Paris (AFP)

Actors, directors, writers, musicians ...: 162 personalities from the artistic world sign a platform calling for the protection of children from sexual crimes by setting the threshold for non-consent at 15 years and 18 years in the event of incest.

This column, to be published in Le Parisien Weekend on Friday, is signed by Tristane Banon, on behalf of the Collectif pour l'Enfance.

She was one of the first in the 2000s to tell of having been sexually assaulted by Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

"It is mass crime that we are talking about (...). We who want firm laws to deter these unacceptable acts, all of us, who are signing this petition today, ask you that this threshold of non-consent be fixed at 15 years, 18 in case of incest ", declares the text addressed to those who" make the laws ".

He cites estimates according to which "ten million French people" were victims of sexual violence before the age of 18, and recalled "that a minor child (is) raped every hour in France".

It is signed, among others, by Juliette Binoche, Zabou Breitman, Isabelle Carré, Annie Duperey, Line Renaud, Céline Sallette, Louis Bertignac, Dany Boon, Thomas Dutronc, Guillaume Gallienne, Patrice Leconte, Claude Lelouch ...

The forum describes as "small progress" the draft bill Billon adopted by the Senate on January 21 to set the threshold for non-consent to sexuality at 13 years.

"It is good but it is insufficient. It is good but it is dangerous (...) Our expectations are far too high for that", says Tristane Banon, referring to the recent affair of Olivier Duhamel, figure of the Parisian intelligentsia and renowned constitutionalist accused of incest, or the testimonies of Christine Angot, Catherine Allégret and all those, "anonymous", who "by the tens of thousands" now express themselves under the hashtag #MeTooInceste.

"After the victims have found the strength and courage to open the eyes of society wide, you who make the laws cannot be the only ones to keep them partially closed," says the author.

"It is only by recognizing the impossibility of consenting to incest before age 18 that your progress will be remarkable," she adds.

The government said on Tuesday it was "in favor" that any act of sexual penetration committed by an adult on a minor under 15 now automatically constitutes a crime, without it being possible to question the consent of the victim .

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