You probably don’t know this woman: her name is Franca Viola. She was born in Alcamo, Sicily, in 1947, during a time where, see, things for women were deeply different.
This is her when she was 17.
She was 17 when, on the 26th of December, 1965, she was kidnapped by her former boyfriend, Filippo Melodia, the son of a local mobster, and a few of his friends: she had broken the engagement with him a couple of years prior, when she was 15 and he was 23, and he couldn’t accept it. He kept her segregated in a farmhouse for 8 days and raped her, before she was found and freed by the police.
At that time, the Italian law stood with her kidnapper and rapist, as it stated that if the rapist married his victim, then the crime was virtually erased, and, had the guilty part already been prosecuted and convicted, the trial and the sentence would cease. This kind of marriage was called “rehabilitating marriage,” as it was believed that the victim, and her family, had to fix the dishonour caused by the rape.
Incredible, isn’t it? Not really. In an area where families still used to hang the sheet dirty with blood to their balcony after the first wedding night to prove the virginity of the woman to the entire town, the law and the public opinion still expected women to marry their abusers to mantain their honour.
Franca refused to marry Melodia. Knowing that the entire town – and, later, the whole country – could turn its back at her, knowing that she was going to be mocked, frowned upon, and insulted, she denounced him. Her family, who, contrarily to many other families, stood with her and supported her choice, needed to be guarded at all times by a handful of policemen, having been threatened by Melodia and his family. Franca was assisted by a brilliant lawyer. The trial ended up being reported by Italy’s major newspapers, and Franca, the first woman – girl – to refuse rehabilitating marriage, quickly became an example of bravery for many, many other women.
In court, Melodia tried to turn the judge against her. He said she’d already hooked up with him when they were together. He tried to escape conviction.
He was convicted for kidnapping anyway, and justly. Eight years later, when he got out, he was shot dead by an unknown killer.
Despite earlier threats that she was dishonoured, and that she wasn’t going to find anyone willing to marry her, she married Giuseppe, a childhood friend, in 1968, who stated that he wasn’t afraid of any possible acts of revenge from Melodia. He allegedly said said, “I’d rather live ten years with you than a lifetime with another woman.” About her dad, who supported her every step, Franca recently said, “My father Bernardo came [to get me] unshaven, with a week’s old beard: I could not shave if you were not there, he said. What do you want to do, Franca? I will not marry him. All right, you put your hand, I will put one hundred. This sentence, he said. I just want you to be happy, nothing else. He took me home and he did the great effort, not me. It was him who put up with those who no longer greeted him, his friends gone. The shame, the dishonour. His head up high. He wanted only what was good for me.”
When he heard about her wedding, even Pope Paul VI asked to meet her to congratulate her.
Her trial was the final push to erase the law about rehabilitating marriage and honour killings, which also allowed “mitigating circumstances” if the killer had acted upon jealousy or to restore his honour (for instance, if a husband walked in on his wife cheating on him, and killed both her and her lover). But that didn’t happen until 1981.
Rape was finally considered a “crime against the person,” instead of a crime “against the morals”, only in 1996.
She still lives in Alcamo; she says that, sometimes, she still sees her kidnappers, and whilst she greets them, they lower her gaze in shame. Franca has never, not once, lowered her gaze, and that’s why she changed history.
This is just a tiny post to remember how small acts of courage can change history and change the shape of a nation – and as a woman, an Italian, a Sicilian woman, I want to thank Franca for saying ‘no’ and – perhaps by chance – changing the history of Italy.
Reblogging again for International Women’s Day, in celebration of the women who changed history.
This is Franca Viola today, an elegant and gentle woman, now grandmother of a little girl.
In 2014, on this day, she was honoured as Grande Ufficiale al merito della Repubblica italiana – Great official for merit of Italy – for her role in fighting the misoginyst mentality of those times, and contributed to re-think the approach towards rape and the role of women in Italian society.
Woman in excruciating pain: I’m in excruciating pain
doctor: have you considered it might just be your period
woman: but i’m no where near my period
doctor: yeah yeah, that’s what they all say
woman three years late: I’m dying from an illness that wasn’t diagnosed because they blamed it all on my period.
Chris asked to meet with me last fall, in late September. We sat down in an office in MIT Admissions. “For the spring admissions video,” he said, “I basically want to make a two-minute trailer for the new Iron Man with Riri Williams.” This sentence, and the conversation that we had afterward, was what would eventually turn into the video you all saw posted on Tuesday… [+]
So I’m at the bus terminal and this guy (who’d been following me and hovering over me for 10 minutes) comes up to me and says “hey beautiful. Can I talk to you?” So I said “no thank you.” He goes “I just want to speak to you, though.”
And I said “yeah I know that and I’m not interested in talking to a strange man at a bus terminal. Please leave me alone.”
So he stands there watching me. Finally he says “listen, there’s no need to be difficult. I approached you politely like a gentleman so I don’t see why you’re saying no. Now just let me speak to you.”
I said “nobody’s being difficult my guy. You asked a question, I gave an answer so we’re done.”
Then he says “yeah but the answer you gave me made no sense. Why don’t you want to talk to me? You don’t know what kind of person I am. You’re judging me before you know me. You’re being ignorant and prejudiced so”-
Just then this other guy who’d been sitting close to me said “my nigga shut the fuck up! I saw you following her and stalking her like a fucking animal or some shit, like you didn’t think she didn’t notice? She’s probably scared of your predatory ass and I don’t blame her. Mans need to understand you don’t follow girls and shit. That shits corny.”
So the guy goes “yo, mind your fucking business.”
And the other dude says “nah because I see you harassing this girl and as a man this becomes my business. You thinking you were polite doesn’t mean a girl has to speak to you. Be nice because you’re nice, don’t use that please and thank you shit and think somebody has to speak to you. You’re not a “gentleman if you don’t respect her. Take the L and go catch your bus you fucking creep.”
So the guy starts swearing and then walks away. The guy who’d defended me is like “you okay tho? Like real talk I don’t really like men because of shit like that. They’re fucking predators man. I do what I can when I’m able to for women because you don’t deserve to be hunted.”
I love the Gwendoline is a) taller than everyone and b) still wears high hells to make herself EVEN TALLER than everyone. (Example: She’s only one inch taller than NCW but she’s like, “Nah I want to tower over him so he knows who is in charge.”)
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