Macron reveals new French Paradox

At a time when social media has broken down most barriers, standing on ceremony is rare. From presidents and rock stars to sports personalities and actors, we know everything about them — both true and untrue — so affixing honorifics to their names seems quite redundant.

Only in India do public personalities appear being addressed by honorary or official titles, or at least an honorific suffix such as ‘ji’, ‘babu’, ‘bhai’, ‘amma’ and more.

But France’s youthful and, therefore, presumably more ‘with it’ president has demonstrated that Indian politicians are not the only ones to stand on dignity when Emmanuel Macron smartly pulled up a cheeky teen who addressed a question to him using the diminutive ‘Manu’. Selfiesare comme il faut, nicknames are “Non, non, non!”


However, given that every aspect of his life as ‘President de la Republique’ has been discussed threadbare — including his recent dinnerware extravagance — it is not unlikely that the general public would feel on nickname terms with their leader.

Workplaces are increasingly doing away with hierarchies in conversation; even ‘sir’ is used less frequently except in pro forma official letters and bureaucratic circles. The western lexicon should develop equivalents of Indian honorifics that can be affixed to first and surnames alike, to please both leaders and the public.