer be a mystery”, we are promised in the header. An initiative immediately relayed (and welcomed) by extreme right circles. “This is the first time that a mapping [de l’extrême gauche] was done”, welcomed the presenter Christine Kelly, on the set of Faced with information (CNews). “It is good to see that some have courage,” also commented the journalist and regular speaker on the show Marc Menant.
Neofeminists, media, influencers, LGBT+, anti-fascists, electoralists, trade unionists… Whoever takes a quick look at this imposing tree could in fact imagine an extreme left as omnipresent as it is all-powerful, nestled even in the trendy bars of the capital. “This cartography is above all representative of the obsessions of the extreme right,” judges Audric Vitiello, lecturer in political science at the University of Tours, to whom L’Express submitted this map.
This is evidenced by the place given to the “antifascists” category – around a fifth of the map. However, in the opinion of Hugo Melchior, independent researcher in contemporary political history, “if anti-fascism has been constitutive of the political identity of the left for a century, the number of women and men who actively campaign within groups and other collectives of this type is relatively weak today – without taking into account the variegated nature of the anti-fascist movement in France.
“There is an error”
black book However, dedicates a “sport” category only to “antifas”, where we discover the existence of the Raccoon Box Club, an anti-fascist self-defense club. On Facebook, the private group (Raccoon Kai Boxing Club) has fewer than 200 members. As for the “known places” (understand these places favored by far-left activists) in the capital, we find, of course, the Saint-Sauveur (20th arrondissement), the historic bar of anti-fascist activists, but also the BarOurcq ( 19th century), a pétanque bistro, the artisanal brasserie Paname Brewing Company (19th century), or the Glouglou Ménilmontant (20th century).
Asked by L’Express, the first three establishments denied any political affiliation. On the Glouglou Ménilmontant side, they explain that they do not understand: “Perhaps they thought that because we are neighbors of the Saint-Sauveur, but there is a mistake…” The three establishments nevertheless have one thing in common: being located in the 19th and 20th arrondissements of Paris, where Jean-Luc Mélenchon came well ahead during the first round of the 2022 presidential election.
Finally, on the personality side, we note the presence of Simon Buxeraud. You didn’t know him? The connected identity right, yes. This “antifa accused of attacking an R activist[econquête]”, as written Black book, had been “challenged” to a bare-knuckle fight by pro-Zemmour influencer Papacito.
“The enemies of my friends are my enemies”
“The enemies of my friends are my enemies.” This seems to be the leitmotif which has earned certain people (even if their real influence is anecdotal) to appear on this map. The “neofeminists” category welcomes, for example, the actress Typhaine D (12,500 subscribers on Instagram), who became known for her proposal for a “universal feminine language” aimed at creating a feminist grammar. She thus sits alongside the elected member of the Council of Paris and author of the Lesbian genius (Grasset), Alice Coffin, or the writer, author of Dear asshole (Grasset), Virginie Despentes.
Among the right of the right, Typhaine D made a name for himself for having debated, in 2022, with Ralph la Cartouche, a well-known influencer of the identity right. Shortly after this exchange, the second was the guest of… Black Book, on the question “Should inclusive writing be banned?” Another example of this tribal logic: if the Goutte d’Or editions (a little over 2,000 subscribers on At the heart of Z. A journalist infiltrated Eric Zemmour’s campaign.
For Jean Massiet, presenter of Backseat, a political news show positioned on the left and broadcast live every week on the Twitch platform (230,000 subscribers), it is even a double punishment – both pinned in the “neofeminists” category and in that of “political influencers “. For good reason: this trained lawyer and former pen of the socialist Marisol Touraine at the Ministry of Health refuses to invite far-right personalities to his show.
Anachronism
The “neofeminist” category is nothing new, on the contrary. We find the Women’s Liberation Movement (MLF), born in 1970 to demand women’s free control over their bodies and to challenge “patriarchy”. But today, if some of its historic activists continue to express themselves in the media, this movement is only mentioned in the past.
Not to mention that, among the founding members of the MLF, certain personalities are far from holding values classified as far left. Thus Marie-Jo Bonnet, who claims to be left-wing but says she is opposed to the PMA and the GPA and does not hide her annoyance with the so-called “neo-feminists”. As for the Witch Bloc Paris, an anarcho-feminist movement, it was dissolved in 2020.
“Confusionism”
Concerning the political extreme left, this is also the great mix of genres. Thus, revolutionary communist organizations, such as Lutte Ouvrière or Permanent Revolution, are amalgamated with left-wing, reformist and electoralist parties. An organization like that of the Autonomous is placed in the category of “syndicalists”, even though this anarchist-inspired movement claims, on the contrary, autonomy in relation to the parties, the State and the unions.
“The way in which black book presents the political extreme left, without shores or borders, betrays a very great confusionism, analyzes Hugo Melchior. However, since at least 1968, the common denominator of the so-called ‘extreme left’ has remained their revolutionary conception of the conquest of state power.
In other words, the extreme left would like to be, historically, extra-parliamentary, although revolutionary currents, such as the Trotskyists, can decide (unlike the anarchists) to run in elections to popularize their program. The reformist parties, on the contrary, only envisage taking power by peaceful, electoral and parliamentary means, on the model of Salvador Allende’s Popular Unity in Chile, or the union of the left in France, from 1972.
“The far left at our doors”
Certainly, the presence of La France insoumise in this projection is not surprising (even if the party is not revolutionary in the strict sense, seeking to gain power through democracy). But, even coming from the identity right, how can we explain the presence of the reformist Yannick Jadot, senator Europe Ecologie-Les Verts (EELV), or of the mayor of Paris, the socialist Anne Hidalgo, in this panorama, while the majority members of EELV and the PS in no way meet the definition of the extreme left? These are in fact mentioned without us really knowing if it is a question of demonstrating their links with other more extreme movements or to insinuate a more clear-cut positioning. Contacted, black book did not wish to respond to L’Express. But, in the opinion of academic Audric Vitiello, “this mixture of references going from the left to the extreme left demonstrates above all a desire to denounce, in a hyperbolic mode, the ‘influence’ of an extreme left which would be upon us.”
Even if it means drowning the subject in anecdotal references, such as Current woes – an environmentalist parody of Current values – or the radical ecology party of LFI deputy Aymeric Caron, Ecological Revolution for the Living, although affiliated with Nupes and which claimed 4,000 members in 2018. We would almost forget the presence of the Earth Uprisings, the Permanent Revolution movement or even… from La France insoumise.