Introduction

Like any normal person, I am extremely anxious about the rise of the far right that we observe all over the world and more particularly in France. And I wonder how seemingly normal people can be seduced by its repugnant ideas. Or at the very least, vote for racist and fascist parties.

And above all, how to reverse the trend. How to convince them to stop fighting to worsen their neighbor's situation (even if it worsens their own in the process), but to improve their own situation.

How to pull them out of obscurantism, hatred, and the self-destruction process in which they have locked themselves? This article is here to present my current answer on the subject.

My main source for the remainder of this article is the book:Ordinary Voters: An Investigation into the Normalization of the Far Right ofFélicien Faury , of which you can see a lecture, commented on here: : The normalization of the Far Right.

Who votes for RN?

The counterpart to the massification of the RN electorate is that over time, it has become increasingly heterogeneous. Once mainly composed of small business owners, reactionary bourgeoisie, nostalgic pieds noirs from the colonial era, and military personnel, it has now expanded to all strata of society.

But for me, I would like to focus particularly on the popular vote for the RN, because on the left, it is the one that intrigues the most given that according toMost left-wing ideologies believe that the working class benefits from voting left. There was even a time when it was said (as it is for Muslims today, and for African Americans in the United States, until the recent defeat of the Democrats against Trump) that they have no other choice but to vote left, so there is no point in courting that electorate.

Already, it's not just any part of the working classes that votes for RN. It's the most privileged parts of the working classes.

The one who is on a permanent contract, owner of a suburban house, and who thinks she lives in the countryside because she sees grass from her window and there is neither commerce nor public service around her.

Only, a forest of identical pavilions devoid of any social life (and even life itself) apart from the incessant passage of cars along the long road that leads there, which makes it very clear to children, the elderly, the handicapped and others who do not have the privilege of being motorized that they are barely tolerated.

Seriously, young couples, stop exiling yourselves to these terrible places for the sake of your children.In its residential areas, when you don't have a car, you can't do anything.(not even going to see a friend to play cards)And spoiling is the case with children. Except if you commit to playing taxi until they're 18 (and even in adolescence, they don't necessarily want to rely on mom to see their girlfriend). And a house, far from everything once all the costs (particularly transportation and heating) are factored in, is a money pit. who prevents any somewhat amusing expense. The only advantage is to allow each child to have his/her own room but given that it is becoming more and more financially complicated to have more than one child, this objection carries less and less weight.

And above all, it must be remembered that if there aren’t apartments for large families in city centers, it's often not due to a lack of space, but a choice made by the developers. And in saying this, I'm not criticizing the developers. They often have very good reasons for making this choice.

Per square meter, small apartments cost more, so making large apartments is less profitable. And in addition, there is the belief (not completely unfounded) that large families do not want to live downtown and therefore a fear that large apartments will not sell. But mEven in cases where market logic would dictate the construction of large apartments, quite often public authorities put pressure on developers to build small homes in the city center and detached houses far from everything for families, because they are afraid that large apartments would attract low-income families (or worse, Arab low-income families). TheFools do not have many children, but at least they pay a lot of taxes and are white.

In short, it's not the developer I'm angry with, but thexpoliticsswho does notfonAnd nothing to solve the problem of access for the working classes to a decent housing, at a reasonable price, in a place where they will have access toxservicespublicsand to a job without having to make an hour's drive (see promoting policies that addresses the problem)

Afterwards, I will nuance everything I just said, by adding that these families probably have good reasons to prefer to relocate to suburban neighborhoods, which the childless city lover that I am cannot understand. Not to mention that if we make a real ecological transition, people will probably have to massively leave the city to settle in the countryside, so my speech may age badly.

But, let's stop criticizing gratuitously (and with a heck of a lot of bad faith) the lifestyle of a large part of my fellow citizens to get back to the subject.

As I said: the working classes who vote for the RN are the stabilized parts of the working classes. Those who have a stable job in the city. Those who have a small nest egg set aside (very small nest egg, often, just enough to buy a used car, if the one they have breaks down) and who earn enough to consume a little of this superficiality that adds all the spice to life (like a week at the seaside every other year).

In short, it is neither about country folk hit hard by the agricultural crisis, nor the long-term unemployed, nor the worker who is juggling short-term or part-time contracts, nor the working poor struggling to earn a minimum wage per month. In one word, their life is not grim.

It's not germinal, but it's not Disneyland either. Their work is wearing, they are directly suffering from the degradation of working conditions and live in fear of losing what they have laboriously acquired at the cost of great sacrifices and great efforts and not a particularly rich lifestyle either.

And as a result of this life made of rewarded sacrifices, he strongly believes in meritocracy and the value of work, as defined by the right from Sarkozy onwards (before this word was rather associated with a left-wing concept that has nothing to do with it).

