They line up in front of a courthouse in southeastern France, from morning to evening, and have gathered in the thousands in cities across the country. They hold signs reading, “one rape every six minutes,” “not all men but always a man,” and “giving in is not consenting.”
They chant: “Rapist we see you, victim we believe you.”
Women across France are rallying in support of Gisèle Pelicot, a 72-year-old reluctant icon whose husband is on trial in the city of Avignon for systematically drugging her and inviting dozens of men, 50 of whom are now his co-defendants, into their home to rape her over nearly a decade.
The shocking case has sparked what many women in France call a long-overdue reckoning over “rape culture” and systemic sexism in the way the judicial system handles sexual violence.
I think I would have more sympathy with those focusing on the “not all men but always a man” sign if this weren’t in the context of a woman being drugged by her husband and then said husband inviting about 50 random men to rape her, over 10 years.
One of the worst times to advocate for men’s rights/issues is when everyone is talking about the heinous crimes a bunch of men have done. Especially if the comments you’re leaving are focusing on how women rape just as much as men do, etc.
One of the worst times to advocate for men’s rights/issues is when everyone is talking about the heinous crimes a bunch of men have done. Especially if the comments you’re leaving are focusing on how women rape just as much as men do, etc.
Agreed. Unfortunately there’s always gonna be a whataboutism as long as men feel unheard…
People can lose empathy when they think the world is ignoring them. It’s taken me years to move on from people telling me to “man up” or “get over it” about my SA.
I really hope that at some point male victims of sexual assault will work to create a movement of support. It’s not ok that y’all get told to man up, and it’s not ok that y’all are often used as a way to shut down discussions of sexual violence against women.
My mom molested me when I was a child. Not always a man, and fuck that bitch for trying to pretend it’s so.
She was likely raped (by a male, perhaps her father?) much like you were by your mother. It’s very callous to refer to her as a bitch because a sign. Women aren’t attending these protests because they find them fun. They are victims like you.
It’s just exactly like the people who saw “black lives matter” and thought they meant only black lives matter. They see the sign saying “not all men but always men” and ignored the first part and focused on the second part. Then proceeded to ignore the actual subject of the article (you know, the woman who was continually raped without her knowledge or consent for over 10 years by 50 or possibly more men and the fact that the defense is arguing that “maybe she secretly knew and liked it”). And are completely focused on being outraged by the sign.
This would only be correct or even make sense if you didn’t get triggered by a sign that read always a woman.
Funny how you jump into assumptions and justifications for her without knowing a thing about her other than her gender and the signpost she has, yet wag your finger at another victim for having a reaction to a message invalidating a ton of rape victims, and also lumping them in the same group as their abuser, as if it was an inherent, genderlocked flaw.
If you don’t see that as a double standard, then you should really read my last paragraph again and reevaluate your biases.
I think you might have some biases of your own. You are accusing me of the very thing you are guilty of too. Maybe we can at least agree its awful to be raped by people?
Did you like, Just get unbanned or something? Coming back after two months to revive old threads, with accusations of people being biased.
Being raped is beyond horrible, clearly, no matter the gender relationship. Going to an anti-rape protest with a sign invalidating rape victims is fucked up too.
And, Where am I guilty of what you are doing? Where am I making excuses for rape apologists and sexists statements?
No I was never banned. I am not chronically online. I don’t use an app for this website. I sign in on a browser, coming back every couple months, and might look at and respond to my messages if I feel like it. That’s not that abnormal. And I don’t take it as an insult that you seem think it is? Very odd. Sorry you are offended. I hope you have a good morning or evening depending what part of the planet you are currently on.
So if I make a sign that says “not all women but always a woman” because so far, both times I’ve been raped are by women, there wouldn’t be an uproar about how it’s sexist and excludes woman victims of male abusers?
Why should I be cast aside, lumped in with the “always a man” crowd as an abuser, while the women who abused me are lauded as victims? Why not just care about all victims of abuse? Why do we say “well you’re only 4% so you don’t matter” or “sit down and shut up we’re not talking about you” whenever male victims just want to be fucking included in the conversation and not forgotten about for once, and by the group that should be recognizing us as compatriots in our trauma at that?
She doesn’t have to put us down to make herself feel better and we’re rightfully angry that it happened again.
Hi, you didn’t read a word I said. I sympathize with male rape victims. This article is not about them though.
