Barbara you haven’t lost anything.
They say that blood is stronger than water, but it is values that bind people together.
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You can choose your Friends,
You’re ‘stuck with’ Your family 
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I don’t know any people who vote National Front in the UK, but as about 25% of my commune regularly do I must know people who vote Front National here. Based on that I would say older, rural, basic secondary education, xenophobic, anti brown and black foreigners in particular even though there are none in the commune.
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Family gone!
My so called brother
is history ………I just can not talk about him as I feel ill to remember how he is.
Long story.
@anon7138442. Weren’t you in France last year for the elections? FN in France ended up as the second largest slice of vote on the second round with 34%. So yes, particularly if you live in a rural area or a white working class area many of your daily contacts and neighbours will be voting FN.
Can can look up exactly how many people in your commune voted FN here
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one of my friends voted NF and I I believe that he did this because he knew no better.
His life has not been the easiest and he is very much a macho man with his shiny car andhis
passion for heavy metal. But I like him and can see that he is not as dark in his thoughts as others I
have come across. If he likes someone…….then he likes them and nothing will stop that.
morning @JaneJones I was in France last year, and most years, but as a tourist, I don’t know that much about French politics apart from the basics. I know of Macron and his new party and I’m familiar with the Presidential elections in terms of the rounds system. I am at the point where I’m considering staying for longer periods. My French language skills are poor so I don’t really hear (eavesdrop on) what people are saying when there, which is a shame. I’ll have a look at your link above.
I suppose what I was saying was that in normal circumstances people’s political views are invisible and they have common behaviours evidenced day to day.
It’s normally when there’s a gathering which encourages conversation, chuck in some drink and maybe a news item where people make their perspective known - this is when the fighting starts 
Hope that you do not mind me answering.
Not sure if the French fight so much about politics really.
My French friend and I know that we think differently but that does not
put upa barrier between us…his wife has different views to him too.
Macron is really not doing so bad for France!
We’ve sat through 3 French general elections in our Salle des Fêtes… and things have slightly changed each time…
First time, we sat listening as each voting slip was read out… everyone sat rigid/alert in their seats…and when the FN candidate was read out you could almost hear folk catch their breath… but no-one budged an inch. FN did not get sufficient votes to go forward.
Second time… again everyone alert and listening… and when the FN name was read out folk visibly turned their heads, trying to figure out who had voted… but again, insufficient votes.
Third time… FN got even many, many votes in the first round, enabling them to go into the second round… yet no-one bothered to react as the FN name was read out… 
BUT in the second round… FN got thoroughly trounced… phew 
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We tend to discuss politics quite a lot, but we don’t necessarily talk in the same way about them to foreigners.
That makes general sense to me, but I wonder - is that a matter of national loyalty, or because a good political conversation might be too nuanced for a foreigner to follow or understand, or both or neither, something else?
I ask because I have a growing sense of the many small but significant differences in our cultures, and am curious to find out a bit more. And, apart from gardening and the chickens, I sometimes get a bit stale 
I’m not sure that fight is the appropriate word. When I spend time with my French relations politics is a fairly normal topic of conversation but differences are discussed or debated, it never becomes a battle.
Debate is fine and it happens on here. Most of the time we are polite to each other. Of course
our views vary!
But recently I discovered that a friend of mine was a far right supporter and enjoyed getting together with his buddlies with sick jokes and humiliating pics and remarks aimed mainly at Muslim women. They then begun to be humiliating towards me suggesting that I was a heavy drinker and that I was a terrible person!
He knows very well that I am almost Tea total.
I have stopped communicating with him and he has taken off all the inflamitry pics and conversation full knowing that it was improper.
He was a friend and sadly this is over.
Am I being over sensitive?
Cousin, brother, friend. You’re certainly getting through them all lately.
Chris is they are far right extreemists then I find it hard to have a
relationship with such a person.
Are you suggesting that it is me?
Should I be like them, perhaps?
Barbara, I didn’t realize they are far right extremists. I just thought to reply and remark to the effect that you are cutting off people close to you. I do not think it is you and I too could not maintain a relationship with such a person. I apologize if I’ve given you that impression.
My brother was sacked from the his job because he sent text of a racially stringent manner to
a superior officer at work and this was not the first time he had done this. He suffered with depression…Yes but so many of us do at some point in our lives, He is unemployable.
He has denied me access to my parents death certficates which are needed if I wanted to become French…so to speak…they needed translating.
The rest of my friends are fairly normal and they are all coming to see me in a few weeks time.
Hello Barbara
If you need copies of any official UK certificates then use this site. Saves having to be in touch with any disagreable family members. Yes, we all do have some of those !
Good luck
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Ok, I understand. Hope you have a lovely time with your friends. You can get certified copies of the certificates which are acceptable in France
I think it is a question of how you debate, the tone and style and content of a lot of animated but perfectly cordial French conversations would make British people highly socially uncomfortable and have them either trying to change the subject or getting angry and having a fight.
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