Of course, they are the victim of survivorship bias. They see that in their case work has paid off, so they conclude that work pays and that those who do notdo not succeed are just too lazy to get their fingers out of their butts, as they ignore the 90% of other cases where work does not pay off.

Not to mention that this is a very reassuring view of things for people in their situation and therefore difficult to question. Indeed, accepting that their current position is due as much to the vagaries of life as to their efforts (very real, it is not to be denied), means having to accept even more precariousness and uncertainty in a life that already has plenty.

This belief in meritocracy gives them an additional sense of control over their lives. It makes them believe that all they need to do is work in order to make ends meet. This is the great power of meritocratic ideology. Its strength is not the paradise it promises for a distant future where their work will be recognized for its true value, but the feeling of control and security it provides in the present (somewhat like the religions of old).

But, it is also its weakness, as it imposes additional psychological pressure on those who do not succeed, by making them responsible for their fate.

But I'm going to stop the cheap psychology by specifying that this is just a very personal proposition of explaining certain factors that lead to these beliefs they have according to sociologists. I repeat to be sure to be well understood: Sociologists observe in the field applying scientific methods that this part of the RN electorate has its beliefs, but it's me who proposes these necessarily partial and unverified explanations. Sociology already gets enough unfair accusations thrown at it without also being held responsible for my nonsense.

Another characteristic of this part of the electorate is the weakness of its cultural capital and its anti-intellectualism, largely inherited from a far too traumatizing passage in a national education system that they did everything to leave as quickly as possible.

And finally, to conclude this detailed portrait, there is a small minor detail that I haven't mentioned till now: they are white. Or at least seen as white currently (for some, this has not always been the case, especially for those of Portuguese origin).

And like most voters (regardless of their political side or social origin), they are racist and increasingly acknowledge it in public (thanks to the public service for making Zemmour a superstar, then deciding to copy CNews instead of fighting it). But, unlike other groups, they make their racism one of the main driving forces of their vote.

Indeed, and this is something that is most difficult for the left to understand: he does not believe in class struggle, but in the struggle of races.

Even if they share the same disgust as leftists for the indecent fortunes amassed by a minority thanks to inherited wealth over several generations, the widespread corruption of politicians, the total absence of democracy, the degradation of public services,... they do not believe that the first threat to them comes from the powerful, but from racialized individuals who might move in next door. Or at least, this is the threat they are most sensitive to.

Indeed, for them, blacks or Arabs arriving in their suburban neighborhood or visiting their businesses is a threat they believe they must combat. For them, it's the beginning of an invasion that will transform their peaceful living place (too peaceful from my point of view) into a suburb filled with insecurity, graffiti, and trash as seen on TV.

For them, this means that if they do nothing, the value of their house (which is their only asset) will collapse. Consequently, they will no longer be able to resell it to go and live elsewhere and will therefore be condemned to live among halal butchers and drug dealers.

Or simply to regularly encounter black people. And for them, it's completely unbearable. It's experienced as a form of social degradation and a cause for shame.

Their priority, the only lever of action they think they have to improve their lives (or at least prevent them from worsening), is to preserve the white exclusivity in which they live. However, they are increasingly unable to do this given the rise of a wealthy, black and Arab bourgeoisie who have more money and more cultural capital than they do and who aspire to leave the suburbs and its very real problems (not to mention that they hope to provide a better life for theirAs an AI model developed by OpenAI, you haven't provided any text for me to translate. Kindly provide a text in any language and I'll do my best to translate it into English for you.childs).

So there you go, the National Rally vote is because blacks and Arabs are getting richer and more cultured.

So, please, Arabs, adhere more to the stereotype and be content to laze around all day on your couch waiting for welfare to come in.

And, above all, do not go burning a trash can out of boredom during an evening.rThe phrase "e pote" does not seem to be in a particular language. Could you please specify the language so that I can provide an appropriate translation?a little too wateredduring your adolescence, because otherwise, they will immediately cry out about the end of civilization (completely forgetting that during their ownadolescence, they did much worseWithout any particular reason other than the desire to annoy.).

But let's get serious again: The consequence of this is that not only, hesyouYour text was already in English but it was incomplete. Please provide a complete text or sentence for translation.They see the RN vote as a means to defend their interests, but moreover, they view leftist programs and their minimal anti-racism as a threat. If we add to this that leftist ideas are carried by social classes with a strong cultural capital like the teachers they hate, it results in them being totally disgusted by the left.

The Rufinists and some Marxist-Leninists, survivors of the Cold War, will tell me that all that is needed is to abandon all these societal battles that divide the working classes and return to the good old class struggle.

But, that would be a mistake, because as I said earlier, he does not believe in class struggle. They do not believe in the possibility of further taxing the rich or even the possibility of uniting to lead victorious social struggles. 40 years of neoliberalism and union abandonment have passed by there. Furthermore, their meritocratic belief makes them not see bosses as enemies.

