This article references sexual assault and rape.
Dominique Pélicot has been found guilty and jailed for 20 years after drugging and recruiting strangers to rape his ex-wife, Gisèle Pélicot, who has since become an emblem of courage and hope for survivors around the world.
All 51 defendants at the trial have been found guilty of their respective charges, with 47 found guilty of rape, two guilty of attempted rape and two guilty of sexual assault.
Here, Terri White shares how Gisèle Pélicot's bravery is changing the way society responds to rape and sexual abuse.
Feminist Andrea Dworkin once wrote of women who had survived violence and abuse, women just like her: “No matter how often these stories are told, with whatever clarity or eloquence, bitterness or sorrow, they might as well have been whispered in wind or written in sand: they disappear, as if they were nothing.”
Until Gisèle Pélicot, I thought that Andrea Dworkin was dead right. And, well… wasn’t she? Generation after generation of women and girls spat out their stories in rage, quietly recited them in shame, and yet no words seemed to halt the march of sexual violence. It didn’t just continue, it flourished. Our word, it turned out, was good for nothing.
And then came the extraordinary events in a French courtroom. And as the true depths of the 71-year-old grandmother’s mass drug-rapes were exposed to the entire world – at her own insistence – amongst the devastation, fury and despair, I felt the beginnings of… hope.
This time, her story wasn’t kept in a corner of her world, stuffed into the furthest reaches of her soul. This time, revulsion and anger swept the world, and a mirror was held up to the rape culture every woman suffers under. And this time, it seems – god, I hope – that her story will remain, and it will be something. And it won’t just mean something, it will change something.
I’ve been thinking back to all the stories I’ve heard, read, and told, in my own life so far. The one I shared just after turning five years old, of the nights my mum’s husband put his penis in my mouth; those printed in the hardcore pornographic magazines my next childhood abuser used; the one voiced in questions from a teenage acquaintance who was unsure if her boyfriend was allowed to be that rough; those printed in newspapers alongside the words “not guilty” and “her word against his”.
Whether women rose collectively, or individually; whether they showed their face or spoke with a different name; whether their stories were about strangers, colleagues, friends, husbands, fathers, those who’d never met us or who said they loved us while assaulting us with hate – none seemed to truly… stick.
Instead, the stories were so often torn apart, prodded and poked, retold with the victim as the villain, the villain the victim. Otherwise, they were ignored and dismissed, not heard at all. The tears and the blood scrubbed away, while we swallowed down the shame. The upshot was always the same: nothing changed.
“The protests all over France showed that Gisèle is not alone. Every victim deserves to have that support.”
But as Gisèle’s story unfolded, it didn’t sound like the ones we’re used to hearing, like one that could so easily be erased. Her husband admitted to regularly, routinely drugging her and then inviting men to violate her. Fifty were identified – 33 weren't – and now stand trial for rape and sexual assault (some accept their guilt, many don’t, claiming confusion around consent or not knowing she was unconscious). Gisèle Pélicot was in her own home. And each incident was video-taped, burnt onto film as a moving-image record of what was done to her body.
Maybe it’s this which has made the truth undeniable. The fact that the ‘isolated incident, just one man, just one woman’, argument dissolves when you’re faced with 83 men in a small corner of the world allegedly raping one woman because… they could.
And while even Gisèle, when she testified, faced questions on her own behaviour, what she was wearing, she dismissed them, treating them with the disdain they deserved. That they always deserve. And then she went one better – she decided much of how her story would be told and who would hear it, refusing to surrender the narrative to the men who always, always make a grab for it.
She sacrificed her own right to anonymity, her privacy, and demanded that the trial was held in public, in front of the media (who were shown videos of her assaults). A necessary “shock wave”, said her lawyer, so that the world would know the true horror of rape.
And now we know. All of us, not just women (many of whom knew already, let’s be honest), but men, too – who really must reckon with it. We know that it’s a gratuitously violent act often committed in the place we’re meant to be safest, our home. By men we love. And not by monsters, but by the most ordinary of men: a nurse, a local councillor, a plumber, a journalist, a butcher. All capable of the most monstrous of acts.
We now know that these men claim not to understand consent, or simply don’t care about it. That they believe women to be the property of men, who exist to be used by men. They think that we are, ultimately, less than human. Flesh and blood and bones assembled in the shape of a woman for their pleasure and their violence.
The truth is truly a nightmare, but one we must face to begin to understand why so many men commit acts of sexual violence. And isn’t this what we owe Gisele, in solidarity, after she sacrificed so much of herself – the cost incalculable – so she could shine a light on it?
And while a global conversation about about misogyny, sexual violence and consent continues (including a radically simple take on shame: “it must change sides”) there are also signs that the law may change – with the case prompting calls for French law to include consent (prosecutors currently have to prove intent to rape rather than partner consenting).
Gisèle Pélicot has made her own desire for change clear, saying: “It’s true that I hear lots of women and men say you’re very brave. I say, it’s not bravery, it’s will and determination to change society.” Her story is a hero's story. I hope, I believe, it’ll be one written and ink and carved into rock. It’s up to the rest of us to make it stick.
GLAMOUR is campaigning for the government to introduce an Image-Based Abuse Bill in partnership with Jodie Campaigns, the End Violence Against Women Coalition, Not Your Porn, and Professor Clare McGlynn.
For more information about reporting and recovering from rape and sexual abuse, you can contact Rape Crisis on 0808 500 2222.
If you have been sexually assaulted, you can find your nearest Sexual Assault Referral Centre here. You can also find support at your local GP, voluntary organisations such as Rape Crisis, Women's Aid, and Victim Support, and you can report it to the police (if you choose) here.
The resources and helplines you need to know.
