Many countries require that consent be given before sex — and have written that into their rape laws. France is not among them.
Now two lawmakers hope to change that, and they got a step closer Tuesday night when the lower house of the French Parliament passed a bill that expands the definition of rape to include nonconsensual penetration.
Their cause gained traction after a horrific trial last fall in which dozens of men were convicted of raping Gisèle Pelicot while she was in a deeply drugged state.
“This is a starting point, not a final one,” Marie-Charlotte Garin, one of the two lawmakers who proposed the bill, told the National Assembly after the vote. “We are moving from a culture of rape to a culture of consent, and this is the first stone we are throwing against the wall of impunity.”
The bill will go on to be debated in the upper house.
Here is some background on why the change is being suggested and who objects.
How does France define rape, and why change the definition?
French law defines rape as any form of sexual penetration committed on another person — woman or man — by violence, constraint, threat or surprise.
