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SCHOOLS

French launches €14m ‘only yes means yes’ campaign on sexual consent

France's higher education ministry has launched a €14 million campaign around sexual consent, teaching students to seek explicit consent for any sexual encounter under the slogan 'sans oui, c'est interdit' (without a yes, it's forbidden).

Published: 10 October 2022 11:43 CEST
French launches €14m 'only yes means yes' campaign on sexual consent
A protester raises her fist in front of a poster reading 'There is a taste of rape when I'm studying at the university' during a demonstration on March 6, 2021. (Photo by Bertrand GUAY / AFP)

The campaign is hoping to teach students to: “Ask explicitly and look for an enthusiastic yes; Get into the habit of posing simple questions like ‘Do you want to?’ ‘Can I?’ ‘What do you like?’ and ‘What do you want us to experience together?’; Listen to the other person; Respect his or her desires and own limits; and finally, Accept No.”

Other prevention actions for the 2022 school year will include training sessions for dedicated anti-assault units in most of France’s universities. So far, over 900 teachers, students, and staff across the country have been trained. 

Ahead of week-ends d’intégration – or welcome weekends at the start of the school year, which are known for festivities and higher consumption of alcohol amongst the student body – posters with the new slogan “Without a ‘yes,’ it’s off limits” (Sans oui, c’est interdit) appeared across campuses in France to help educate students about consent.

Sylvie Retailleau, the Minister for Higher Education, stressed the importance of such actions in an interview with daily Le Parisien.

The minister explained that about “149,000 students in France are affected by sexual assault or attempted assault” each year. 

According to Retailleau, that number represents approximately four percent of the total student body (for higher education) in France.

With the annual budget doubling from €1.7 to €3.5 million per year, Retailleau intends for associations, such as the “National Association for Student Athletics” (Anestaps) to receive more grant money to help sexual assault prevention.

The consent awareness campaign will also partner with websites like Konbini to reach students online. Informative videos with advice and testimonies from students, as well as a consent quiz (consentest) will be posted across social media to help educate young people across the country.

Additionally, Anestaps will set up “safe spaces” during onboarding festivities and welcome weekends, to ensure that students who have been harassed or feel unsafe have a place to go to and a secure person to speak with.

The organisation will also use the ‘angel shots’ system during school events. Students who feel unsafe can order a fake drink at the bar and trust that the person behind the counter will understand it as code for needing help.

Schools will also set up investigation units, which will be free, confidential, and available to victims. The goal will be to encourage victims to file complaints, as well as to collect testimonies and reports. The units will offer students with legal, medical and psychological assistance.

Despite previous actions by the State to combat sexual assault in France’s universities, the problem has persisted. As a result, in 2021, the Ministry of Higher Education launched the multi-year plan (running until 2025).

The program was given a total budget of €7 million, which has now been doubled to €14 million.

The plan includes 21 measures, several of which were already taken up this past year. The steps are structured around four primary areas: widespread training of staff and students to respond to sexual assault, the reinforcement of reporting mechanisms, communication campaigns to spread awareness about consent and reporting mechanisms, and finally the promotion of student and staff commitment to combat sexual assault and gender-based violence on campuses.

In June, the public prosecutor’s office for Evry (Essonne) told AFP that it had opened several investigations for rape in the four major French universities of the area, including the renowned establishments of Polytechnique and Ecole Normale Supérieure (ENS), after receiving “several complaints” of sexual assault.

Sexual assault in France is defined as “any forced sexual contact” and it is punishable by 5 years of imprisonment and a €75,000 fine (Article 222-27 of the Penal Code)”

Neighbouring Spain has recently passed a ground-breaking ‘only yes means yes’ law on sexual consent, meaning that consent must be affirmative and cannot be assumed to have been given by default, or by silence. 

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POLITICS

Fuel prices to immigration: The key points of Macron’s pledges

French President Emmanuel Macron laid out his some of his priorities for the months to come in an interview on French television on Sunday night.

