The last few days of last year in terms of violence against women have brought some news and the testimony of a slow change, proof of this is precisely the case of the writer Matzneff.

In the first part of December 2019, the book of writer Vanessa Spingora Settlement has come to the present. In it, Spingora talks about the relationships he lived under the former writer Matzneff.

The testimony of Spingora gives a chilling, even more so when it is thought that from now on the writer will be forever placed on the skin of this victim. In this autobiographical novel he refers to the executioner, Matzneff, who years ago had equipped the literary field with stories of his pedophile and perverse relationships. No one then complained about it. Neither then nor later. In fact, until this year 2020 the area has supported and praised – it received the last literary prize in 2013 or –. The change is also that, beyond resonance, judicial proceedings are opened.
Things have changed for more than one side.

First of all, although we had known for a long time that, if we looked beyond home, all the corners were full of dirt, now the positions are being denounced publicly and out loud, you cannot talk about that. Now, those accusations have been heard, and even if they are not a few, but a few, they have an echo, and no one doubts.

It has been necessary for years to do so and it has been publicly acknowledged that relations and lives are based on this submission to men.

It is good news that today there can be no apology for relations of dependency, rape, manipulation, paedophilia, which is no more acceptable.

On the other hand, in the case of Matzneff, there are some who feel obliged to abandon what they have now praised. In fact, Matzneff was the 2013 Renaudot Prize winner. Today, the rewarders say that they were perhaps wrong.

They do not, however, go backwards. There is no contempt. It's a soft confession made in half words. Yes, it feels that in the words of Beigbeder, who was one of the jury leaders of the prize, times have changed, but no, it is not revolution. Let us remember that a few years ago this same country claimed the right to a slut in the manifesto of the 343 Pigs, something that I could not do today, if thought were to continue.

However, the change has not reached all households, in many cases the relations remain brutal and harsh: one hundred thousand annual rapes, 150 women murdered in the French State by their partners in 2019, one quarter of children and young people will be sexually assaulted before they turn 18, and one in five is mistreated.

The numbers are in sight, it's new comparing the situation of years ago. That too is a change. There have never been as many feminist associations as there are today. Each political trend has at least one affiliated group. Politicians prioritize all violence against women, it will undoubtedly be one of the lines of the election campaigns next March.
However, more concrete and radical measures are still awaited. Because there is no intervention box, no law, no protective device strong enough, no punishment for the aggressors, no encouragement for the victims to speak.

It's not enough for fear to change its side.