White roses in hand, surrounded by horses, hundreds of people, including many women victims of violence, marched “with their faces uncovered”, in silence, Saturday afternoon, in Mazan, in support of Gisèle Pelicot. Mazan, this same town in Vaucluse where, for years, this now septuagenarian had been drugged with anxiolytics and raped by her husband and dozens of strangers whom he recruited on the Internet, facts judged before the criminal court in Avignon since the September 2.
“We take off our glasses girls, we are not here to hide,” says a demonstrator at the head of the procession. These women who lead the way in the Vaucluse countryside, in a beautiful autumn light, have all been victims of violence and are learning to rebuild themselves via equine therapy, within the Isofaculté association, at the initiative of this event. .
“I was a victim of things thirty years ago and there was nothing we could do about it”
“It’s the first time I’ve demonstrated, I think it’s normal to do it for a woman and for my experience,” says Catherine Borel, 69 years old. “This trial is terrible, hard, but this woman has tremendous courage to have succeeded in rebuilding herself. It will allow progress. I was a victim of things thirty years ago and there was nothing we could do about it: they didn’t believe me about the violence, and I found myself with my two children flying out the window.” she dares to say today.
With her, Josiane Dolce, an elegant little lady of 73 years old, with red hair like Gisèle Pelicot, confides that she still has “there in (her) head” the traces of the psychological violence of which she was a victim. Both came from Carpentras, a small neighboring town. “If there are women in the same situation, dare to say it, let us support you,” they add. On this extraordinary trial known as “the Mazan rapes” and its 51 accused, everyone has their own opinion, their feelings.
“This is not the trial of all men but of certain men,” slips Josiane, who did not go to court, for fear of her reaction to the videos now publicly broadcast at the hearing. She also fears a form of “voyeurism”. A few rows behind, a young woman, with a serious face, holds a sign: “The victims are crushed by justice”. She herself says she found herself on the civil parties’ bench at the Assize Court, as a victim of rape and attempted murder. And it was a “permanent struggle”.
