Photos of Macron boxing raise eyebrows in France
after he comes out swinging against Putin
President sparks social media buzz as users ask
whether he is getting ready to take on Vladimir Putin after images posted to
Instagram
Helen
Livingstone
Thu 21 Mar
2024 04.38 GMT
The release
of official photos showing Emmanuel Macron hitting a punching bag have been met
with a mixture of praise and consternation in France.
The photos
of the French president, posted on Instagram on Tuesday by his official
photographer, Soazig de la Moissonnière, are coloured in moody black and
white, and show the president with teeth gritted and biceps bulging as he works
out.
Social
media users soon began comparing him to Rocky Balboa, while others questioned
the timing of the pictures, coming as Macron has called on Europe to ramp up
its response to Russia’s war on Ukraine. Some said the photos showed him
getting ready to take on President Vladimir Putin, himself no stranger to
photoshoots designed to show off his sporting prowess.
Women’s
magazine Femme Actuelle described the photos more flatteringly, writing that
they showed “Brigitte Macron’s husband” with “a determined look, as if he wants
to do battle with his opponent … He seems to hit so hard that his biceps pop
out from under his black T-shirt.”
Other
commentators voiced dismay at the images. French Greens MP Sandrine Rousseau
reposted one of the photos with the comment, “What a defeat for progressivism.
And what poverty of political communication.”
Writing in
the centre-left Libération newspaper, Jonathan Bouchet-Petersen said the photos
were a “rather dismaying communication choice” and said it would have been
preferable if the photo really were the product of a cheeky social media user
as he had initially assumed.
Éric
Anceau, a history professor at the University of Lorraine, wrote on X that the
photos were “part of the neo-populist virility that certain leaders are fond of
today, starting with the master of the genre (until now) Vladimir Putin”.
Putin has
previously been photographed fishing, shooting and riding bare-chested, playing
ice hockey, vanquishing his opponents at judo and riding in tanks and
submarines.
Macron has
also previously raised eyebrows with a picture of him lounging on a sofa with
his unbuttoned shirt revealing a hairy chest during his 2022 election campaign.
Brigitte
Macron revealed last year in an interview with Paris Match that the president
boxes twice a week and he has previously posed with boxing gloves to promote
exercise ahead of the Paris Olympics.
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