This time last year, the world watched in horror as Gisèle Pelicot stepped into an Avignon courthouse, waiving her anonymity to expose the heinous crimes committed by her husband, and 50 other men. International headlines spoke of the ‘Monster of Avignon’. Gisèle Pelicot herself fought back on this, refusing to label her ex-husband a monster. Instead, these men were products of a ‘macho and patriarchal society’ which ‘trivialises rape’. Pelicot’s words echo what survivors have said for years. Monstrous language protects perpetrators by suggesting that their actions were inevitable rather than chosen.

Violence exists on a continuum of entitlement, misogyny, and social attitudes that permeate everyday interactions. Dehumanising language obscures that continuum, creating a fictional divide between ‘good men’ and ‘monsters’, when in reality, these behaviours exist on a sliding scale, often normalised long before they escalate into criminality. I remember this clearly from my school years – boys rating girls out of ten, catcalling in the corridors, cries for help dismissed as mere attention seeking. These weren’t monsters, just ordinary children taught that turning a blind eye was the easier option.

Earlier this week, I spoke to the Community Champions alongside some of our team at Everyone’s Invited, the charity that exposed the scale of sexual harassment and assault in UK schools and universities back in 2021. One student, a bright and passionate 17-year-old, put it plainly:

“If we do not assess why this is happening, we cannot change the culture that is fundamentally ingrained in our schools, in our sport, in our media, and in our relationships.”

Words like ‘monster’ obscure the questions we desperately need to ask: what beliefs enable such behaviour? What cultural scripts are we teaching?

Crucially, reshaping language can reduce shame and stigma. In the last five years, we’ve seen terms like ‘gaslighting’ and ‘lovebombing’ come into the mainstream, enabling survivors to name their experiences. We must continue to dismantle the idea that perpetrators are inhuman, and use words grounded in reality: accountability, coercion, manipulation, misogyny, power, control.

The story we tell about perpetrators and survivors shapes the willingness of institutions, systems and individuals to change. It shapes society’s ability to recognise early warning signs before further harm occurs. And ultimately, it shapes whether we understand sexual violence as an inevitable horror inflicted by the few, or a preventable harm embedded in the behaviour of the many.

So often, in cases like David Carrick’s, the perpetrator is positioned as a monster – evil incarnate – as though that protects us from the harsher reality that rape and sexual violence are endemic across society. It doesn’t.

Sophie Lennox is Education Project Coordinator at Everyone’s Invited, a charity dedicated to exposing and eradicating rape culture.