As those who follow the news know, Frederic Mitterand's vehement support of Roman "Child-rapist" Polanski seems to have been motivated by more than just his admiration for the latter's movies. It seems Mitterand too has a thing for hot young bodies (male in his case) and, in his autobiography, appeared to claim that he'd done a Gary Glitter in the boy brothels of Bangkok. At least that's pretty much how everyone interpreted the key section of the book once their attention was drawn to it.
However Mitterand seems to have managed to weasel his way to a denial on TV last night which I think I can translate and simplify as follows: "those cute little hairless thai rent-boys aren't actually 12 but they look like it so it's only virtual pedophilia and it's not fair to punish someone for not actually raping real little boys."
Of course he didn't say that but it seems to be the only way to square the sections of the book where he talks (thanks Charles Bremner) about "Garçons" (boys) and "Gosses" (kids). As Mr Bremner also says the book is pretty much dynamite and in most other countries would dash anyone's hopes for high office even if you didn't notice the apparent (longing for) masses of Man Boy sex. But in France he got a pass from the elites because all the really rotten things seem to have taken place a long time ago outside France. Hence no one really batted an eyelid when Sarko appointed him as minister for arty farty businessculure. Indeed one suspects his book was one of those that many people bought thanks to the reviews praising its literary quality etc. but few actually read hence they didn't really know what bad things he'd claimed to have got up to.
But that was before he started defending Pedo Polanski. At that point someone recalled the Thai sections of the book and pointed out the "conflict of interest". Given that the French public opinion has been heavily against Polanski once people were told what he'd actually done, it should not have been too surprising to find people wondering why Mitterand would say of Polanski:"To see him like that, thrown to the lions because of ancient history, really doesn't make any sense". Mind you this has been a crisis where the French MSM has done the NY Slimes trick and ignored public opinion until it was forced to pay attention.
Part of the reason for the delicate way that the French establishment is handling this affair is that the original accuser was Marine Le Pen, the heir apparent of her father as leader of the right-wing xenophobic Front National. But I think that this is a very dangerous tack to take. The FN have faded recently as a force because Sarko borrowed many of their less racist and more reasonable positions/policies, however, just as the BNP has benefited from ZANU Labour ignoring the feelings of the (non-)working classes, so the FN could well capitalise on the UMP's apparent happiness to have a minister who has fantasized about, if not performed, sex with young boys. If at the next election the FN can claim to be the only party resolutely against pedophilia they'll win votes.
Blog Home : October 2009 : Permalink