Madams prime minister,
The work that threatens the Pêche d’Or-Bergerie islet in the popular district of Malassis in Bagnolet (Seine-Saint-Denis) is imminent. Without a quick intervention on your part, it will be too late in a few days to save this place so important for the neighborhood and in particular for us, women and mothers of this neighborhood.
At a time when guaranteeing a fair and safe place for women in the public space is finally emerging as a major issue, it would be absurd to destroy a public place frequented mainly by women of all ages, mothers, childminders . A place they love.
Indeed, as women and mothers, we find in the Malassi sheepfold a haven of peace and security open to all. For eleven years that meetings, concerts, various festivities have brought joy and conviviality to our neighborhood, we have never had to deplore inappropriate, sexist behavior or sexual assault – yet so frequent in most festive gatherings. For reasons that it would be good to give sociologists time to clarify, this place is « safe ».
Nooks, cabins, goats and hens
For our children, who grow up reluctantly in the concrete and all-digital, it’s a magical place to meet nature and the living. The floor of flowers and tall grass is the most beautiful activity mat for babies. Here, those who breastfeed do so without embarrassment or fear: the place offers everyone the possibility of settling in as they wish, without the injunction to hide which reigns in the majority of public spaces in our country.
We relearned the simple gesture of picking raspberries and rosehip berries sparingly for our children. The latter play together with delight, finding poetic and mixed playgrounds in the nooks and shacks of the place. The space is made in such a way that it is necessarily shared and cannot be confiscated by a ball game – which elsewhere very often relegates the girls to the margins of the playgrounds.
Goats and chickens amaze them tirelessly. Here, screens don’t exist: we don’t even think about them. In the fight led for eleven years under the aegis of the Sors de Terre association to defend this place and in the active support of the Malassis sheepfold, it is therefore no coincidence that we count a large majority of women. Alongside the shepherd, who is the voice and the face of the sheepfold for the general public, it is women who allow this place to exist.
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