Posted on 01/13/2013 9:48:15 AM PST by Mrs. Don-o
The leading figure in France’s anti-gay marriage movement, which hopes to get 200,000 demonstrators out on Sunday to protest the proposed “marriage for all” law, is an unlikely firebrand for the Catholic and right-wing dominated campaign.
The French anti-gay marriage movement has an unlikely figurehead in the form of a reactionary comedienne who goes by the moniker “Frigide Barjot”.
The name – which translates as Frigid Loony – is a play on the name of Brigitte Bardot, the French actress better-known as a symbol of the 60s sexual revolution.
Barjot – real name, Virginie Tellene – is a born-again Catholic whose background belies her role as spokesperson for a movement that has bought a medley of conservative, far-right and Christian groups together to protest the Socialist government’s plans to allow same-sex couples to marry and access to fertility treatment.
Barjot and her supporters hope to get 200,000 out on the streets on Sunday for a France-wide demonstration against the Socialist government’s proposed “marriage for all” law.
Taking up the bizarre pen-name in the 80s as part of comedy and satire collective “Jalons”, Barjot became a household name for organising stunts poking fun at venerable French institutions.
Jalons’ debut “happening” was a protest against the cold during the freezing winter of 1984 at the aptly-named Paris metro station Glacière [meaning “freezer”], ironically blaming the French head of state for the weather conditions with the slogan: “Ice is a killer; Mitterrand its accomplice”.
Since then she has made her name as both a stand-up comedienne and as a satirical writer.
Barjot refuses to be branded homophobic, citing her life-long attachment to her first boyfriend, who turned out to be gay, and “25 years working in gay nightclubs”.
“I do not deny gay love and I’ve got nothing against gay culture,” she told right-leaning daily Le Figaro for a portrait published on Friday. “But I cannot condone the introduction of a new type of marriage into France’s civil code.”
Barjot, who has described herself as “Jesus’ press officer”, says she was “struck in the heart” during a music concert at Notre Dame Cathedral in 1987 and has been an ardent Catholic ever since.
Since then she has been an increasingly active defender of the Catholic Church and its values.
In 2009 she set up the “hands off my Pope” movement in defence of Pope Benedict XI amid the scandal of former English bishop Richard Williamson, whose excommunication was lifted despite refusing to renounce views that “Jews are the enemy of Christ.”
According to the Figaro, Sunday’s anti-gay marriage outing will “write her into the history book of the French Catholic movement” – or not, if the event turns out to be a damp squib: "In an era when the church has not one single charismatic character to represent it, she will become either the ephemeral media image of this movement, or Saint Frigid.”
Rough Translation from Barjot's (French) Wiki site:
Virginia Tellenne, born Virginia Merle, known under the pseudonym Frigide Barjot (“Frigid Loony”, pun on "Brigitte Bardot"), is a French comedienne and columnist, born September 25, 1962 in Boulogne-Billancourt.
Virginia Tellene is the wife of Basile de Koch, with whom she wrote speeches for former Interior Minister Charles Pasqua. She co-leads the group "Milestones" with him .
May 12, 2011, she published her autobiography Confessions of a Connected Cathode, which recounts her conversion and learning the faith.
After an appearance on television (2003) on “Everybody’s Talking About It” she got involved in television shows such as "We Tried Everything", "This is My Choice", and "We Have Ways to Make You Talk" (on Teva). On 27 May 2012, she created the "Collective for Sustainable Humanity" to oppose gay marriage, abortion, euthanasia and the increasingly readical appliation of French “secularism.”
In 2009, she defended Pope Benedict XVI in the media about the various controversies concerning the Lefebvrists, the pope's teachings on condoms and AIDS, or his trip to to the Holy Land. She handed the pope in April 2009, a manifesto of support containing 32,000 signatures through the website "Don’t Touch My Pope".
She was the lead singer in The Dead Pompidou's.
She is the author of several books: "I Educate My Parents," "I Raise My Husband," and "The Survival Manual for the Modern Woman." (Presses de la Renaissance), "Confessions of a Connected Cathode" (Plon, 2011 (ISBN 978-2-259-21307-3).
In November 2012, she co-organized demonstrations against same-sex marriage and adoption.
Her "Don’t Touch My Sex", against "gay marriage", will be published by Mordicus. (2013).
Heh.
Divine assistance comes ever so often from unusual sources, unusual places. God be with Tellene, and with us all. Thank you very much for the ping!
We need to import this from France!
Catholic ping!
I wonder how long her career will last now.
bumpus ad summum
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