Overview
- Footage published on Dec. 8 by the weekly Public shows France’s first lady backstage at Paris’s Folies Bergère using the slur while speaking with Ary Abittan after activists disrupted his show.
- The presidency’s office said the remark targeted the activists’ “radical methods” and was intended to reassure the comedian rather than denounce their cause.
- Politicians and public figures condemned the language, with François Hollande, Greens leader Marine Tondelier and National Assembly President Yaël Braun-Pivet among those calling it inappropriate, and no formal apology reported.
- Activists seized on the term as a rallying cry under the hashtag #salesconnes, with figures such as Judith Godrèche and Camélia Jordana voicing support and merchandise appearing on #NousToutes’ site.
- The dispute stems from protests against Abittan, whose 2021 rape investigation was dropped in 2024 and upheld on appeal in 2025, and at least one feminist group, Les Tricoteuses hystériques, says it plans to sue Brigitte Macron.