Politicians used to jog in parks to show off their health and fitness, but now martial arts such as boxing have taken over, with France's Emmanuel Macron recently donning gloves.
The 46-year-old president was seen hitting a punching bag with his forearms bulging in an image posted on Wednesday to the Instagram account of official photographer Soisig de la Moissonnière.
“(Macron) is a technocrat who is challenging the populist style of trying to deal with (Russian President) Vladimir Putin on his own turf,” said political communications expert Philippe Moreau-Chevrolet. Ta.
AFP did not reprint Macron's photo because it does not use handouts from the French presidential palace.
The images follow weeks of President Macron defending his comments that he would not rule out sending NATO troops to fight in Ukraine, which was invaded by Russian leaders more than two years ago.
Putin has tried to show off his athletic prowess with judo, boxing matches and, in 2009, his now-infamous shirtless horseback riding trip.
French voters are used to seeing conservative former president Nicolas Sarkozy wearing a jersey or riding a mountain bike, or 1970s leader Valéry Giscard d'Estaing playing on soccer fields or ski slopes. was.
Moreau-Chevrolet said that along with boxing, Macron had turned to sports that are “compatible with the exercise of state power”.
“It's a violent sport, but like politics, it has rules. It's also a very theatrical image of a hero who overcomes suffering, as was the case with Emmanuel Macron.”
～“Overcoming fear” ～
The French president is not the first Western leader to don the gloves.
Justin Trudeau's victory over a Conservative MP in a charity match in 2012 may have helped him claim the position of Prime Minister of Canada three years later.
Boxing has many followers in France's political class, with former Prime Minister Macron Edouard Philippe also a passionate fighter.
The sport taught him to “overcome the fear you feel in scary situations,” he said.
In France, conservative female politicians have also entered the ring, including Paris regional leader Valérie Pécresse and Rashida Dati, who currently serves as culture minister in the Macron government.
“Even though people may think it's a strange sport for women, it projects an image of being a fighter,” Pécresse told weekly magazine Le Point.
Some people across the political spectrum had an immediate allergic reaction to Macron's photo.
Sandrine Rousseau, a member of the Green Party, complained about “excessive norms of masculinity” in a post on It was the same word.
“What a pathetic form of government. What a failure of progressivism. What lazy political communication,” she added.
～Rapidly increasing numbers～
Switching to sports that require physical strength does not necessarily bring good results for politicians.
Britain's Boris Johnson, who has been photographed wearing red boxing gloves, slapped a 10-year-old Japanese rugby fan in the face while playing during a visit to Tokyo in 2015. I turned bright red.
However, the large number of fans among the people prevents the leaders from throwing in the towel.
In France, the National Boxing Federation had 60,000 members last year, more than double the number of members in 2021.
Boxing has also moved from a working-class sport once beloved by the French Communist Party to a more middle-class sport, with gyms popping up in wealthy cities like Paris.
Mixed martial arts (MMA), which combines kickboxing and wrestling, has also grown in popularity since it was legalized in France by Macron's government in 2020.
The first bout organized by the global organization Ultimate Fighting Championship will take place in 2022 and is currently broadcast regularly on the television channel RMC Sports.
MMA has tens of thousands of fighters and hundreds of clubs across France.
max/tgb/jh/gill
