Johnny Depp and Moroccan victims of violence

In Morocco too, the trial between Johnny Depp and his ex-wife Amber Heard was very well attended. Never seen. Since the OJ Simpson case, it is indeed the first time that the whole world is passionate about a trial of this kind. Defamation, scabrous details, violence, passion, hatred, alcohol and drugs… For six weeks, the lawyers of the two actors raised a section on the former marital life, all in all tortured, of their respective clients to achieve a virtual victory. undisputed by Johnny Depp.

Worldwide, the team Johnny cried victory, celebrating the triumph of truth over lies, justice over betrayal, and in this case husband over wife. With the crushing defeat of Amber Heard, it is the whole #metoo movement of which she claimed to be a standard-bearer which takes a big hit and with it, the real victims of domestic violence.

By deliberately lying about pseudo-violence suffered, the American actress thus breaks the cliché of the female victim and reveals, despite herself, a facet that we would have been careful not to see: women can also be violent. It’s a subject that we don’t talk about often enough but which nevertheless deserves to be shed light on it and Johnny Depp by accepting and assuming to wear the suit of the beaten and abused man opens the way to others.

The numbers being what they are, women are of course the main victims of physical violence, but let’s not forget that the reverse also exists, and Morocco is no exception. Thus in our country where it is good to prove masculinity and virility foolproof, they are 42% to have suffered at least one act of violence according to figures put forward by the High Commission for Planning (HCP) in 2021.

To come to the aid of these men who suffer from being beaten up by their wives, victims of humiliation, acts of witchcraft, economic and sexual blackmail, the Association for the Defense of Husbands Victims of Domestic Violence tries to hear their voice. A voice that is however walled in silence most of the time for fear of ridicule and the taboos that condition their masculinity.

But if Law No. 1°3-13 on the fight against violence against women also allows, despite what its name suggests, men to defend themselves and exercise their rights as victims within the framework domestic violence, other laws are real scourges for men who are victims of manipulative women.

For example, until 2014, the year marked by the suicide of Amina Filali who was forcibly married to her rapist, article 475 of the penal code offered the victim a choice that was at least atrocious. The rapist could thus be absolved of his crime if he married his victim. But since then, this law has been amended, offering only one possibility: prison for the rapist.

This is where the notion of consent comes in, which for us in Morocco is a secondary notion, and for good reason, how can we speak of consent when sex outside marriage is prohibited. This issue of placing the woman in the role of the victim and the man in that of the rapist is a real headache when you are parents of a boy.

And for good reason, article 490 which sends to prison those who practice sex outside marriage makes countless victims on the side of women but also on the side of men although we talk about it less. Because as long as a couple practicing consensual sexual relations (although outlawed) is caught in the act, the woman can then cry rape and claim a forced relationship to escape prison.

How many men have ended up behind bars for refusing to marry their alleged victim? How many young girls have lied to those around them, preferring to pass themselves off as victims of rape and condemn their lover to prison? Imagine the cruelty of this dilemma. Eye for eye, tooth for tooth.

We know very well that youth has to happen, but in this society in which we live, steeped in complexities and hypocrisy, what is forbidden to girls, we allow boys. We refuse the idea that a girl can have sexual relations before her marriage, but we worry about the fact that her son does not have any. And as long as we are not a family model where sex is a taboo subject that we do not talk about for religious and cultural questions, we are obliged to warn our boys.

So how do you broach the subject of sexuality with your son when he’s flirting with the age of puberty and the desires that go with it? How to help him to do his sentimental and sexual education in a fulfilling way when we know what the prohibitions of the law imply? How to teach him this sacrosanct concept of consent, oh so important, to make him realize that when a woman says “no” it’s “no” and not a disguised “yes”, when the subject of sexuality is completely biased in Morocco?

Barely appeared their first hairs on the chin and their first emotions, they switch from childhood to a world where their sexuality can take them directly to the prison box and be taxed in addition to rapists. So what to do, what to tell them, how to prevent them without making them panic?

It is high time that these liberticidal laws which condition the private and intimate life of individuals are no longer subject to a religious reading. This, under the guise of making virtue reign and proliferating good morals, only brings in its wake a number of violence and inequalities that no longer have any place, both on the side of women and men. . Talking about it, trying to change things is not a perversion of the spirit nor an attempt to westernize our Muslim mores but a necessary debate to lay the foundations of a healthy society, without unavowable secrets, lies and falsehoods. semblants.