In the midst of absolute horror and darkness, it can be really difficult to see any sort of glimmer, any hope or joy or humanity, such is the depravity of the situation.
On the face of it, the trial that’s sickened the world – the mass rape of Gisèle Pelicot – appears to offer little by way of redemption. It has showcased the monsters that walk among us; the wolves that sleep beside us in our own homes. That we can be betrayed and brutalised by those we like and respect and trust and love, in the very place we should feel the safest, is beyond terrifying.
This extreme case has shown how horror and normality can and do co-exist. How a seemingly peaceful and idyllic home – like that of Gisèle and her husband Dominique, who were together 38 years when the horror began, almost at retirement – can be the most dangerous place to live.
It’s proved that the depths of depravity can know no bounds and can spring from the recesses of fantasised perversion – from seemingly good, decent men – into reality. It has forced us to imagine the unimaginable, and then some. Forget your run-of-the-mill sexual violence that’s been normalised in mainstream pornography.
No, the details of the systematic drugging and mass rape of Gisèle – a trusting wife, a mother, a grandmother – by her own husband, who invited dozens of strangers to violate her unconscious body doesn’t even constitute horror.
In fact, I’d liken Dominique Pelicot’s videoed rapes of his wife to a snuff movie (where victims are typically lured to their murders). He may not have physically killed Gisèle, but at least 100 times, he and his ilk destroyed her.
It’s impossible to comprehend such an extreme breach of trust, denigration of emotion and complete disregard of the dignity and safety of any female – never mind a life-partner of almost four decades, the mother of your children, the person you’ve built a life with. It goes beyond shocking. It’s physically repugnant. I’ll admit – I forced myself to read the details of this trial, fighting a rising nausea all the while.
Perhaps most horrifying was how this lady found out about what was being done to her. A report by the BBC outlined how, in September 2020, Gisèle, who was struggling with ill health thanks to regular drugging and ‘rape mode’ ordeals at night at the hands of her monster husband, accompanied him to a police station after he was caught filming ‘under women’s clothes’ in a supermarket.
‘I will show you something you won’t like,’ the police chief warned her, before showing her a picture of a sexual act. At first, she didn’t recognise the two people. And then – the realisation came. The victim in the picture was her.
‘I told him to stop… Everything caved in, everything I built for 50 years,’ she told the court, as no fewer than 20,000 videos and photos emerged of her being raped by her husband and dozens of other men.
In such despicable darkness, the only sliver of hope was her. Gisèle Pelicot, who stepped from such sordidness into her beautiful strength.
Not only did she suffer the ordeal of sitting in that courtroom in Avignon every day, facing her multiple attackers for more than three gruelling months – she had the courage to ensure the rest of the world did too.
By removing the chokehold of silence camouflaging as protection for women who are successful in bringing sexual predators to court – which has served to perpetuate the stigma surrounding sexual violence for decades – Gisèle has helped to free us all.
And that’s why she did it – because, as were her first words following the conviction of her husband and 51 perpetrators – ‘we share the same fight’. She did it for her children, her grandchildren – shedding any shame or judgement, that was never hers to carry, and placing it where it should always have been – in the mauling hands of her attackers.
The world has watched this woman in awe; the removal of her sunglasses as the trial progressed sending the ultimate message. I am done hiding, shielding all this pain. Here I am – I have nothing to be ashamed of. Gisèle’s bravery has paved the way for so many others to step out of the shadows – and she’s in good company.
Just look at the Irish women who have ensured they are heard, who have brought gender-based violence out of the shadows into the public sphere. Stories of violence, incest, child abuse, marital rape, consent – the list is endless.
Kathleen Correia, Lisa O’Meara, Bláthnaid Raleigh, Kim Jordan, Nikella Holmes, Áine McHugh, Natasha O’Brien and Nikita Hand – they all fought the same fight that Gisèle fought – that, heartbreakingly, one in four of us fights. Their victim impact statements may be difficult to listen to. But we should hear them, be disgusted by them, and celebrate them.
For there have always been predators in our homes and on our streets. Up to now, nothing suggested that will ever change. But women speaking out and encouraging others to do so too?
That’s a momentous societal shift that could herald a different kind of future for our daughters. So to Gisèle – and our countless other heroines – I thank you.
