Paris (AFP)
A petition launched on Tuesday, entitled "Let's put the job of hostess in events!", Had collected Friday more than 20,000 signatures, a few weeks after a first text signed by 37,000 people against the presence of hostesses on the podium of the Tour de France.
"Alice", the initiator of the petition, who is also the creator of the Twitter account #PasTaPotiche, believes in this text sometimes have, in his job, "the impression of passing in the eyes of others for a green plant, it is degrading and I do not feel useful in my work ".
Denouncing, in addition to the sexism present in this business, discrimination in hiring (on age, measurements, skin color), the young woman who prefers to remain anonymous assures the AFP want to "meet the Minister of Labor ", Muriel Pénicaud, to ask him" a plan of action ".
At the end of July, at the height of the Tour de France, feminist activists had launched a petition demanding the end of the "sexist tradition" which resides in the presence of hostesses on the podiums of the cycling event. It has so far collected 37,000 signatures.
It was after this first petition that Alice launched the Twitter account #PasTaPotiche on July 27, gathering testimonials from hostesses, anonymous or with an open face.
"Mobilizing on social networks allows us to discuss, to know each other," says Alice, while her job, often done alone, is not conducive to the gathering. Moreover, "it is enough that one complains so that our agency does not remember us any more," she assures, thus justifying her anonymity.
Alice, however, denies wanting to "ban the hostess job": "I sometimes do very useful tasks on a daily basis, but others are perfectly useless". She asks Muriel Pénicaud to "put an end to the sexism inherent in this profession".
© 2019 AFP