Some women can ENJOY being raped says Frenchwoman who signed letter criticising the #MeToo movement alongside actress Catherine Deneuve

Brigitte Lahaie, a porn star-turned-agony aunt, has caused an outcry with her comments that some women can enjoy rape

A row over Frenchwomen who attacked the #MeToo movement descended into pathos yesterday when the signatories fell out over a claim that victims could enjoy being raped.

Brigitte Lahaie, 62, a radio host and former pornographic film actress, apologised and wept in a television interview after she was disowned by members of the “100 women”. The group, which included the film star Catherine Deneuve, 74, caused an outcry in France with their attack on the “puritan persecution” of men after the Harvey Weinstein scandal.

Ms Lahaie was condemned by several other signatories of the women’s open letter for saying in a television debate on Wednesday that a victim could experience an orgasm during rape.

Last night she said that she had not intended any offence and “regret that my remarks were taken out of context”. But she repeated her view, calling it an unfortunate fact. “What I meant to say — because I know matters of sexuality by heart — is that sometimes the body and the mind do not coincide,” she said.

Ms Lahaie deplored the way that she said she had been “lynched” on social media. “If that’s the way the world works, then I apologise,” she added.

Along with actress Catherine Deneuve (pictured),  Lahaie is a signatory to an open letter, condemning the #MeToo movement

Ms Lahaie made her claim in response to Caroline de Haas, a feminist who has led the week’s counterattack on the group. In their debate on BFM TV, Ms de Haas had rejected Ms Lahaie’s argument that women were more sexually powerful than men.

“How do you give back to women the power of their bodies? It’s simple — you stop the violence,” Ms de Haas said. “After you have been the victim of rape you no longer have so much pleasure.”

The remarks from Ms Lahaie, who gave relationship advice in a popular call-in programme for more than a decade, were just one incident out of several from signatories that fuelled an onslaught from ministers, public figures and social media.

Catherine Millet, 69, an art critic who wrote a graphic bestseller about her prolific sex life in 2001, said that she was no more troubled by a man’s unwanted hand on her knee than by smoke from a cigar.

A group of 30 feminists led by Ms de Haas issued a written response, saying: “Their world is disappearing . . . Their open letter sounds like a tired old uncle who doesn’t understand what is happening.”

The 100 women, whose text was mainly drafted by Ms Millet and signed later by Ms Deneuve, were almost universally condemned in France for saying that men have a right to “bother” women. The critics cast the 100 women as old, out-of-touch reactionaries. They were accused of condoning predatory male behaviour by depicting it as old-fashioned seduction.

The group was not helped by enthusiastic support from Silvio Berlusconi, the former Italian prime minister, who said: “Catherine Deneuve has said blessed words.”

It was “normal that women should be happy when men try to seduce them,” Mr Berlusconi, 81, added.