50 people stood trial, accused of raping the motionless body of Gisèle Pélicot while her husband recorded their actions for his video library. The unprecedented mass rape case revealed the actual image of a rapist, according to AP News.
A trial in France shows how pornography, sex chat rooms and men’s disdain for consent are fuelling rape culture. French society was disturbed not by the fact that her husband Dominique Pélicot orchestrated the mass rape, but that he had no difficulty finding dozens of men who agreed to engage in unlawful sexual acts.
One of the rapists, a married plumber with three children and five grandchildren, said he was not particularly bothered that the woman was not moving when he visited the Pélicot family home in the town of Mazan in 2019. He stated that it reminded him of adult videos, featuring women “pretending to be asleep and don’t react,” he watched.
Many of the other defendants told the court that they could not have imagined Dominique Pélicot drugging his wife and that they were told she was a willing participant acting out a perverted fantasy. However, the husband denied the accusation, claiming that his co-defendants was aware of the situation.
Pornography flourishing
Céline Piques, a spokesperson of the feminist group Osez le Féminisme!, or Dare Feminism! stated that many of the men under investigation were perverted by pornography. Although some websites started fighting search terms such as “unconscious,” hundreds of such videos could still be found online, Piques stressed.
Last year, French authorities registered 114,000 victims of sexual violence, including more than 25,000 reported rapes. However, experts argue that most rape cases go unreported due to a lack of tangible evidence. Many women do not press charges, with most dropping cases before investigations start.
The Pélicot case was unique in the French judicial system. After a shop security guard caught Dominique Pélicot making videos of unsuspecting women’s skirts in 2020, police searched his home and found thousands of pornographic photos and videos. The main defendant later revealed that he had recorded and stored the sexual encounters of each of his guests and organised them neatly in separate files.
France thrilled world community
Gisèle Pélicot, who is in her early 70s, did not know she had been raped. She chose to stay in the courtroom while the videos were shown. Unable to watch, she closed her eyes, stared at the floor or buried her face in her hands.
Sexual assault experts say the unwillingness or inability of the accused to confess to rape reveals the taboos and stereotypes that persist in French society. Magali Lafourcade, a judge and general secretary of the National Consultative Commission of Human Rights, did not attend the trial but said popular culture had given people a wrong idea of what rapists looked like and how they acted.
It’s the idea of a hooded man with a knife whom you don’t know and is waiting for you in a place that is not a private place.
Two-thirds of rapes occurred in private homes, with the vast majority of victims knowing their rapists, Lafourcade emphasised. She drew attention to the frightening reality that the Pélicot case “makes us realise that in fact rapists could be anyone.”
For once, they’re not monsters – they’re not serial killers on the margin of society. They are men who resemble those we love. In this sense, there is something revolutionary.
