The biggest gathering was near the Eiffel Tower in Paris and was closely watched by a large deployment of police.
In addition to representatives of the media, others included members of the “Yellow Vest” and “Extinction Rebellion” movements, along with individuals waving flags of the communist and green parties, and the FO trade union.
A banner deployed by the news agency Mediapart declared that “Democracy dies in obscurity”.
Late Friday, parliament approved an amended “comprehensive security” law which would criminalise the publication of images of on duty police officers with the intent of harming their “physical or psychological integrity”.
Protest against the global security law in Paris, Trocadéro, Saturday. Police is checking bags at the entry points, not attestations. pic.twitter.com/yXroT1oUJs
— Ingri Bergo (@ingribergo) November 21, 2020
In practice, the law would restrict the publication of photos or videos taken of police officers' faces while in action.
In many cases an officer's face would have to be blurred.
Journalist unions say it could give police a green light to prevent them from doing their work and potentially documenting abuses by security forces.
An amendment clarifies that press freedom should in no way be hindered by the proposed measures.
French media are also concerned about potential rights abuse via the use of drones to watch demonstrations and facial recognition programmes linked to surveillance cameras.
French police have been taken to task in recent years for alleged brutality meted out to protesters and criminal suspects, especially those from black, Arab or other minorities.
Just have to pause one sec to acknowledge that Paris always seems to know how to throw a good protest. #PPLSecuriteGlobale pic.twitter.com/bON8SPX4EP
— Ingri Bergo (@ingribergo) November 21, 2020
In the northern city of Lille, around 1,000 demonstrators turned out, one of whom carried an English-language sign that said “Orwell was right” in a reference to the dystopian novel “1984”.
Others marched in the Brittany city of Rennes and in Montpellier on the Mediterranean coast, where some chanted: “Put down your arms and we'll put down our telephones.”
Article 24 of the draft law foresees a one-year prison term and a 45,000-euro fine for spreading images that show officers faces or allow them to be identified when such images harm their “physical or psychological integrity”.
Social media campaigns that expose individual officers are targets of the proposed legislation.
Police say they risk great personal threat in the line of duty, and dozens have been injured in clashes with protesters in recent years.
An attack on a police station outside Paris last month by dozens of people armed with fireworks and steel bars spurred the government into taking measures.
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I can think of no more certain way for the French Government to anger freedom-loving Americans against spending tourist dollars in France. Make no mistake: Online campaigns to inform would-be visitors to France that they are supporting suppression of free speech and freedom of the press are going to explode in the faces of French legislators who are knowingly empowering police brutality. There will be a price to pay in hard cash!
And who decides what photo-adjacent comments are “intended to harm…the physical or psychological integrity” of the police? This right-wing 38-year-old Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin? And what the hell is “psychological integrity”? What does that even MEAN?? The Académie Française should convene to spell that out, and I would like to film them tripping over THEIR psychological integrity!! What a farce this is going to be except for the French citizens who are clubbed, beaten, kicked and arrested for speaking truth to power.