Published: 25 September 2023 10:39 CEST
Fuel prices to immigration: The key points of Macron's pledges

During an interview with French television channel, TF1, on Sunday night, French President Emmanuel Macron weighed in on several ongoing topics in French society, from immigration to fuel prices via cost of living and plans for the ecological transition.

Here are four key takeaways:

Petrol prices and household subsidies 

In order to counter the rise in fuel prices, Macron told TF1 that he has “no miracle solution”, but that the prime minister, Elisabeth Borne, would meet with fuel distributors this week to “call for fuel to be sold at cost price”. 

The president also said he would request that the government include a new scheme to help low-income households who rely on their vehicles to get to work in the upcoming 2024 budget. The Macron government previously offered a similar subsidy for low-earning households, but this one would be paid ‘per vehicle per year’, rather than simply by the household. 

Le Figaro reported that it would likely be restricted to the first five income brackets, meaning individuals with a “reference income of less than €14,700”. This would involve individuals who earn less than €1,314 net per month, couples with one child who take in less than €3,285 net per month, families with three children earning less than €5,255 net per month.

Macron did not offer an exact timeline for when it would come into existence, but as it would be part of the new 2024 budget, the aid would likely not be available until 2024.

 As for other government plans to help motorists with rising fuel costs, the prime minister previously said the government would pass legislation to allow fuel distributors to sell at a loss, which is normally outlawed in France due to protection for small and independent businesses.

However, large distributors such as Carrefour, Leclerc, Intermarché Système U, Casino and Auchan, all refused the government’s plan and said they would not sell fuel at a loss. This includesTotalEnergies, who controls around a third of French fuel stations and had already agreed to cap petrol per litre to €1.99.

In explaining why fuel prices have been rising, Macron said: “We are paying for our dependence. Since the beginning of 2023, the price per barrel of oil has risen around a third and that’s going to continue (…)The increase for this is not tax-related. It has to do with geopolitics.”

Inflation

Macron said his focus is job creation. The French president has previously touted goals of ‘full employment’, which would include some reforms to the existing structures for unemployment benefits and eligibility.

As for wages, Macron said that during an upcoming conference on employment and benefits – set to take place in early October – the government would “work with sectors that still pay below the legal minimum wage.”

As for wage indexation for all fields, the president said he is not in favour as it would “create an inflationary loop.”

Environment and ecological transition

The president also discussed his plans for ‘ecological transition in France’. Macron is set to reveal a thorough ‘ecological plan’ on Monday night at the Elysée Palace. 

On Sunday, he said that the country is “halfway there”. He said that he wants to institute ‘écologie à la française’ (environmentalism in French-style), which he defined as “neither denying the situation nor curing it, but progressing.”

He promised that the government would invest €40 billion in the ecological transition, and stated that one of his major priorities will be to end coal-use and production in France. 

The president said that by 2027, the country’s two remaining coal-fired plants would be converted for ‘biomass’. 

Macron also specified that the government would not ban gas-fired boilers and furnaces, as it had previously indicated, to avoid leaving rural households “without solutions”. Instead, he said the country would seek to encourage the installation of heat pumps. 

The president also mentioned the possibility of offering a specific subsidy for those looking to purchase electric vehicles. He said this could come into force “between now and the end of the year.” 

As for producing electric vehicles and batteries, Macron said that the government planned to create ‘tens of thousands of new industrial jobs’.

READ MORE: Battery makers turn northern French region into ‘electric valley’

Immigration

On the heels of a visit form Pope Francis to Marseille over the weekend – who called for greater solidarity with migrants – Macron addressed the subject of immigration. 

Quoting the former French prime minister, Michel Rocard, Macron said that France “cannot take in all of the world’s misery.”

As for undocumented workers in short-staffed jobs – like the restaurant industry for example – Macron said that there must be ‘intelligent compromise’. He also said: “we must first try to ensure that it is our compatriots (eg. French nationals) who take these jobs (…) there will be no unconditional right to regularisation”. 

France’s parliament will vote on immigration legislation later this autumn.

READ MORE: LATEST: What’s happening with France’s new immigration law?

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