A global “rape academy” where men swap tips on how to drug and assault their sleeping wives has been exposed in the wake of the shocking case of Gisele Pelicot.
An investigation has uncovered networks of men on popular platforms and sites sharing disturbing details such as step-by-step instructions, advice on dosages of sedative drugs and livestreamed abuse of their unsuspecting partners.
In an interview with The Briefing podcast, Kara Fox, a CNN journalist who worked on the investigation, warned the material is easily accessible and the threat to women is real.
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“Perhaps the most terrifying or surprising part to a lot of people is the fact that [these sites] operate in plain sight,” she said. “It’s not on the dark web.”
The investigation was sparked by the high-profile case of Gisele Pelicot, who waived her right to anonymity to stand up to her now-former husband Dominique, who had been drugging and raping her with other men for years, at a trial in France last year. He and 51 other men were convicted and sentenced for their crimes.
Perpetrators in the online “rape academies” shared a sense of community and appeared “almost immune” to the violence and material they were creating and viewing, according to Fox.
“These people would try and encourage each other and they would almost goad one another; they were looking almost for approval from one another,” she said.
“The normalisation of how easily you can go from talking about, you know, ‘hello, how are you?’ to ‘this is what I’m doing and this is how you do it’ … down to the milligram of how many sedatives to give someone and how not to mix it too much with alcohol, otherwise you might have a bad result [is] really shocking stuff actually.”
Porn website Motherless, Discord and Telegram were named as some of the platforms where users have shared so-called “sleep content” chat and abuse material. A channel called Without Her Knowledge was named in the Pelicot case.
Survivors of partner drug rape from around the world, including Australia, have reached out since the investigation was published.
Fox said even when groups or sites are shut down or taken offline after being reported, new ones spring up.
But she hopes public anger will trigger “a sea change” in regulation.