François Hollande's Affair: Scandal Reveals a Changing France - by Simon Shuster

President Francois Hollande and Julie Gayet

The esteem reserved for the right to privacy in France is perhaps best expressed by an old French proverb: “In order to live happily, live hidden.” For generations, this was more than a cheeky excuse for the French to keep their dirty secrets. It was more like a national philosophy, part of a culture that elevated infidelity to an element of style. But in the Internet age, that philosophy has begun to seem a bit naïve, as national traditions of tact and good taste tend to get steamrolled these days by the universal laws of curiosity. France is no longer an exception.

On Friday, French President Francois Hollande learned that the hard way after a gossip magazine published evidence of his affair with a movie actress named Julie Gayet. The report went viral with all the merciless speed of the Web, making Hollande’s chest-thumping demands for privacy seem about as quaint as a Parisian organ grinder with a monkey on his shoulder.

Technically, though, French law was on his side. Legal restrictions on snooping in France are some of the harshest in the world, imposing major fines and even a possible jail term on newspaper editors who expose the private lives of citizens. As the scandal spread, Hollande invoked those laws on Friday by threatening to sue the French magazine Closer for invading his privacy. “A terrible mistake,” says Yair Cohen, a lawyer whose London-based firm, Cohen Davis Solicitors, specializes in stopping the viral spread of defamatory information.

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