Only the large fortunes coming from inheritance really bother them. On the contrary, they adhere to the myth of the self-made man and admire bosses who have worked hard to establish their company. And they often have small business owners burdened with taxes in their surroundings, having to deal with an incompetent administration and regulations as absurd as they are obscure (often requested by large companies to kill their small competitors or to practice disguised protectionism to their advantage).

Consequently, they are not very sensitive to the traditional left-wing discourse saying that we need to increase taxes on businesses or regulations (to put it politely).

For them, the only way to save public services and improve quality of life is not to band together to confront a distant, deserving, and far too powerful employer.

Their preferred solution is to attack the population that disgusts them as much as the ultra-rich: the assisted. Who, in addition, often have the bad idea of being black or Arab (they really do it on purpose, it's not possible). Even on economic topics, left-wing ideas resonate in their mind clouded by racism and meritocratic ideology as a repellant rather than a solution to our common problems.

What to do

In short, in summary, among them, voting for RN is not a mistake made due to lack of information. It is not enough to explain to them that unlike the left, the RN has no intention of implementing social policies for them to change their vote. Their vote for RN mainly stems from their racism (and secondly from the betrayals of the neo-liberal left).

The union of philistines and barbarians on the basis of a social program is an attractive concept, but completely illusory in practice. For them, the left embodies...not completely wrongIntellectuals and minorities. The left is their bane and it's impossible to change their mind with door-to-door canvassing, distributions of leaflets,a program socialOr any speech on TV.

If you are from their family and you see them daily, you may have a chance, but it is impossible for a party to do it on a large scale or for a small local group of activists to influence their vote or idea. In any case, not directly and not immediately.

For me, we must resign ourselves to having to do without their vote. There's no point in putting activist resources into trying to convince them to vote for a left-wing party, it's pointless. What we need is to go all out in areas where there's an over-vote from the left, but a lot of abstentions.

That is to say thatit is necessaryfocus all our efforts,on theprecarious lower classes,and theThe text provided "es" is a Spanish pronoun which translates to "is" in English.youngYou didn't provide any text to translate. Can you provide the text that needs translation? graduate workerspeople who are not rich, but with a strong cultural capital, like theengineers or theteachers whoaredecidedlyomnipresent(in this article).Broadly on the suburbs and city centers to the detriment of residential suburbs.No need to jeopardize the vote of these social classes by trying to seduce big racist idiots who only dream of our defeat.

However, outside of election periods, it is necessary to promote anti-racism and a positive view of multiculturalism as much as possible. We must violently oppose assimilationism and say that what is pleasant is not that minorities abandon their culture and that we all live among whites, but on the contrary that they keep their culture and that we live together.

And, this is not some Care Bears delusion of a detached hipster, but a concrete reality that I experience every day. I work in IT and in my field, multiculturalism is the norm.

And, I confirm that it's very pleasant to live with people coming from all backgrounds (and to eat the totally different delicious pastries that they sometimes bring to work).

I love, when I leave my house to run, feeling like I'm crossing 3 borders.Unfortunately, its borders are as much social as they are cultural.On the contrary, I hate strolling through residential areas with all identical houses where I always feel like I'm getting lost (and that smell of exhaust fumes). Not to mention that I love to stop randomly when I'm tired and buy a pastry that I've never tasted before, from a country I didn't even know existed.

In short, multiculturalism is like a holiday at home. And, if this view of diversity were to become the norm, then the working classes voting for the RN would no longer consider preserving a white exclusivity as a priority. On the contrary, they would welcome diversity with kindness (well, there for once this is a really Utopian vision).

And if we managed, despite the absence of their vote, to elect a real left-wing party and then massive student and union mobilisations forced it to at least follow its program (I vote so that demonstrations serve a purpose and not to no longer have to demonstrate), the working classes voting RN would start to believe in the possibility of improving their lives in ways other than by attacking the most vulnerable.

And here, I'm dreaming a bit, but a left-wing party once in power could carry out national education reforms that would make it less violent for people from the working classes. A school where the culture of the working classes would be valued instead of being disparaged. A school that would be a place of fulfillment and discovery and not a means of social advancement through an increasingly ruthless academic competition.

In the very, very long term, this would reduce the anti-intellectualism of this population.

But, in principle, there is little chance of that happening, even in the event of a victory for LFI. One only needs to see Mélenchon's reaction during an interview with Danny and Raz when he mentioned Danny's academic failure to realize that at LFI, the mood is not for a deep questioning of the school system.

Source

Here are some sources that I have read to write this article:

THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE NATIONAL RALLY

Vote RN and racialization of solidarity

Mistrust towards the school, key factor in the RN vote