Pierre (first name has been changed), 33 years old, must have told this story hundreds of times in ten years. “Something crazy happened to me”, he shouted to the men who listened to him, laughed and envied him. This girl ” completely crazy “ who forced him to penetrate her after an imposed fellatio, when he was 19, was his achievement. He was then a bartender in Toulouse, in an environment where we take shots during service and women afterwards, and where we talk about them “as if they were meat”. With his tattoos, tousled brown hair and silver rings on all his fingers, Pierre feels a bit of a rockstar when, well after closing, girls, like groupies, beg the bouncer to let them into the bar for a last drink with the handsome bartender.
The young man is faithful to his girlfriend at the time. One evening, during a party at a friend’s house, a woman his age complains about not having a sexual partner, and Pierre suggests, “in a joking tone”to dedicate oneself. “I must have sent the wrong signals because she compliments me and then kisses me.”he says. He lets himself get rid of it. Later in the evening, she takes him by the collar, looks him in the eyes. “Now let’s fuck”, she tells him before leading him to a separate room. He is following her ” without thinking “. She blocks the door with a chest of drawers, pulls down his pants and begins oral sex. “She lifts her dress, gets on all fours and penetrates herself. I had an erection even though I didn’t want it at all. It must have lasted five or ten minutes, I don’t really remember. I was there without being there”relates Pierre, describing a moment of dissociation that many victims of sexual assault evoke.
Women are the main victims of sexual violence. According to the “Virage and gender relations” survey (Virage), carried out by the National Institute of Demographic Studies (INED), in 2015, 15% of them have suffered at least one form of sexual assault in their life, four times more than men. For the latter, three quarters of rapes and attempted rapes take place before they reach the age of majority. The attackers are almost exclusively men.
Launched on February 22, in the wake of the revelations of actor Aurélien Wiik denouncing rapes suffered when he was a minor, the #metoogarcons movement is in line with these data. Under this hashtag, hundreds of Internet users recount the sexual abuse they suffered when they were children and a few, much rarer, report attacks from women they met in the evening or on dating applications. . Cases of men being sexually assaulted by women constitute a “statistical minority”, assures Lucie Wicky, doctoral student at the School of Advanced Studies in Social Sciences and at INED, the only researcher in sociology to work on sexual violence suffered by men in France. Pierre is part of this minority. But he never considered himself a victim: this story was only a “evening event” which he transformed into “feature of arms”.
You have 76.82% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.