Opinion piece published in Marianne on July 26, 2024

David Lappartient, president of the French National Olympic and Sports Committee (CNOSF), and Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, Minister of Sports and the Olympic Games, reacted to the case of French athlete Sounkamba Sylla, selected for the athletics team, who was prohibited from wearing her headscarf for the opening ceremony and the competitions. " We are completely aligned between the State and the CNOSF ," asserted the former head of world cycling. " The French Olympic team is fulfilling a public service mission. It is bound by secularism. This may not be understandable in other countries, but it is part of our DNA here in France. This secularism allows us to respect everyone's beliefs, and of course, it allows everyone, outside of official representation, to be free to live as they wish within the bounds of the law. " He added: " We hope that all athletes will be able to participate in the opening ceremony. "

This is precisely what will happen, as she will ultimately be able to participate without a headscarf, but wearing a cap. It is in this context that the NGO Amnesty International, in a report published on July 16th, accuses France of " racial discrimination based on sex " due to its refusal to allow its female athletes to wear the hijab at the Olympics. This approach must be acknowledged as demonstrating a certain degree of ignorance or bad faith, curiously echoed by many media outlets in France. What lies behind the misleading appearances of this accusation?

This report claims that we are the only country in the world to impose this neutrality. We might be entirely justified, but this assertion is false. Rule 50.2 of the Olympic Charter, which applies to all participating countries, clearly states that " no kind of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda is permitted in any Olympic venue, site or other location ." It is true that this rule was waived starting in 1996 when, at the Atlanta Games, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) yielded to the Islamic Republic of Iran by allowing its first veiled athlete. However, the rule remains in effect and was even reiterated recently in a guide published by the IOC. This neutrality is in the spirit of the Olympic truce, as seen by the ancient Greeks, the identity disputes that cause disagreements and even wars must fade away to make room for the only motto that matters, that of the modern Olympics, " faster, higher, stronger – together ".

Amnesty International's accusation of discrimination against France stems from the NGO's prioritization of difference over equality, contrary to the principles of our Republic. We are the country that, due to the numerous popular revolutions it has witnessed (1789, 1830, 1848, 1871, 1936, etc.), saw the " law of numbers "—the people—become the source of political power, creating citizens equal beyond their particularities, bearers of the common good. This is how France became the nation it is today. It is worth recalling that, in the modern sense of the term, "nation" signifies the freedom for the people to exercise state power by establishing themselves as a sovereign political body, hence the concept of the "nation-state."

The State has become secular, that is to say separated from religions, to guarantee this fundamental political principle, which does not exist anywhere else at this level. Equality is also the principle of the unitary State which results from it, which guarantees the existence of the same law for all, a great achievement of the French Revolution, and not each person's rights according to their difference.

It is the idea of ​​natural human rights, as stated in the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, which means that, because of belonging to the human species, it is considered that everyone from birth should benefit from the same rights. It also guarantees freedom of convictions, including religious ones (art. 10), as long as this does not come into conflict with the freedom of others, because rights are also duties.

An equality that has asserted itself regardless of origin, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation… And there is nothing more contrary to this principle than the logic of community separation to which ostentatious religious symbols insinuate themselves everywhere lead. This is the characteristic of other democracies, organized in the mode of multiculturalism with its corollary, communitarianism, which alienates the individual to a logic of clientelist interests, privatizing his freedoms and rights. Let us not talk about those countries where religion is in the State, where freedoms are sometimes restricted to the point of oppression.

But also, it is this principle of equality that has pushed our republic in the direction of real equality to make it a social republic, with the conquest of social rights like there are nowhere else either, from Social Security to the Labor Code. It is this sense of the general interest that we find in French-style public services, also unique in the world, which are part of the principle of secularism, of which the sports federations in question are part. This was recalled by the Council of State in its decision concerning the hijab women whose request to wear the veil during football matches was rejected. In defending secularism, let us not forget that we are defending these social rights.

The Republic was the result of the break with an old unequal order justified by religion, it was born from this break between a law said and imposed in the name of the divine, to a law made by men for men, in the name of all. It is a source of pride, because our history is that of a society that has been able to move away from the supervision of religions, which does not take anything away from the freedom to believe or not, by protecting by secular laws the freedom of the citizen, which is found above all in the equality of rights, of human rights.

It is on these latter that there is still progress to be made in the cause, by building a body of values ​​and principles raised above particularisms, to guarantee each person their freedom. The question of the fight against discrimination must not import the acceptance of all differences in the name of the diversity of cultures, behind which many misfortunes occur, but a fight in the service of more equality and thus, of universalism, more unity, of protection, defining a humanism that can light the way towards a world of peace and happiness for all. This is the meaning of the Olympic Games which bring the world together around very beautiful values. France as a "secular and social Republic" is never anything but at the forefront of this movement.