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.
Men and women alike in Italy have taken to Instagram and TikTok to post the clips, where they stare at the camera while being groped.
The protests come after a caretaker who admitted to fondling a schoolgirl was acquitted after arguing he had only been joking.
Often tagged with #10secondi or “palpata breve” — Italian for “a brief groping” — the videos are intended to demonstrate how long 10 seconds can feel during a sexual assault.
This week a judge ruled Antonio Avola, a caretaker at a Rome high school who admitted to groping a 17-year-old female student in a school stairwell, was not guilty of sexual assault.
The incident happened in April 2022 when the 66-year-old 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.
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.
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 centre 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.
“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.”
