A few days earlier, the mayor of Mazan had issued a gentler version of the same argument, in a public statement that described Gis\u00e8le Pelicot’s years-long ordeal as “a private matter\u2026 that has nothing to do with us”.<\/p>\n
One can well understand Mayor Louis Bonnet’s desire to protect his town’s reputation and its tourism industry. But it seems worth noting that a year earlier, he’d made headlines across France after he’d told me, twice, in an interview, that he wanted to “play down” the seriousness of Gis\u00e8le Pelicot’s ordeals because “no-one was killed”, and no children were involved.<\/p>\n
It is also worth noting that almost all the women we did speak to in Mazan last week did not share the mayor’s desire to see the Pelicot case as, primarily, something to “move beyond”.<\/p>\n
Smoking a cigarette in a shaded doorway not far from the church, a 33-year-old civil servant, who gave her name as Aur\u00e9lie, spoke with undisguised bitterness.<\/p>\n
“No-one talks about it anymore, even here in Mazan. It’s as if it never happened. I know someone experiencing domestic violence right now. But women hide it. They’re afraid of the men who do these things,” she said, adding that she was “certain” that more of Gis\u00e8le Pelicot’s rapists remained undetected, and at large, in the neighbourhood.<\/p>\n
Walking nearby past a couple of sunbathing cats, Aurore Baralier, 68, was equally keen to talk, but took a different view of the Pelicot case.<\/p>\n
“The world is evolving. France is evolving.” With Madame Pelicot’s help? “Yes. It’s been a boost, for women to speak freely,” she told me, emphatically.<\/p>\n
Across France, there is no doubt that the publicity generated by Gis\u00e8le Pelicot’s globally broadcast determination that “shame should change sides” – from victim to rapist \u2013 has provided added momentum to a campaign against sexual violence already energised by the MeToo movement.<\/p>\n
“I would say changing behaviour is something that takes generations. [But] the Pelicot case sparked a huge, historic mobilisation\u2026 against sexual violence, and against impunity,” said Alyssa Ahrabare, who co-ordinates a network of 50 feminist organisations in France. “We’re focused on training professionals, supporting victims, on investigations.”<\/p>\n
“Yes, France has changed. The [number of] complaints of rapes has tripled, showing that victims \u2013 women and girls \u2013 they speak up and they want justice,” agreed C\u00e9line Piques, spokesperson for the NGO “Dare to be feminist”.<\/p>\n
And yet, the energy and optimism that engulfed Gis\u00e8le Pelicot last December, as she emerged from the Avignon courthouse and into a scrum of supporters, have not led to many substantive changes to the way the French state tackles the issue of sexual violence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A few days earlier, the mayor of Mazan had issued a gentler version of the same argument, in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":181033,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-181032","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181032","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=181032"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181032\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/181033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=181032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=181032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=181032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}