Ok I was always abused by multiple women, time to make a sign thay says always a woman
Please feel free too. I’m very sorry that happened to you, I know how it feels to be victimized in that way.
Its a shame an obviously inflammatory sign and clickbait seeking article image has made it so that the discussion is mostly off topic.
Its insane and the whole evil piece of shit that perpetrated his kink of having multiple people raped by omission and literal drugging and rape gets away from conversations by the obvious bullshit of absolutes is insane to me. how about no victim blaming on either side and recognition that rape is awful abuse of power dynamics that occur whenever its viewed as possible.
But also this post should probably be removed because that sign is meant to cause this kinda of angry response and it leads into a lot of hurt victims and happily ignorant people hand waving it away.
There were multiple people raped by omision?
Told that it was the wife’s kink to pretend to be asleep and that consent was given earlier to be passed on since they would be roleplaying as soon as they got in the bedroom…
Fuck that’s fucked up, typing out.If stealthing is rape by altered consent then this certainly falls somewhere in that spectrum too.
reportedly saying he received a message on coco.gg reading, “I am indeed his wife, and I agree to welcome you.” [Source]
Edit for a quote but yeah I mean this is a huge deal and full of insane testimony that should be the basis of this discussion.
Basically threesomes where 1 of the participants have not been given a chance to fully consent and 1 was given none. Because of 1 guy who enjoyed the power he felt.
The men didn’t care about the woman’s consent. They just wanted to fuck so they accepted whatever was said. They’re victims of their own bad judgment.
imagine taking this story, about where a woman was systematically drugged and raped for OVER 10 YEARS, and going “ah yes but what about the men?!?”. I truly feel for the men in the comments sharing their stories, and I hope they continue to share and raise awareness, but Jesus y’all not the time
Yeah exactly. I’m a man who was assaulted as a kid by a woman. Shit happens. But looking at what shit happens most often - it’s sexual violence perpetrated by men against women.
I don’t know how we change that. Maybe by continuing to level up the power dynamic between men and women, I feel like we’ve been making some progress with that over the past century. Finally. But it’s more than that, there are too many idiot arseholes who think they can have anything their fists can beat down. Almost all of them are men.
Pretty much every girlfriend and female friend I’ve ever had has had bad experiences with men. Women I have cared about over the years have had experiences across the spectrum from cat calling and comments back when they were kids in school uniforms all the way through to stranger rape. Domestic violence isn’t uncommon either.
I dunno, I wish I had a solution. It fuckin breaks my heart - when a close friend or a partner opens up about what happened to her and there’s nothing you can do, it’s years too late, you have these thoughts like if I’d been there I could have stopped it- but it happened years ago and you are fuckin helpless to do anything except maybe hug her if she’s comfortable with that, or if not try to tell her it’s over, she’s safe and stronger now, whatever you think might help.
You don’t realise how harmful sexual assault is until you’ve been unable to help someone you love. The key word isn’t ‘sexual’, it’s ‘assault’.
Shit like that makes me fuckin ashamed to be a bloke. I don’t know how we fix this, but I’ve got two suggestions for a good start - firstly, we don’t do that shit. Never, there’s never an excuse. Secondly, we fuckin shut down other guys, even if they’re our mates, if they start with that sort of talk.
Yeah, there’s wrong uns in whatever gender. But in terms of atrocity it’s us men well in the lead. We gotta change that. I think we can at least fuckin try.
thanks for being one of the reasonable ones in this comment section lol. and it seems you’re doing a pretty good job of trying to enact change. keep it up, it’s a team effort :)
sorry to hear about your story as well, hope everything is going well for you now.
Cheers, yeah I’ve kinda grown into my own shit. It’s caused me a lot of problems over the years, but I’m getting old now and I’m okay with stuff.
I’m just saying that anyone can get hurt like that, but it’s mostly women getting hurt and it’s mostly men doing the hurting. We’ve got to fuckin stop doing that because it is profoundly wrong.
Lol does it feel good that they literally called you “one of the good ones?”
Personally I think that’s pretty wild, imagine saying that to a black person lol. I’d frankly be upset by that
if I were youwait I am upset about it lol, look at me being one of those uppity men again.They said reasonable ones, not good ones. Those words have two different meanings. Don’t put words in their mouth.
Mmhmm, and if I told my friend (who is black, important note) that I like him because he’s one of “the reasonable ones,” that would be tooootally normal and not racist at all right? Right?
Ooooooooooooooooooookaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay
