The 50 rapists who could be any man

[Shouldnellly]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/dec/19/who-are-the-men-convicted-over-rape-and-assault-of-gisele-pelicot-

sickening to read of the normality of these men. From a tiny region. Everywhere

It makes my blood boil to hear these men trotted out excuses around being abused when they were younger. I was abused by my parents, but have never once so much as felt the urge to abuse or hurt others. I turned my shame and anger inwards and nearly destroyed my own life in my teens and 20's, as well as tolerating abusive behaviour from others. I then sought help and committed years to healing myself and breaking that cycle.

You take accountability for your actions in life as a grown up. Whatever you have been through in life there is zero excuse for this, and zero mitigation.

More broadly, I have had conversations with men about rape before, and feel like they just don't get how utterly traumatising rape is. (Let alone this decade of horror Madame Pelicot went through). They think it's like having sex when it's inconvenient, or when you don't really feel like it. They don't see it as a violation.

Also, I have never understood how rape is used as a weapon in war- and now a man can get aroused when he is angry or scared etc, eg the awful examples of child soldiers being forced to rape their families at gunpoint, men raping in anger. Some of Pelicot's recruits said they were scared of him. And yet they still managed to rape her. Women need to feel relaxed and safe to feel aroused, and yet men get a hard on in the most awful on circumstances. It makes me sick.

There's also no effort now, like on dating sites
It's all
"Send me a pic"
"WYU2?"
Or graphic language about how they want to see you/fuck you within 3 sentences

Example
"Hi" (from him)
"Hello, how are you doing?"
"In bed just touching myself"

I mean COME ON. The bar is so fucking low
As if we are just there and that's all having a girlfriend/wife is about
Even the 50-60yo men on dating sites are exactly the same

They never ask about going for a drink let alone a date because they aren't fussed about conversation, it's all appearances and sex

I've given up. By the time you've ruled out cocklodgers, immature men, ones who are abusive, ones who are actually dangerous (rape etc) and the ones who are just after sex you're left with.. well fuck all

I imagine at least another third would do nothing to stop it either

This. I think one of the big differences between men and women is the proportion of men who have a paraphilia and how important it is to them.

I actually don’t think it’s helpful to approach this issue through the simplistic ‘it could be any man’ narrative. The fact is that the vast majority of men have not and would not engage in crimes of this nature.

Given statistics show 1 in 4 women have experienced rape or sexual assault after the age of 16, and these assaults are happening at the hands of men “it could by any man” is a fair enough message in terms of safety. My DD needs to know where her boundaries are and how to recognise someone stepping over them because it could be any man.

These men were members of the community, not wearing flashing “I’m a rapist” signs and their stories tell of other women they’ve abused and subjugated.

Absolutely we need to invest in supports and therapies for children raised in abusive homes but let’s not pretend that will stop men harming women if they have a mind to do so. No it’s not all men but it’s enough.

Bizarrely, I don’t think the fantasy of shagging a sleeping woman is a mainstream porn genre? I know this due to a recent foray into Pornhub to educate myself on what teens had access to.🤐There are some seriously shady genres including step family 🤮 and bukkake 🤮🤮. I definitely that porn overconsumption and casual acceptance of the sheer depravity of what’s available in the mainstream is desensitising some men to what decency is.

It definitely is, or was a few years ago when I had cause to look into such things. Absolutely awful stuff!

The vast majority of sexual assaults are carried out by individuals known to the victim though, so the ‘it could be any man’ message isn’t particularly helpful. It’s much more likely to be an uncle than a random man on the street.

After this, I think we all have to acknowledge that at least some of them may be.

I doubt many adult women are being raped by their uncle. Men know to them so partners, ex partners, friends of friends, people they meet on online dating, colleagues, etc etc.

Apparently. ‘consent’ isn’t part if the rape definition in France (but that may change).

”French law currently defines rape as “any act of sexual penetration of any kind whatsoever, or any oral-genital act committed … by violence, coercion, threat, or surprise.”
“Without the intention to commit it, there is no rape,” lawyer Guillaume de Palma, who is defending six of the accused, argued in court. “In France, proof of intent is required.”

I think culturally differences do come into play here. The BBC New reporter said that he'd asked members of the public what they thought on the case and some commented that it was hyperbolic. I don't think that would be the reaction in Britain but there are varying degrees of opinions depending on what country you are from.

I had the 1pm Radio 4 news on yesterday and there was an extended news article on about this awful case and dh got up and stormed out at the exact point a particular book title was mentioned (Men Who Hate Women). I later went upstairs to find him fiddling around with some diy he was doing and he said that he'd had to leave because it was "depressing and unpleasant". "At least you're never on the receiving end of such unpleasantness!" I said.

Men are so callous and self absorbed. They haven't got a clue and simply don't care. The only reason they'd be angry if their wife or daughter was raped is because they'd take it as an affront to their pathetic masculinity.

This is NOT an attack on Giselle, but I think it's worth noting that her initial response to the idea that he was up skirting young women was that she was shocked, but would forgive him.

Culturally, that was seen as acceptable to her - but how many men's "low grade" sexual offences are minimised, rather than rightfully treated as a warning sign of wider sexual offences?

I know that this was the crime that led to the whole thing being uncovered, but did the police search the house/pc/phone due to the upskirting incident? Was it the first time he had (been caught) doing that?

It makes me worried because we see so many examples of abuse today and that's potentially creating a new generation of people prepared to rape

you mistyped ‘people’ when you meant men @Whyherewego

Bizarrely, I don’t think the fantasy of shagging a sleeping woman is a mainstream porn genre? I know this due to a recent foray into Pornhub to educate myself on what teens had access to

@redalex261 you wouldn’t ever see it on legitimate porn sites as sex without consent is illegal so they don’t host such videos. However, you will find it on many many non mainstream porn sites. Also on pornhub there are lots of videos where women are woken up by random men (inc step father/ brother) and then enthusiastically engage in sex with them.

While Charlie Hebdo isn’t probably most mumsnetters magazine of choice it was appalling how their contribution to the situation was to publicly humiliate Giselle through ridicule and consequently the belittling of her pain and the actions of the men involved.

I wonder how many women were involved in that - from concept to commission to the cartoonist to the editor to the approval….

I think so.

No, he was fined €100 for an upskirting incident in Paris in 2010. I believe that he never told his wife about this.

More broadly, I have had conversations with men about rape before, and feel like they just don't get how utterly traumatising rape is. (Let alone this decade of horror Madame Pelicot went through). They think it's like having sex when it's inconvenient, or when you don't really feel like it. They don't see it as a violation.

This is a huge problem. Men think of rape as sex. So the one third of men who said they would rape if there were no consequences, and then the percentage goes up if it's put in more euphemistic language, they seem to think they get to have sex, not that they are raping. Possibly don't see it as a big deal if someone has been raped, like that mayor who said it would be worse if she was dead or if she had been a child. Obviously he thinks it's not OK to rape children, or possibly thinks it's not OK to have sex with children.

I wonder how many men think rape is a woman having sex when she didn't really feel like it but did anyway? I wonder how many of them only think it's rape if it's a stranger who assaults a woman out jogging or breaks into her home or whatever. In other words, if it doesn't come with violence or overt coercion, it's not rape. If the woman didn't try to fight the man off, it's not rape.

How many of us have had sex at times when we weren't the instigator and weren't pushed about having sex, particularly when we were young? Remember the whole lie back and think of England, mothers telling their daughters it's something to be endured in a marriage, all that kind of stuff? It's not that long ago since rape was not possible in a marriage, under the law. Enthusiastic consent needs to be taught to both sexes. I was reading something in the past few years, maybe here, about teen girls agreeing to anal sex when they didn't really want to. I remember in mixed company when I was in my 20s, so 20 odd years ago, one of the younger men saying how he had had anal sex with his girlfriend by stopping during vaginal sex and just penetrating her anally. I remember being hugely uncomfortable but I didn't immediately think 'rape'...

Again, with prostitution, women are agreeing to sex they don't really want. Now I see all prostitution as rape, but I am sure men don't.

I consider it terrorism as well. It has a socio-political goal, which is to control women through fear. Violence against any demographic in the service of a socio-political agenda is terrorism.

Yes, it's popular. The story of how I came to find that out is too sickening to tell.

For years I’ve been saying this. They walk among us indeed. I’d actually bet my life savings on the fact that 90% of rapists don’t actually think what they’re doing is rape, and that a similarly high percentage of men in general would commit rape and sexual assault given the chance, without thinking they’re doing anything wrong. It literally could be any man. Yes, including our fathers, brothers, boyfriends. The amount of women who post on here saying they awoke to find their husband having sex with them, having started when they were asleep. I know several women that’s happened to IRL too, many by their partners. It’s rape. But many women normalise it too unfortunately. I really don’t know how we turn this around as a society. Massive reeducation is required.

It's not a small area though. Avignon is within that distance and there are half a million people in Avignon.

I don't know what the the other areas surrounding Mazan have exactly but a cursory look suggests many many towns with populations between 3000-10000. So it wouldn't be hard to assume maybe 100k or more.
So a population of 600,000-750,000 ish is quite likely to have way more than 100 depraved men. They were recruited via a depraved website so it wasn't some random selection of men

@Fireworknight

French law currently defines rape as “any act of sexual penetration of any kind whatsoever, or any oral-genital act committed … by violence, coercion, threat, or surprise.”
“Without the intention to commit it, there is no rape,” lawyer Guillaume de Palma, who is defending six of the accused, argued in court. “In France, proof of intent is required.

Surely 'surprise' covers any sexual contact that wasn't consensual. Surprise is a weird word to use but I'm assuming there is a slight translation issue. But surprise suggests anything not expected by the victim even if it doesn't involve violence, threat or coercion. Like for Mdm Pelicot.