French man accused of drugging his wife and inviting men to rape her

Do you have a point here or is it just more personal abuse?

Another point about this constant "It's misandry!" whinge is that even if it were, the consequences for men are just not on the same level as what women put up with - even from men who claim to live them.

As I forget now who said, When a woman says "I hate men" she just goes ahead and lives her life, avoiding men to the best of her abilities. When a man says "I hate women", it often means he will shout and abuse random women in the street, if not far far worse - hurt, rape or kill them.

And yet men seem to think the two "hates" are mirror equivalents. They're not.

Well, you said "the detectives who unearthed this crime were men" - we don't know that, and they didn't exactly unearth it. It wasn't like they were going through cold case files or something.

First, we don't even know that the security guard was male. Probably, since most are, but that's all I know - and I've followed this pretty closely. And as I said, the security guard didn't actually detect the upskirting anyway, merely responded to women's complaints (I don't think that's been posted on here before so you may not have come across it, but I've seen it said explicitly elsewhere)

Second, you assume that the detective who pushed for further investigation was male. I don't know that, so I suppose neither do you, though I have read in today's testimony that the order of events was that when he was arrested for upskirting, a psychiatrist (who was male, TBF) was automatically brought in to speak to him, and it was this psychiatrist who was immediately convinced that Pelicot was doing a lot more than that. That's why it was taken further this time, contrary to the time 10 years before that when he was just fined and nothing more was done.

That, clearly is a mistake that our society needs to stop doing, dismissing or minimising "minor" sexual assaults like upskirting or flashing.

@RMCInfo L. Layet expert psychiatre explique avoir été mandaté dès la garde à vue de #Pelicot pour l’affaire de captation sous les jupes des clientes d’un supermarché il avait confié à l’officier de police judiciaire sa conviction que ce n’était pas une première #viols #Mazan @RMCInfo  

So, we have a psychiatrist who did his job well, and a procedure that had him called in automatically it seems. That's good too. I wonder what the procedure is in Ireland or the UK for someone caught upskirting women at the local Lidl?

No worries, I realise my own post sounded a bit harsh, and I didn't mean it to be.

I just think the idea that "men saved women from this" is kind of a weak - actually deeply ironic - argument really. It's a bit like claiming, as I've seen elsewhere, that if men all disappeared, women would have nobody to protect them from danger … ehh - what danger?? 😏

But it wasn't meant as a personal attack on you.

I forgot to mention this the other day, when the accused were all briefly allowed to speak on the first day:

A 55 year old male nurse who claims to be unaware that having sex with an unconscious woman might involve issues around consent?

Does anyone else think there's a risk that somebody might need to consider the possibility that some of his patients may have been abused too?

I'm not at all convinced that the 50 will all get long sentences. I suspect there are so many that it will be seen as enough to give Pélicot a longish sentence, and the others will vary but in practice I think many of them will probably escape a severe sentence. I posted up about a judge a few years back who got a suspended sentence for planning to have his 13 year old daughter drugged and raped.

So I fear that they will feel that if they make an example of Pelicot, that will be enough. Possibly also some of the worst of the others: the one who was HIV positive, and the one who used the method to drug his own wife, whom he and Pelicot then raped about 10 times. Maybe a few others.

In comparison, the bog-standard ones will probably get off lightly. I hope I'm being unduly pessimistic.

Maybe women will riot in the streets if they do? Or is that just my misandry again? 😏

Perhaps you haven't understood the point made by the lawyer. I certainly can't understand how what you've just posted relates to the point made.

All (or nearly all) of the 50 men being accused are from the local area. That's what the defence lawyer is saying. I don't know how mabny times you need it repeated in order for it to get through to you.

Sorry I've no idea what you're saying here. How would that work, given his argument, which I explained?

And indeed the psychiatrist's answer, which I also gave?

I did. The journalist is Juliette Campion, she's from France Info. And I gave the link to the relevant thread, so you can follow the whole testimony yourself.

If you wish to.

The alternative is that the Vaucluse is a particular hellhole full of far more rapists than anywhere else.

I don't expect that's the case, but perhaps you have some evidence that it is?

Sorry, @Overheal I don't know what you're asking. I actually explained the context (which is to say the second part of the tweet) and the reply from the psychiatrist - which you don't have there.

What are you saying is missing that doesn't allow you understand that my point is that if you have a random area of limited size and population, much smaller than a whole country, and within that area you find dozens of men on a website looking to rape women, who then do actually rape a woman, then either, that area is some weird outlier of a place, or else most/all places are likely to have similar numbers of men with the same (and other) perversions.

Can you explain why you seem to think that finding one person who comes from somewhere else would disprove this please?

No, that's still not what I'm saying. But never mind. Because the more detail comes out, the more it's looking as though that's actually the case:

Here's another live tweet from the journalists covering the case - I'll do you a screengrab if you prefer:

The accused are being questioned one by one (not all today, it's going to take days).

For the 13th man, the photos/videos are not of the couple's bedroom. When asked, the daughter said it looked like their holiday home in the west of France. And this guy, n° 13, - guess where he lives? Yep, just nearby in La Rochelle. Look it up on a map if you like: Ile de Ré to La Rochelle. Might be an hour's drive but I doubt it. More like half an hour.

So now we have three places where Pelicot was recruiting men locally. When he was in Paris, he recruited men in the Paris area. Most of the time this was going on, they lived in Mazan, and he recruited around there, but when they were away on holidays, in the west of France, probably 800km away, then he was recruiting men from around there.

Those French, eh? What are they like? Three different centres of crime rape rings, as you call them.

Come to that, you're not far off the mark it seems.

I wonder whether men are the same in the rest of Europe too. Maybe it's unique to France.

It's striking that the men they interviewed are playing it down. A local shopkeeper says "Nobody gives a damn." They're bored with it all now, it seems.

But local women are saying they are worried about the men who haven't been identified:

“So, we know 30 out of 80 still haven’t been caught. There are tensions here because people don’t know if they can trust their neighbours. You ask yourself – is he one of the 30? What is your neighbour getting up to behind closed doors?” said Isabelle Liversain in a voice sharp with frustration.