Behind the rejection, the minutes of silence, the anger or the amazement when someone sees or listens to the news about the latest sexist murder or the latest rape in the news, there are surely many questions. Anyone who sees or hears, while repudiating this act of violence, may harbor doubts. You can even say them out loud: why didn’t you report before? Why didn’t you last so long? Why are you reporting now? How is it possible that she is now saying that he sexually assaulted her continuously, if they were a “normal” couple? How is it possible that such a nice man did what she claims to have done?
There are fictions that can be used to understand complex realities or to take these explanations into areas that theory or activism may not reach. The series “Querer” by director Alauda Ruiz de Azúa, broadcast a few weeks ago on Movistar, could well be a guide to delving deeper into the darkest – and still very misunderstood – layers of gender-based violence and the justice system. But there are real stories that function like mirrors: with all their rawness, they confront us with the difficulties and stumbles experienced by those who denounce sexual violence.
Gisèle Pelicot can say it well, a “destroyed woman”, as she defined herself throughout the legal proceedings which are now entering their final part. Destroyed, Pélicot is a woman who denounced and who decided to publicly confront shame and obstacles. Even though a lot is going on in this case (having rape images as evidence is rare), it has been met with suspicion, ridicule, stigma and insulting questions. This Monday, on the occasion of the International Day against Gender Violence, the French prosecutor’s office requested the maximum sentence against Dominique Pelicot: 20 years in prison for having raped his partner for ten years, giving her sleeping pills to break his will and “gifted” her to other men, who also raped her.
“Gisèle Pelicot was reduced to an object. “Consent was not present either before or during the act,” declared prosecutor Jean-François Mayet at the start of his complaint before the Avignon criminal court. Mayet assured that this affair shook society “in the most intimate bonds between human beings”. And this is precisely one of the keys that operates in gender violence committed by couples and ex-partners: those who attack are the same ones who at the beginning were charming or educated men with whom one fell in love, who felt at home them, like their family. Denounce who, you were convinced, was going to love you, take care of you; denouncing – and if the trial goes well, putting in prison – someone with whom you shared your life and who is perhaps the father of your children, is much more complex than saying “why didn’t you didn’t he do it? “.
After spending three decades married, Miren filed a complaint of continued sexual abuse against her husband, with whom she also began divorce proceedings. Why didn’t you do it before? This is the question that floats in the atmosphere, at home, at your friends, in the trial
With her testimony, Gisèle put words to this difficulty, to this stupor which crosses the life of someone who recognizes that their most intimate partner is attacking them and, even more, is taking them to court. “I don’t know how I’m going to get back up. “I don’t know if my life will be enough to understand everything that happened to me,” the woman said during one of the sessions.
No evidence
Miren, the protagonist of the series ‘Querer’, is on the other hand a fictional woman, although having many points in common with Gisèle: a lasting marriage, children, a more or less comfortable life, a well-connected husband who is pleasant to others. But with one big difference with Gisèle Pelicot, the real woman, is that Miren has no proof apart from her own testimony. After spending three decades married, Miren one day goes with a lawyer to file a complaint of continued sexual abuse against her husband, with whom she also begins divorce proceedings. Why didn’t you do it before? This is the question that floats in the atmosphere, at home, among his friends, during the trial.
From there, what happens to Miren is what happens to many others. He faces doubt and suspicion, even from his own children. Isn’t he doing it for the money? Traces of psychological and sexual violence are not always visible. Look, she remains alone, denouncing her plunge into isolation from those who do not understand how this is possible. This isolation is social but also economic, which is not strange in women who abandon their careers to take care of themselves or live in a precarious situation which becomes even more acute when there are no expenses to share and that they must bear everything.
Would Gisèle have been a Miren if the 20,000 visual documents found by the police had not existed? Would they have believed her if she had said that her husband and father of her children, a man she herself considered adorable before she knew what he was doing, drugged and raped her? Would she have had the unwavering support of her children? Would there have been demonstrations of support, applause at the end of the trial?
Once the step has been taken, what a woman can find is far from ideal: even in the Pelicot affair, where there is recorded evidence and where much of society has turned towards the woman, the Questions asked in the courtroom showed gender bias. of justice. “Doesn’t he have undisclosed exhibitionist tendencies? » asked one of the defense lawyers. Another defense lawyer recorded a video on social media while dancing Wake me up before you go (in Spanish, “wake me up before you go”).
Affect and cycle of violence
Psychologist Olga Barroso explained in an interview how the cycle of violence works: “With all abusers there will be a time when there will be no type of negative behavior in the relationship, there will even be positive behavior . Later, when they make sure that she wants to be with him and has built up a representation in her head of him as someone who loves them, they begin to display not-so-positive behaviors. Meanwhile, the abusers work to make the woman feel inferior or worse. For this, they will resort to all psychological violence.
Dominique Pélicot recognized the facts and uttered a devastating sentence in his final statement: “Submitting a rebellious woman was my fantasy. » In her case, she achieved this submission under the influence of drugs to, as she claims, “control her without making her suffer”. In “Querer,” Íñigo, Miren’s husband, displays psychological and emotional violence that breaks the woman’s spirit. At the same time, she commits sexual violence disguised as marital relations. When we get to the point in Miren’s life that we see in the series, she is already, like Gisèle Pelicot, a destroyed woman.
If you are an emotionally healthy person, no matter how much you say “this is abuse”, the whole emotional part you have built up does not immediately disappear or disintegrate. This is something that would happen to any of us.
Olga Barroso
— specialized psychologist
The cycle of violence oscillates between “honeymoon” periods of forgiveness, positive behavior or affection, and times when abusers “release” their tension by wanting to control or exploit women. “Once he knows that she’s not so sure of her judgment, that he feels worse, he moves on to the next phase, which is blaming her and showing her that she’s failing. Once the attacker achieves this goal, the violence may intensify because it will be difficult for him to see clearly what is happening,” Barroso continued.
This is where one of the big complications of ending an abusive relationship comes from: “If you’re an emotionally healthy person, no matter how much you say ‘this is abuse,’ the whole emotional part that you have built does not disappear or disintegrate immediately. . This is something that would happen to any of us. For someone who hasn’t made that connection, it’s easy to say ‘look at this, get out now’, but you’re in there, you’ve become emotionally attached to this person,” Barroso concludes.