How Marine Le Pen killed a rapper’s football
anthem
The head of France’s football federation says song by
Youssoupha will not be used at tournament after an uproar from the far right.
Marine Le Pen blasted French-Congolese rap singer
Youssoupha for his "insulting" and "outrageous" lyrics |
BY CLEA
CAULCUTT
May 30,
2021 4:02 am
https://www.politico.eu/article/marine-le-pen-rapper-youssoupha-france-football-anthem/
PARIS —
Marine Le Pen has scored an early goal against rap music in France.
In a
controversy that engulfed sports and politics ahead of the European Football
Championship, which kicks off next month, the far-right chief led a public
offensive against a rapper whose song had been chosen as France’s anthem for
the tournament.
Blasting
what she called “insulting” and “outrageous” lyrics in a tweet, Le Pen and
other right-wing figures criticized the top-selling artist Youssoupha not over
the anthem itself, but over earlier songs in which he’d explicitly targeted
her. On Wednesday, the French Football Federation announced it would drop
Youssoupha’s song, titled “Write my name in blue,” from its lineup for the
tournament.
“It’s a
retreat in the face of a controversy created by the National Rally,” said
Nicolas Kssis-Martov, a left-wing journalist at the magazine So Foot. “Nothing
is neutral when it comes to the France team and the context is unprecedented,
with a resurgent right and far right.”
The episode
underscores just how fraught France’s cultural and political debate has become
in the run-up to a presidential election next year in which Le Pen is a top
contender against President Emmanuel Macron.
France’s
football team, which is made up mostly of players with immigrant backgrounds,
has long been held up as a symbol of diversity and healthy “vivre ensemble” —
or the idea that different communities can live happily side by side.
But that
symbolism has also made anything that touches the team potential political
dynamite. In the case of the anthem for Euro 2020 (it’s still officially called
that after being delayed by a year because of the pandemic), it was 15-year-old
lyrics by Youssoupha in which he said his “semen impregnates this b**** Marine
Le Pen” that led to the far-right outcry and the song’s cancellation.
Explaining
the decision to the daily Le Parisien, the head of the French Football
Federation, Noël Le Graët, distanced himself from the choice, which was first
used in a video clip unveiling the players selected for the France team.
The song
was never meant as an anthem for the team and had been selected by “the young
staff of the communications department,” he said.
Kssis-Martov
said that explanation sounded unlikely. “I’d be surprised that a senior manager
at the federation did not approve the song, especially because they would have
paid Youssoupha,” he said, adding that the federation would not commission more
than one song ahead of the tournament.
Campaign
against rapper
Le Pen’s
offensive against Youssoupha comes as she is ramping up her third bid for the
presidency, with polls putting her neck-and-neck with Macron.
The
National Rally chief, who is also running in local elections next month, called
on the football federation to yank the song last week, tweeting that “the
insulting and outrageous lyrics shock a number of Frenchmen.”
Allies then
chimed in, attacking the artist for what they said was a call to rape their
leader. Youssoupha declined a request for comment, telling POLITICO that he
would not speak about the matter.
“It doesn’t
matter what the anthem is about,” said Jean-Lin Lacapelle, a National Rally
lawmaker in the European Parliament. “It’s about what [Youssoupha] represents:
he is a symbol of the anti-France, the contempt for France. At a time when
people are looking for values, for references, we need someone who loves
France.”
In an
example of how Macron is struggling to straddle both left- and right-wing
messaging in the run-up to the election, the government gave a mixed response.
“Youssoupha
is a popular rapper who campaigns against racism in France, who has beliefs and
who speaks to the youth,” said Sports Minister Roxana Maracineanu. “This song
promotes diversity. The diversity of our football team that gathers around one
shirt, one French flag, it’s magnificent and it corresponds to the values of
football.”
But Gabriel
Attal, the government’s spokesperson, refused to comment on the choice of song,
while the junior minister in charge of citizenship, Marlène Schiappa, condemned
the insults against Le Pen.
Culture
wars on the pitch
The clash
is a resurgence of a fierce debate over the national football team and what it
says about French identity.
France’s
World Cup victory in 1998 was branded a success for diversity and a symbol of a
modern France, with a black-blanc-beur [black-white-Arab] team including
players from different backgrounds. No matter where you came from, you were
French and you were proud. It was a poster-boy moment for French universalism,
with differences of class and origin transcended by victory and team spirit.
But France
has struggled to recapture that spirit ever since.
“The
perception of diversity in the national team is indexed in how France feels
about itself,” said Kssis-Martov. “In 1998, France discovered the children of
immigration thanks to football and [then France midfielder] Zinedine Zidane
embodied that positive feeling. But it flipped as soon as there were problems.”
In 2010,
the relationship hit rock bottom when the French players went on strike in
South Africa over a clash with a coach. Many in France saw the incident as
proof the team was a collection of spoilt millionaires, no longer proud of
their country.
According
to Kssis-Martov, managers of the French team have since tightly controlled the
image of the players and sought to snuff out any controversies. But with the
political debate in France dominated by the right and issues of immigration and
the fight against criminality, tensions around what the French football team
represents are unlikely to go away.
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