A cultural war has erupted in France over the iconic figure of Gérard Depardieu. The 75-year-old actor is considered one of the greats of the French cinema but he stands accused of multiple allegations of sexual violence and harassment. An investigation is currently ongoing into claims he raped a young actress several years ago. The woman in question appeared in a documentary broadcast recently called The Fall of an Ogre, alongside another actress who alleges she was also a victim of Depardieu. The film broadcast footage of Depardieu making suggestive remarks to women in 2018.
Depardieu denies all the allegations, stating in October last year that he has never ‘abused a woman’. The case has now become a political issue. The minister of culture, Rima Abdul-Malak, mooted the possibility of withdrawing Depardieu’s Legion of d’Honneur, an idea that was quickly shot down by Emmanuel Macron. Describing the criticism of Depardieu as a ‘manhunt’, the president said: ‘He’s an immense actor, a genius of his art. He makes France proud.’
Perhaps what rankles most with the majority in France is the double standards at work
Eric Zemmour, the leader of the right-wing Reconquest party, remarked that for once he was in full agreement with Macron. He declared that Depardieu was the victim of a ‘puritanical’ age that is determined to cancel him because he is a symbolic of a decadent past.
Last week, fifty cultural luminaries signed a letter in support of the actor in the right-leaning Le Figaro entitled ‘Don’t cancel Gerard Depardieu’. They accused his critics of a ‘lynching’ and said: ‘When you attack Gerard Depardieu like this, it is art you are attacking.’
In response, 150 other luminaries signed a letter in the left-leaning Liberation, accusing their 50 peers of ‘insinuating that his talent should shield him from all criticism, and even excuse him for his intolerable behaviour’. Not in our name, they stated.
According to Murielle Reus, vice president of #MeTooMedia, a campaign group against sexism and sexual misconduct in the media, ‘there’s a generation that still doesn’t understand this societal evolution’. The counter-argument is that there’s a generation, reared on social media, which believes one is guilty until proved innocent. The allegations against Depardieu are serious, and if investigators charge the actor and he is convicted in a court of law he should be punished. But for the moment he has been charged with no crime and he denies all the allegations levelled at him.
Perhaps what rankles most with the majority in France is the double standards at work. Many of the feminist groups ‘lynching’ Depardieu last month launched an online petition to cancel Serge Gainsbourg. The singer has been dead for 33 years, but the mere thought of a new metro station in Paris being named in his honour outraged thousands. Gainsbourg is accused of being a misogynist who once sang a song about incest. ‘At a time when every day we count our dead killed by violent partners, and despite the famous “separation of man and artist” preached by the defenders of our patriarchal system, this decision to pay tribute to Gainsbourg is a spit in the face of the victims,’ declared the petition.
Yet few feminists who share these views have said anything about the mass rape and murder of Israeli women by Hamas terrorists last October; nor have they spoken out in support of Claire, a young Parisienne, raped last month in her home, or Mathilde, attacked by the same man on the same day. Nor did they tweet anything about the 68-year-old who was raped and murdered in her Lille home in October, or a seven year old girl who was sexually molested in Paris at the New Year. Why not? Because the men who allegedly carried out these attacks are foreigners.
On the contrary, a few on the far left accused Claire of orchestrating a ‘racist’ campaign in order to promote the recent immigration bill. They appear to believe she should have shut up rather than tell the media that if the authorities had done their job and deported her alleged attacker she would not have been raped.
Many French feminists were also strangely silent last month when a video went viral on social media of a young woman being beaten up. The assailant was also a woman, in a headscarf, defending her brother’s honour, after her victim had accused him of sexual assault. The hypocrisy of these feminists was dissected in a newspaper column by the writer Louis El Yafi, who wrote: ‘What happens when a woman is attacked but it does not fit with their ideological outlook? At such times, their way of thinking and their narrative no longer work. So, rather than contradict their ideological matrix, these feminists keep quiet.’
In a social media post last week, the French branch of Femen, the International women’s rights movement, boasted that it ‘refuses to remain silent and let the victims die in silence and denial’. They were referring to Depardieu, whom they wanted ‘erased’ from French life. ‘The #MeToo revolution is underway!’ declared Femen.
‘Undermined’ is probably a more accurate description, by their own double standards.
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