France to toughen punishments for sexist street harassment

MPs in France have voted to double penalties for anyone convicted of sexist harassment in the street

Published: 17 November 2022 17:24 CET

France to toughen punishments for sexist street harassment

(Photo by PATRICK HERTZOG / AFP)

MPs in France’s National Assembly have voted in favour of tougher penalties for anyone convicted of harassing someone in the street based on their gender.

Gender-based contempt, recently introduced to deal with instances street harassment, refers “a comment or behaviour with a sexual or sexist connotation”, undermining their dignity, or creating an “intimidating, hostile or offensive” situation.

It may be considered “aggravated” in certain cases, such as when it is committed by a person abusing their authority, or on a vulnerable person or in public transport.

Under current rules, anyone convicted of such behaviour may be fined up to €1,500. That will increase to €3,750.

MPs had earlier voted to make the filing of complaints by video link allowable for certain offences for those who prefer to do it that way, and for victims of crime to be able to file complaints and be heard at home, or at “specialised association to assist victims or any other place”.

Meanwhile, an amendment provides for a five-year experiment “of mobile police and gendarmerie brigades” to “collect complaints from victims of domestic violence in rural areas, in zones determined by decree”.

The law was introduced in August 2018 following mass public outrage when a man punched a woman for confronting him over wolf-whistling her outside a Paris café.

It netted more than 700 fines in the first year.

Crimes under the new law include catcalling, asking intrusive questions, unwanted following, “upskirting” (taking pictures under a woman’s dress without her knowing) or even just commenting on a woman’s looks or clothing.

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The French Jewish community, the third largest in the world, has for months been on edge in the face of a growing number of attacks and desecrations of memorials.

“National police in Rouen neutralised early this morning an armed individual who clearly wanted to set fire to the city’s synagogue,” Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Police responded at 6.45 am to reports of “fire near the synagogue”, a police source said.

A source close to the case told AFP the man “was armed with a knife and an iron bar, he approached police, who fired. The individual died”.

“It is not only the Jewish community that is affected. It is the entire city of Rouen that is bruised and in shock,” Rouen Mayor Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol wrote on X.

He made clear there were no other victims other than the attacker.

Two separate investigations have been opened, one into the fire at the synagogue and another into the circumstances of the death of the individual killed by the police, Rouen prosecutors said.

Such an investigation by France’s police inspectorate general is automatic whenever an individual is killed by the police.

The man threatened a police officer with a knife and the latter used his service weapon, said the Rouen prosecutor.

The dead man was not immediately identified, a police source said.

Asked by AFP, the National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office said that it is currently assessing whether it will take up the case.

France has the largest Jewish community of any country after Israel and the United States, as well as Europe’s largest Muslim community.

There have been tensions in France in the wake of the October 7th attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel, followed by the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip.

Red hand graffiti was painted onto France’s Holocaust Memorial earlier this week, prompted anger including from President Emmanuel Macron who condemned “odious anti-Semitism”.

“Attempting to burn a synagogue is an attempt to intimidate all Jews. Once again, there is an attempt to impose a climate of terror on the Jews of our country. Combating anti-Semitism means defending the Republic,” Yonathan Arfi, the president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF). wrote on X.

France was hit from 2015 by a spate of Islamist attacks that also hit Jewish targets. There have been isolated attacks in recent months and France’s security alert remains at its highest level.