Social roles and standing

The twenty-third entry is la base militante, and the adjective in it is one of the most misleading words a French newspaper prints. Un militant is simply an active member of a party, a union or a cause: somebody who pays the subscription, turns up at branch meetings, knocks on doors before an election and sets out the chairs for the count. Un militant associatif gives his evenings to a charity, une militante écologiste campaigns for the environment, and militer is to be involved in any of it. The words are neutral and often warm; a party thanks ses militants on election night. English « militant » kept the harder edge of the soldier inside the Latin miles. It describes someone combative in pursuit of a cause, and in news reports it has come to mean an armed fighter. So la base militante is not « the militant base » but « the grass roots », « the rank and file », « the ordinary members », and des militants ont manifesté describes activists at a march, not a band of gunmen. Translating the word as it looks turns every volunteer with a clipboard into a threat.