A French left-wing activist with a degree in gender studies delivered a chilling response to a mother who said she had been threatened with rape by a mob during violent street unrest, invoking “collateral damage” while defending the Marxist cause.
The shocking exchange caught on video featured Bettina Zourli, a self-described journalist and feminist writer, arguing with a woman who said she had barricaded herself inside an apartment with her infant while rioters tried to enter. According to 21 News, a Belgian outlet, the exchange occurred at the Place de la République in Paris, the day after the violence of October 17.
When the mother said looters targeting a shop downstairs threatened to rape her and labeled her a “filthy bourgeois,” Zourli didn’t offer a shred of sympathy. Instead, the radical ideologue coldly shrugged off the heinous threat against a young mother.
“It’s collateral damage,” Zourli declared. “Pacifist activism doesn’t work. Nelson Mandela called for taking up arms at one point, because apartheid could never have been ended through peaceful means… Revolution isn’t peaceful. It doesn’t stay within bounds.”
When the mother accused Zourli of justifying the rape threats, Zourli denied it.
“No, not at all,” she replied, according to the French-language account published by 21 News.
The denial did not stop Zourli from defending revolutionary violence during the exchange.
The stunned woman fired back, asking, “So you condone violence?”
“I’m for revolution, obviously,” Zourli replied.
“Ah, so you condone violence. Thank you for clarifying,” the mother pressed.
Zourli doubled down on her extremist drivel: “Of course, but vandalizing a BNP Paribas (the largest bank in France), that’s normal. It’s the source of our problems.”
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“But the person who’s affected, who won’t recover, that’s collateral damage? You support vandalizing small businesses and threatening women with rape. Thank you for clarifying,” the mother snapped.
The activist’s final line of defense? “I’m just drawing a parallel, because that’s the reality of war, actually.”
French left-wing activist Bettina Zourli who describes herself as a journalist, feminist, and pro Palestine activist tells a woman who was threatened with rape while holding her baby during last night’s riots that her experience was “collateral damage” in the revolution.
— Imtiaz Mahmood (@ImtiazMadmood) October 19, 2026
Zourli is best known in France for her radical “childfree” crusade, preaching that women should refuse motherhood. She features herself under her Instagram handle @jeneveuxpasdenfant (“I don’t want children”) .
In media appearances, from Belgian TV to left-wing podcasts, Zourli has argued that the normal parenting model makes gender inequality worse and leaves women vulnerable.
Yet despite claiming to fight for women’s liberation, she apparently has no problem throwing real-world mothers to the wolves if it furthers her violent political agenda. Her denial that she was justifying those threats does little to make that response less chilling.
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