Italians grope themselves in protest of judge’s shock ruling that it’s not assault if under 10 seconds
Outraged Italians are groping themselves in unsettling videos in protest of a judge’s ruling that unwanted touching that lasts less than 10 seconds isn’t a crime.
The controversial ruling resulted in the acquittal of a man who admitted to fondling a school girl, but argued he’d only been joking.
Men and women alike in Italy have taken to Instagram and TikTok to post the clips, in which they stare stone-faced at the camera while groping their breasts and chests alongside a timer counting down from 10 seconds.
In others, they continuously caress themselves for nine seconds, only to stop just before the timer runs out and mockingly tell their groper to stop before it becomes assault, or laugh that they didn’t realize it was only a joke.
Often tagged with #10secondi or “palpata breve” — Italian for “a brief groping” — the videos are intended to demonstrate how unnervingly long 10 seconds can be, especially during a sexual assault.
The videos are in response to the judge’s ruling in the case of 66-year-old Antonio Avola, a caretaker at a Rome high school who admitted to groping a 17-year-old female student in a school stairwell.
In April 2022, Avola crept up behind the girl while she walked to class with a friend, then pulled her pants down and fondled her buttocks and underwear.
“Love, you know I was joking,” she said Avola told her when she reacted in shock, according to the BBC.
After the girl reported the incident to police, Avola admitted to grabbing her but insisted it was merely a joke.
Though Roman public prosecutors asked for a nearly four-year prison sentence and a sexual assault conviction, this week a judge tossed out the charges and ruled Avola innocent.
The judge argued the groping “does not constitute a crime” because it didn’t last for more than 10 seconds.
One of the first to post a 10-second video was White Lotus actor Paolo Camilli, and a number of prominent Italian influencers followed suit with their own shortly after.
In many of the posts, after the timers end, the people in the videos express their disdain for the ruling and argue nobody has the right to touch anybody for any amount of time.
The girl at the center of the case is also outraged by the case’s conclusion.
“The judges ruled that he was joking? Well, it was no joke to me,” she told the newspaper Corriere della Sera, according to the BBC.
“The caretaker came up from behind without saying anything. He put his hands down my trousers and inside my underwear.” she said. “He groped my bottom. Then, he pulled me up — hurting my private parts. For me, this is not a joke. This is not how an old man should ‘joke’ with a teenager.”
“That handful of seconds was more than enough for the caretaker to make me feel his hands on me.”
