It’s every woman’s worst nightmare.
In France, an ongoing trial is adding new fire to broader conversations around sexual assault, the abusive men who commit them, and the fellow men who protect the assailants. Dominique Pelicot, 71, stands accused of repeatedly drugging and raping his wife, Gisèle Pelicot – and encouraging a stomach-turning 72 other men to rape her. His daughter, 45-year-old Caroline Darian, fears she may have been her father’s victim as well.
In November 2020, police learned of the series of attacks on Gisèle Pelicot, also 71, while investigating Dominique Pelicot for taking upskirt photos of women at a supermarket near their Mazan home. In all, they found over 20,000 images in his possession depicting about 200 rapes that took place between 2011 and 2020. As she was unconscious during the assaults, she did not know about any of them prior to the discovery.
“I told [the police] … I was a one-man woman,” she recently testified. “I couldn’t bear any man’s hands on me other than my husband’s.”
She had grappled with health complications due to the attacks, but had no explanation for the weight, hair and memory loss she’d experienced for years prior to learning of her husband’s depravity – she’d attributed her symptoms to early-onset Alzheimer’s before learning the truth.
The assailants, meanwhile – some of whom, like Dominique Pelicot, admit to their guilt, and some who claimed to think it was a consensual game – are as young as 26 and as old as 74. Among them are military members, firefighters and journalists, vocations whose primary function is the protection of others. One of them was her own damn neighbor. “He came over to check our bikes. I used to see him at the bakery. He was always polite,” she recalled to the courtroom. “I had no idea he was coming to rape me.”
And, it’s worth noting also that Dominique Pelicot actually invited 83 men, in all, to violate his passed-out wife. Which means there were nine additional individuals who were given the opportunity, turned it down – and then, like the rest, told no one of the situation.
But there’s no hiding anymore. And the reason we know about all of this – most of the men’s names, and the details of their attacks – is because Gisèle Pelicot waved the offer of privacy, instead opting for public proceedings that would see her assailants tried not only in a court of law, but in a court of public opinion as well.
“I have had no sympathy from any of the accused,” she said on the stand, before adding that, despite appearances, she is gutted by all of this. “Inside me, it is a scene of devastation. The façade may look solid, but behind it…”
Why We Prefer the Bear
Earlier this year, a hypothetical debate gripped most every social media platform: Would women rather be trapped in a situation with a man, or a bear?
Women largely chose the bear – a strong and objectively fearsome creature that can weigh over 1,000 pounds, with claws that can be up to 4 inches long. Why would that be our selection? In one TikTok video, user “dontceceme” compiled some explanatory comments. “If I survive the bear attack, I won’t have to see the bear at family reunions,” read one. Added another: “The worst thing the bear can do is kill me.”
See, at least with the bear, we know what we’re in for. Its danger, its lethality, isn’t hidden behind soft skin, trimmed nails, heroic professions or a network of scumbags willing to stay silent. The bear likely won’t violently attack the female bears in its life, the way about 80% of human men do to the women around them.
When we pass you on the street, or work with you, or spend social time with you… when we flirt with you, or go on a date with you… when we make love to you, bare our bodies and minds and hearts to you… when we commit to you, marry you, perhaps even bear your children and work with you to raise them…
There is a part of us that must always wonder: Are you one of the ones who will harm us, rape us or kill us? Are you one of the ones who will keep your brothers’ secrets as we are harmed, raped or killed? Have you done all of this already?
The painful truth is that we can’t truly know. Gisèle Pelicot sure as hell didn’t know, and she had been married to her husband for nearly half a century. Fifty years of parenting, and shopping lists, and inside jokes, and Sunday mornings. Nearly 10 years of which, it turns out, she spent being brutally raped by her husband and a small cavalry of monsters, without her knowledge and certainly without her consent.
And as frustrating as this all may be for men to hear – imagine how that makes the world feel for the women around you. Those of you who do not mean us harm need to join in crying out against the men who do. You need to honor us, and honor the trust we elect to place in you despite growing up in a world that cautions us, through countless examples, not to do so. It is, truly, the least you can do.
Or, perhaps you can go find a bear and take your chances instead. The way we do with you daily. ◼️
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