Liberty Belle

France's new libertarian youth leader

Matt Welch from the October 2003 issue

(Page 2 of 2)

"Most of the young people in France think that nice people should be left-wing," Herold says, "since we've all been to the same kind of schools, which are state schools, and then in the media there's only one way of thinking."

Those who have been busy these last months calling her countrymen "weasels" are surely familiar with the notion that the top-down French society tends to produce monochromatic views at odds with the White House. Herold, who considers herself a strong patriot, bristles at the tension, but lays much of the blame on the French government's anti-war policies and the broad-based anti-Yankee sentiment behind it.

"I think one of the big problems in France is that we are anti-American without knowing why," she says. "It's just kind of a natural thing. I mean so many people I meet are anti-war, and they'll just say that Bush is stupid and the Americans are awful imperialists. It's just their typical answer, and they never think of why. That's crazy. I think it's because we're all being brought up like that, especially at school. It's incredible how we're taught about America -- they're always explaining, for example in geography or history courses, how Americans are imperialistic."

If Herold sometimes sounds rigid (example: "I think people should not talk about politics on stupid TV shows"), consider that she's only 22, that she's saying much of this with a chuckle, and that this is her first go-round with intense media coverage. (She describes one of Fleet Street's profiles of her as "not very good reporting...because there are many things I didn't say, or didn't say in that way, or [that were] just out of context.")

Rigidity is one thing, but being blasé about having the Communist Party as a major player in the ruling government coalition (as it was until last year), or having a cultural establishment dominated by unrepentant former Maoists, is quite another.

What's next? Herold plans two years of business school, followed by a job in the private sector, maybe some more travel, and then who knows? In the meantime, there are rumors of more strikes in the fall, which is when we should find out whether Herold and the Liberté, J'Ecris Ton Nom movement are the beginning of a lasting anti-strike revolt -- and the vanguard of a libertarian youth movement in France.