‘Working till we drop’: why women are on the front line of French pension protests
As the march against Emmanuel Macron’s pension reforms made its way along the Grands Boulevards north of Paris on Thursday, a group of women began singing and dancing in the dense crowd.
Above the sound of police sirens, protestor chants and the clatter of tear gas grenades, the music was familiar; the words were not. A female activist group calling itself Les Rosies – after Rosie the Riveter, the feminist icon of working women – had rewritten the 1990s hit Freed from Desire by the Italian singer Gala with French lyrics.
“Women on Fire! The government is failing Women on Fire! We’re in the fight. NaNaNa NaNa Na Na … stop your blah blah,” they sang.
France’s new law progressively raising the official retirement age to 64, and increasing the contributions necessary for a full pension, has sparked angry protests, strikes, blockades and violence across France for weeks. And French women are on the front line.
Female workers, especially those in poorly paid and part-time jobs, say they will bear the brunt of the legislation and will now have to work even longer than their male colleagues for lower pensions.
“If you’re a woman in France, you should be out on the streets protesting,” said Fabienne Oudart, 56, an artist who joined Thursday’s march in Paris. “Already we earn less than men and that means lower pensions. This reform shows no respect for those women working in low-paid and often part-time jobs.”
Pierrette Gobinot, 49, who is retraining as an auxiliary nurse, agreed. “Putting the retirement age up to 64 is doubly penalising for us. Even these days many women stop work to look after our children, which means we have interrupted careers and are often missing five or six years of contributions. We have to work even longer to
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