Anti-sexual assault activists stood outside the court throughout the trial and hope it could lead to reform of French rape laws and change the debate about rape culture and drug-fueled sexual assaults.
“Shame changes sides” became one of the slogans of the case, and in a sign of the importance of the trial, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz thanked Gisele Pellicot for giving women around the world a “strong voice”.
“Shame always falls on the perpetrator,” Scholz added.
One of her lawyers, Antoine Camus, told France Info radio on Friday that the trial would serve as a “building block” and that by making the trial public, Giselle Pellicot was trying to give the public a chance to “deal with (the issues) and ask the right questions.”
The speaker of the French National Assembly, Yael Braun Pivet, said that the taboo had been broken: “Thanks to you, the world is not the same anymore.”
Former French prime minister Gabriel Athal hoped the mass-rape trial would send a “shock wave” through every boy’s education – “because this is where the fight for equality and respect begins”.
