The coronary pandemic and internal contradictions caused the movement to fade, but their idea is still alive, says , who has been active in the yellow vest from the beginning.
A rebellion burned down on social media throughout the fall of 2018 Emmanuel Macronin against politics flared up on November 17, 2018.
Nearly 300,000 protesters were on the streets demanding change at some 2,000 events across France.
The ambitious president, who has only been in power for a year and a half, pushed forward his reforms, which not everyone liked.
Among other things, he wanted to raise the retirement age and introduce an environmental program that would have raised the price of fuel and lowered speed limits on rural roads.
As motoring rose to a large extent in the criticism, the yellow vest found in every car was taken as a symbol of protest.
The vest was thrown on as well David Poulainan insurance trader and associate from Bordeaux.
– I was involved right from the first demonstration. There were a large number of us in Bordeaux and the atmosphere was excellent. There were many kinds of people among us, but there was solidarity and brotherhood between us.
Poverty and invisibility gave birth to yellow vests
The movement of the yellow vest is based, as in many countries, on the dividing line between France and the countryside.
The political map is no longer drawn by party, but geographically, because living conditions and visions differ so much in rural, urban, and suburban areas.
Such intermediate areas in the south-west of France are the frameworks of Bordeaux, just off the Atlantic Ocean. Little Lormont is one of those impoverished frameworks whose small industry and shops have withered. The city’s building stock is old, and the highway bridge runs directly over the dilapidated but sympathetic center of Lormont.
The traffic between Paris and Bordeaux has thus concretely rolled down. Indeed, Lormont made headlines during the first protests of the yellow vest because that busy route was cut off.
The largest employers in the area were once the port and Ford’s large gearbox factory in neighboring Blanquefort. The plant was closed in 2014, and the port’s operations declined to the current rather modest level in the 1970s.
– The background of the yellow vest movement is the dissatisfaction that has accumulated over the decades, explains Poulain.
– The French socio-economic model is not working, and at the same time we have leaders who do not listen to the people. Another important point is Europeanness. Our leaders think more about Europe than their own citizens, Poulain continues.
The price of fuel and the planned increases to it were then the last staple that caused emotions to stir, especially in rural and suburban areas, where one’s own car is essential for mobility.
The president was frightened
Matters of substance alone were not enough to ignite the yellow vest protests. The nature of President Macron and his reaction to the outbursts of emotion on social media in the fall of 2018 also contributed.
– Macron lives in his own world and has no contact with people’s lives. He belittled and barked at us and hasn’t kept his promises since, Poulain says.
According to Poulain, criticism of the yellow vest targets all leaders alongside Macron.
– They have attended good schools and are certainly wise, but the country is not ruled by common sense.
Macron’s burden, according to many, is also that he came into politics from outside. He was a banker with a socialist president François Hollande raised to his government as Minister of Economic Affairs.
Thus, Macron has not come a long way in the party machinery from municipal politics through the regions to Paris and there gradually closer to the government.
When the protests flared up in November 2018, they were really fierce – almost comparable to the events in Washington last January, when the then president Donald Trumpia a supportive angry crowd rushed inside the U.S. House of Congress.
The crowds raged in Paris, destroying the Arc de Triomphe, among other things, and headed for the Élysée Palace.
Those in charge of the security of the presidential palace are already wondering what to do: let the crowd in and evacuate the president, or try to stop the intruders otherwise. Fortunately, the crowd was dammed in Concorde Square.
Poulain is against violence, but understands that people are angry. If people are not listened to, something needs to be done that will attract attention, he continues.
– The anarchists involved are separate. They destroyed [paikkoja] and annoyed the police.
Poulain believes the police did not intervene as much as they should in the destruction because the “vest” was “wanted to be ruined”.
Macron was also soon caught up in the protests with the nods himself when he visited the town of Puy-en-Velay, in central France, in Auvergne, a few weeks after the start of the movement. The yellow vest had destroyed the town hall there, and many officials who had fled the house were in danger in the fire.
The president’s car convoy was also stopped and security guards had to rush the crowd away from Macron’s car.
Less than a week after this incident, Macron gave his first televised speech to the people and tried to ease the situation.
What cheated on the yellow vest?
The concessions alone were not enough for the yellow vest, and the protests continued until early 2020 on Saturdays. Sometimes there was more people, sometimes less.
But then came the corona pandemic and movement restrictions that stopped marching in the spring of 2020 like a wall.
As the protests continued to resume, they transformed into a movement of people opposed to corona restrictions and masks.
– There were a lot of people involved in the activities of the yellow vest, because we criticized the actions of the government and the decision-makers, Poulain says.
However, he believes the main reason for the fading of yellow vests was not Korona.
– It was an internal contradiction. There were right and left people involved, a lot of different people with similar concerns, but the ideas for solutions were quite different.
Poulain positioned himself in the middle and tried to reconcile between the various parties by setting up an association which for a short time acted as a mediator of the yellow vest.
Here and there there are still yellow vests holding their protests on the roadside, but last Saturday a new kind of movement, partly formed by the former yellow vests, gathered in the city centers.
Now the disappointed ones marched Jean-Luc Mélenchonin supporters who hate Macron and can’t stand the far right Marine Le Pen.
No Macronille, no Le Penille (Ni-Macron, ni-Le Pen) simply wants to reform French politics and is now aiming for the upcoming parliamentary elections in June.
However, David Poulain looks forward to next fall. He believes the protests will then begin again and be even wider and more violent than before.
– The situation has not changed at all, on the contrary. The situation will explode.