The Rape Trial That Could Change France - WSJ [View all]

A trial that has shocked France took a dramatic turn this week. Gisèle Pélicot, 71, has accused her former husband of 50 years of drugging and raping her and recruiting strangers online to sexually assault her while she was unconscious in their bedroom. On Oct. 23 she arrived at the Avignon courthouse, to the cheers of supporters, and took the stand for the first time since her deposition in September.

“I’ve been told that I’m brave. But it’s not bravery,” she declared. “It’s having the will and determination to change society.”

By coming forward and insisting on a public trial, Gisèle Pélicot has forced a national reckoning over sexual violence in France. Since the proceedings began last month, thousands of people have taken to the streets chanting “We Are All Gisèle” in protest against “rape culture.” Artists have painted murals of Pélicot and tagged walls with the phrases “Don’t Put Me to Sleep” and “Death to Patriarchy.” Public intellectuals and elected officials have published editorials and petitions and more than 200 men have proposed a “road map” to put an end to “masculine domination.”

Dominique Pélicot, a 71-year-old retiree living in the village of Mazan, has pleaded guilty to inviting seemingly ordinary men to sexually violate his heavily sedated wife for nearly a decade. Police identified over 80 suspects but found and charged only 50 of them, all filmed and photographed by Pélicot himself.

These men, ages 26 to 74, come from diverse backgrounds, but most are gainfully employed, and many are married with children. As locals have noted, they represent a sample of French society. They are your next-door neighbor, your “Monsieur Tout-Le-Monde,” your average Joe.

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