Sep 1, 2026 · 1h 19m
Coco turned online anonymity into a rape-enabling network
Part One: The Websites Behind An International Rapist Network
The Pelicot case shows how an unmoderated platform, social respectability, medical failures, and institutional inaction can sustain sexual violence.
- 1Coco evolved from a general chat platform into an unmoderated venue where users enabled illegal activity and abuse.
- 2Dominique Pelicot’s respectable public life concealed escalating crimes against Gisèle, whose unexplained symptoms were repeatedly dismissed.
- 3The case implicates a wider network of participants and institutions, challenging narratives that treat marital sexual violence as private.
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The episode’s sharpest turn comes when Coco’s users help Pelicot move from voyeuristic recording to drugging and assaulting Gisèle.
The brief
Robert Evans and Bridget Todd begin with the technology founders who profit from harmful systems, then turn to Coco, a French chat platform that became a largely unmoderated venue for illegal activity.
The episode traces Coco’s evolution alongside Dominique Pelicot’s abusive history, distinguishing the context of his upbringing from any excuse for the crimes he later committed.
Pelicot’s apparently ordinary marriage to Gisèle concealed escalating sexual crimes, while his respectable image helped warning signs disappear from view.
Coco connected Pelicot to people who supplied methods, encouragement, and practical support as he drugged and assaulted Gisèle, turning private abuse into a networked crime.
The hosts widen the frame to platform responsibility, medical gaslighting, and institutional failure, arguing that the Pelicot case is a societal problem rather than a private domestic incident.