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Spread out on the highway so that no cars could pass, 100 or so protesters hit pots with loud rackets in a remote valley in eastern France last month. He walked into a nearby castle with the French president, determined to disrupt and create cacophony around the visit.
Suddenly, a helicopter carrying President Emmanuel Macron appeared overhead, the sound of its blades momentarily drowning out the sound. Although the rowdy protesters did not stop the French leader’s visit, the scene was a reminder of the anger that has fueled his government since implementing an unpopular pension overhaul this spring that raised the retirement age to 64 from 62.
For weeks, opponents of change have harassed Mr Macron and members of his cabinet by banging pots and pans on official trips. In a country with no shortage of kitchen equipment, the protests, known as “casserolades,” after the French word for pan, have disrupted or halted dozens of visits by ministers to schools and factories.
Like the “yellow vest” protest movement of 2018-19 that started over fuel prices and later expanded to include a variety of grievances, the beating pan has also become a symbol of discontent in France after several high street demonstrations failed to sway the government. to withdraw in pension changes.
“The desire to be deaf and to respond with voice represents a kind of discrimination of political discourse,” said Christian Salmon, a French essayist and columnist for the online publication Slate, in an interview. “We are not being heard, we are not being heard after weeks of protests. So now we have one option, which is not to listen to you.
Mr Macron’s decision to raise the legal retirement age is based on his belief that the country’s current pension system, which is based on payroll taxes, is not financially sustainable. As retirees supported by active workers live longer, people will also need to work longer, he said.
The pension law was pushed through using a constitutional provision that avoided a full parliamentary vote. Mr Macron defended the move in a televised interview on Monday as an act of responsibility, saying that major government decisions in the past, such as building up France’s nuclear weapons force, had used the same mechanism.
Casserolades began last month during a televised speech by Mr Macron intended as a way to move on from the upheaval of retirement. Determined to continue the fight, protesters gathered outside City Hall in France to smash pots and pans. In Paris, many residents participate from their apartment windows, filling the entire neighborhood with metallic notes.
Culinary war cries spread quickly. Before long, members of the government were greeted by a cacophony of cooking utensils on official trips around the country.
“We want to show that we are not giving up the fight,” said Nicole Draganovic, a protester brandishing a pot on a highway in La Cluse-et-Mijoux in eastern France last month.
Around him, in the middle of the union flag, there was the sound of various equipment from a typical French kitchen: sieves, lids and pans were beaten rhythmically with metal and wooden spoons. Potless protesters were clanging on the metal fences that lined the highway.
“It’s like a symphony,” Ms Draganovic said.
Some people who took part in the weeks of protests said the main message was anger at the government’s decision to push through pension reforms without the support of a majority of voters or unions.
“This is a rejection of democracy,” said Stéphanie Allume, 55, who stole a stainless steel pan during May Day demonstrations in Paris. “If we can no longer dialogue with the government, we will drown out their voices with the sound of a pot.”
The Casserolades – the latest stage of a protest movement that began with a peaceful march that drew millions of people to the streets and later produced several “wild protests” marked by heavy vandalism – also reflect a centuries-old tradition of protest in France.
Beating the pan dates back to the Middle Ages with a custom, called “charivari,” intended to embrace mismatched couples, according to Emmanuel Fureix, a historian at the University of Paris-Est Créteil. The tradition became political in the 1830s, under King Louis Philippe I, with people banging pots and pans at night under the windows of judges’ and politicians’ houses to demand greater freedom.
The cauldron, Mr. Fureix says, is “an everyday object, an instrument that embodies the voice of the people” in a time of poor political representation – a theme echoed in today’s casseroleades. “The rise of a movement that existed in an undemocratic era, the 19th century, is exactly a symptom of the crisis of democracy,” he said.
Mr. Macron has appeared annoyed by the pan beating, saying that “it is not the saucepans that will make France progress” – which Cristel, the French cookware manufacturer, responded on Twitter: “Mr. President, in @cristelfance we make the pot that brings France forward !!!”
The French leader has also strongly rejected the idea that the country has reached a democratic crisis, noting that the pension law was adopted according to the country’s Constitution. In a televised interview on Monday, he tried to push through controversial reforms by announcing tax cuts worth 2 billion euros, about $2.2 billion, for the middle class before the end of his term.
“The country is moving forward,” Mr Macron said.
But unions have called for another national day of protest early next month, and the government’s response to the casseroleades has sparked unease.
Many ministers are now announcing their travel plans at the last minute for fear of being surprised by pot bangers. And police used anti-terrorism laws to ban some protests and, on one occasion, confiscated protestors’ pots after local authorities banned the “use of portable sound devices.”
Mr Fureix said the government had been “trapped” by the casseroles, just like Louis Philippe I in his day.
“If they repress, they make fools of themselves,” he said. “This is happening now, like in the 19th century when the trial was turned into a political platform for the enemy. If we don’t do anything, the phenomenon grows.
And growing already.
A website created by a tech union now ranks French regions for casseroles based on the level of cacophony and the importance of government officials affected. At a recent protest in Paris, protesters held up giant pots and spoons made of cardboard, quickly providing mascots to the surrounding crowd.
Everywhere the pots and pans have been, Mr. Salmon, the essayist, draws parallels with the “yellow vest” protests. Both, he said, are objects “to which everyone can project their own meaning” and demand.
In the May Day protest, Ms. Allume said she saw a wide range of significance behind the saucepans, including the struggle to put food on the table and the desire to sound angry. He said that the pot itself that he had beaten had once been used to cook pasta and then melt depilatory wax.
“It’s been a lifetime, and now it’s a protest,” he said.
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