Avignon rape trial: “Shame must change camp”

The Avignon rape trial received worldwide attention. The victim, Gisèle Pélicot, has become a symbolic figure of the women’s movement. And France experienced a debate about “rape culture.”

It’s a ritual like a manifesto: in the morning, when Gisèle Pélicot enters the courthouse, applause erupts. Almost every day, dozens, sometimes a hundred people wait for the petite woman with chin-length reddish-brown hair to applaud her and her struggle, to express sympathy and to add a sign as they wanted to say: “This concerns us all. “”

Many express the hope that this process will have a lasting impact. He has had a lot of attention for a long time.

A surprising demand at the start of the process

The victim took care of this himself. It was Gisèle Pélicot who, quite unexpectedly, demanded at the beginning of the trial that the trial should take place in public. What had previously been covered under “Sex & Crime” in the Miscellaneous section and handled with pointed fingers by, of all people, the serious media, became a trial that received worldwide attention, with press representatives traveling from countries such as the USA, Spain and India.

Suddenly this was no longer the trial of 51 men who could bet that their heinous acts would remain within the four walls of the isolated courtroom, reports Adèle Bossard, who was already involved in the case as a regional correspondent for Radio France Hardly anyone was interested in this crime: “Suddenly this was the trial of a woman who became a feminist icon within just a few weeks.”

Against the exclusion of the public

Gisèle Pélicots Likeness as graffiti has been shared and printed thousands of times. Her demand that “shame must change camp” is becoming the battle cry of feminist women. There were solidarity marches.

And Gisèle Pélicot took another outrageous step: When the presiding judge decided to only show the video and photo recordings of the rapes behind closed doors, Gisèle Pélicot and their lawyers object.

Public pressure increases until the judge reverses his stance. For around a week, the recordings have been shown in the courtroom whenever defense lawyers and prosecutors request this as evidence.

A case “for society as a whole”

While the defendants invariably look away as soon as the dim sequences appear on the screen, society could no longer turn a blind eye, says Madame Pélicot’s lawyer, Antoine Camus.

You have to watch these videos with your eyes open. “On the one hand, to assess the crimes and, on the other hand, to make this case a case for society as a whole.” That’s exactly what’s happening right now. “In this respect, Gisèle Pélicot has already won her battle,” explains Camus.

“Voyeurism?” – “Reality!”

One of his opponents is Nadia El Bouroumi. The defense attorney for two defendants criticized: “Showing these videos over and over again is voyeurism.” In the next room, where the audience is watching the trial, there are no additional explanations. This is very brutal.

That’s just the reality, contradicts her, of all people, Beatrice Zavarro, the defense attorney for the main defendant, Dominique Pélicot. She defends the journalists who report from the courtroom against attacks: “This is not voyeurism by the media. Because this is about someone who filmed everything he did. Voyeurism is also at the core of this case.”

But is it appropriate to write a live ticker from the courtroom, as the public radio station France Info does again and again? Regional correspondent Adèle Bossard thinks: Yes, the live ticker is followed by many people and achieves exactly what Gisèle Pélicot wanted, namely “that the public can experience this process”.

The limits of what is bearable

In this way, disturbing statements and excuses from the defendants find their way directly into the public eye. A multiple perpetrator in the glass box explains: “It was just a game, I just wanted to make the Pélicot couple happy.”

Gisèle leaves Pélicot, shocked and shocked for the first time ever in this process. Until then, she had listened to the defendant’s incredibly outward statements.

Only two meters away from them, she has to endure the physical proximity of her tormentors in the narrow courtroom. She remains seated while the videos and photos are shown and does not allow any of the defendants to make direct eye contact. Every time one of them tries to apologize to Madame Pélicot, she pointedly looks away. With this courageous attitude, she has become a hero for many French women.

Now fundamental questions are asked

The trial has raised some really big questions in France: feminists and lawyers are speaking out in the feature pages and discussion groups. It’s about toxic masculinity, whether the definition of rape needs to be rewritten and explicit consent to sexual activity needs to be included in legislation.

So far it has stated that rape must always be assumed if the sexual act was induced “by force, under duress, through threats or by surprise”.

Gisèle Pélicot’s lawyer Camus and other lawyers warn: Making consent the yardstick could be a trap. Because then everything depends on the behavior of the victim and no longer on the behavior of the perpetrator.

Not a “monster”, but “Mr. Everyman”

The question remains what contribution men can make to this debate. Blandine Deverlanges from the feminist group Amazons of Avignon is in the courtroom almost every day. She hopes that this trial will open society’s eyes to the fact that the defendants, as she says, are not monsters, but simply men, “Mr. Everyman.”

She calls it the “banality of the perpetrators.” How could it actually be, she asks: “That Mr. Pélicot managed to recruit dozens of men within a radius of ten to 20 kilometers around this small village of Mazan in the south who were ready to rape his wife?”

The answer is obvious: “Every woman in France is surrounded by potential rapists who would be prepared to take action if they were sure that they would not be discovered.” Deverlanges and her colleagues demand an end to “culture of rape”, with the “culture du viol”.

The silence of politics

Politicians are currently noticeably silent. Only the new Minister of Justice spoke out in one short sentence in favor of including consent to sexual acts in the relevant legal paragraph.

Gisèle Pélicot takes these debate contributions very seriously, assures her lawyer. Inside she is in ruins, he adds.

But on the outside she seems strong. Even when she leaves the courtroom in the evening after hours of negotiations, her head is held high. Again there is applause, again the crowd pays her respect. Gisèle Pélicot thanks those waiting. “In the name of all women,” as she says.