France Mass Rape Trial Triggers Soul-Searching In Spain

France's notorious mass rape trial has generated an enormous echo in Spain, a pioneer in the fight against gender-based violence, and highlighted the often overlooked scourge of domestic sexual violence.

A French court is expected to give its verdict this week in the case of Dominique Pelicot, 72, who has admitted drugging his then wife Gisele Pelicot, also 72, for almost a decade so he and dozens of strangers he recruited online could rape her.

"This affair has had an important resonance in Spain, because here there is great sensitivity to the theme of violence against women," Marina Subirats, a sociologist and former director of the Women's Institute, a government body, told AFP.

Spanish politicians have pursued successive laws to address gender-based violence since 1997, when 60-year-old Ana Orantes was beaten, thrown over a balcony and burned to death by her ex-husband days after discussing his violent behaviour on television.

The gang rape of a teenager at the 2016 San Fermin bull-running festival in Pamplona and the forced kiss by disgraced former football federation chief Luis Rubiales on star player Jenni Hermoso have intensified pressure on the government to act.

Spain passed Europe's first law specifically aimed at gender-based violence in 2004, and in 2022 it reformed the criminal code to define all non-consensual sex as rape.

"Unfortunately, I think that if these horrific cases don't happen, societies won't wake up," said Monica Ricou, a law professor at the Open University of Catalonia who specialises in gender issues.

By insisting the hearings be held in public, Gisele Pelicot has become a feminist icon at home and abroad in women's fight against sexual abuse.

Portraits depicting her distinctive short bob and round sunglasses were seen at a demonstration in Madrid in November to mark the international day for the elimination of violence against women, as has happened in other cities around the world.

Spanish daily newspaper El Mundo's correspondent in France, Raquel Villaecija, said Gisele Pelicot "has succeeded in making women who have been sexually assaulted or raped, the victims, a little less ashamed".

'Hidden violence'

The trial in France has lifted the veil on another form of gender-based violence, which takes place at home, said Isabel Valdes, a journalist with top-selling daily Spanish newspaper El Pais who focuses on gender issues.

"We understand violence in the street, we understand sexual violence coming from power, but violence in the private domain of the home... that's the most hidden violence of all," she said.

The case prompted soul-searching for popular Spanish actor-turned-director Paco Leon, who apologised earlier this year for the light-hearted depiction in his 2016 comedy "Kiki, Love to Love" of a couple whose husband drugs his wife in order to have sex with her.

"Six, eight years ago, we didn't have, I didn't have, this sensitivity on the subject," he wrote in an Instagram post that sparked hundreds of comments in response.

"We all need to look in the mirror, because I believe that it's not just the monsters who drug women, but that we are all participating in this rape culture."

Valdes said the case "will indeed leave a mark because everything adds up".

"All the women who denounce, and all the cases we know about, is what ultimately gives viability to the movement to show what it means, what it implies, and how many women are affected by this sort of violence," she said.

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