NOTE: To those of you who’ll be going “Itna lamba post! Kaun padta hai yaar aaj kal?” ; to those of you who’ll say “Oh Lord! Not another feminist rant!” ; and finally, to those of you who’ll giggle and mock, saying “She’s probably on her period or something”; Let me be the one to break it to you- this post is directed more towards you than anyone else! So know this- YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM if you feel the need to spill out these words!
Respected (sadly enough!) G.Parameshwara, Abu Azmi and every other chauvinistic person in the country – with a big ego, a loud mouth, and a pre-dominantly patriarchal mind-set –
Let me address you first!
I can tell you something that most of us who still have something called a “conscience” and have somehow, managed to still be sane, collectively feel-
WE’RE ALL ASHAMED OF YOUR EXISTENCE!
Every time you open your mouth on an issue like the Bengaluru molestation case, you somehow manage to fill our ears with your spite, your narrow thoughts and disgraceful remarks! And to say that you’re the people who hold positions of power in our society, that you’re our “representatives” is the most despicable thing we’ve ever had to do!
Do you realize that when you make completely bizarre statements like “these things do happen” while addressing an issue as grave as the molestation of multiple women on New Year’s, you’re further empowering every closet monster out there? You’re liberating and encouraging every other molester, rapist, and that “jilted lover” who’s preparing to throw acid on an innocent girl’s face! This reminds of our “beloved” Mulayam Singh Yadav’s extremely sexist and sickening comment way back in 2014, that read “Boys will be boys…they make mistakes”. That was justification of rape at its best! Ladies and gentlemen, there’s the face of misogyny for you!
No, rape is not a mistake. It is a fucking crime! No one accidentally drops his penis into a woman’s vagina!
Molestation is not a mistake! Groping and fondling a woman’s breast in public is not a recreational activity! When will this ever sink in?
And yes, how can our ministers ever forget to blame “Westernization” and the “clothes women wear” for every other crime against women that happens in the country?
[The next lines might offend you. So, I ask you to refrain from reading them if you don’t understand the tone of sarcasm! I need to express it this way to hit a nail on the head of these stupid people!]
In 2013, it was reported that over the past decade, the child sexual abuse cases in India had increased by 336%. Yes, but that’s because we’re dressing up kids these days with such “promiscuous” clothing. How can the perpetrators just watch in silence?
According to a significant statistical observation and study of rape cases conducted by Mrinal Satish, faculty Member of NLU, Delhi, in 2013, about 75% of the rapes take place in rural India. But then again, it’s because our rural women are slowly adapting western culture, aren’t they? I mean working day in and day out, being out on the streets in the evenings, who does that?
To quote the most recent incident, even before the New Year’s Eve mass molestations occurred, a 25- year old burqa-clad woman was molested while she was heading to a bus stop near Arabic College in Bangalore. But then again, what was she doing walking alone at 6.25 a.m in the morning? Right?
Also, the north-eastern girl who was molested on New Year’s Day at 2.45 a.m at night in Bengaluru, 50 metres away from her own house, what was she doing up so late? Who gave her the right to be out on New Year’s just because only the entire world does the same?
According to a survey that was out in 2015, about 90% of the rapes in India that occurred in 2014 were all crimes committed by a person known to the victim– a relative, a neighbor or an employer. But then again, how can we ever go against Abu Azmi’s words? After all, crimes by people you know aren’t even crimes!
Yes, let’s continue to do this. Let’s blame every other thing in the vicinity for crimes against women! Let’s blame Chinese food for giving our men some major “hormonal imbalance” that leads to rape. Let’s blame the condom advertisements. Let’s blame parents for giving us cell phones. Let’s blame easy access to porn. Let’s blame the short skirts. Let’s blame modernization. Let’s blame women who have guy friends for being so “easy” and “available”. Let’s blame women who are confident about their sexuality. Let’s basically blame women who are confident enough!
Let’s blame everyone and everything, except for the root of all evil- the patriarchal mindset and the prevalent misogyny – and all of their co-conspirators namely,the lack of self-control, the total disrespect for consent or even the lack of sex education!RAPE IS A CRIMINAL ACT COMMITTED BY MEN WHO VIEW WOMEN AS OBJECTS WHO EXIST ONLY TO CATER TO THEIR SEXUAL NEEDS! As long as you and I, don’t accept that it’s the mindset that is to be blamed and not the dress, Chowmein or any other silly stuff, we’ll continue to infest our society with thousands of (probably younger) and dangerous Mohan Bhagwats, Abu Azmis and Mulayam Singh Yadavs!
Only when we decide to nip it in the bud, will we ever take one step forward to protect ourselves and our Bhaarat “Mata”!
To loosely quote what Sapan Verma from one of his Outrages for East India Comedy, “BEFORE YOU TERM ALL OF THIS “AGAINST INDIAN CULTURE”, NOTHING SHOULD BE AGAINST INDIAN CULTURE! NOTHING! BECAUSE THE INDIAN CULTURE WAS SOMETHING TO BE PROUD OF, BUT OUR POLITICIANS HAVE MADE US HATE THIS WORD!”
And how do we nip it in the bud, you ask?
We teach our boys right from the age they talk that women should be respected because they’re mothers, sisters, daughters or wives! No, scratch that! WOMEN SHOULD BE RESPECTED BECAUSE WE ARE FELLOW HUMAN BEINGS! And to all those stupid troll pages who scratched out the tagline “Respect Women” and wrote shit like “Respect people, not genders”, have you lost your mind? The very reason the first tagline was promoted is because people disrespected women just because they were women!
The most important thing would be to teach our girls to stand up for themselves. And before even thinking of educating our children on this, let’s just get one thing clear – “Log kya kahenge?” is a deadly disease! DO NOT TELL US GIRLS THAT YOUR “FAMILY’S HONOR” IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN OUR OWN! Do not tell us that “Boys are like that!”. Do not tell us to behave when you let your son throw tantrums! Do not ask us not to trust men. Ask your son to be a more trust-worthy human being! Teach the daughter how to protect herself, how to be bold and confident and how to raise her voice when she knows something’s just not right!
Every single time we’ve laughed off a rape joke, every time we’ve called a girl a “slut” for being around too many boys, every time we’ve called a boy a “pussy” for wearing pink or standing up for a girl, every time we’ve questioned why a rape victim was out late at night, or why she was in such a “provocative’” dress, every time we’ve brushed off someone’s claim saying “Arre! Who toh ladka hai na! Chalega, yaar!”, KNOW THAT WE’VE, IN THAT MOMENT, MARKED OURSELVES AS A SILENT CAUSE FOR THE ABUSE EVERY WOMAN HAS EVER FACED IN OUR COUNTRY!
Victim blaming stems from a culture that wants to dissociate itself from a rape case as far as is possible. When you say a woman is “asking for it” just because she wears a certain type of clothing that you don’t approve of, you promote slut-shaming! Every time you question why the victim was alone at the time of the crime, you promote rape culture! Get one thing straight- NO ONE EVER ASKS FOR IT!
We, the responsible citizens of the country, are as much to blame for these crimes as the real perpetrators. We’ve all been silently contributing to what’s called “THE BY-STANDER EFFECT”. We think it’s okay to watch someone get harassed from the sidelines, even make videos of the same sometimes! When will we learn that someday it could be us out there, left helpless, calling for help!?! Imagine the humiliation, the disgust and the general loss of faith in humanity we cause every time we decide that saving someone is just not worth our time! Remember, WITNESSING A CRIME HAPPEN AND NOT DOING ANYTHING ABOUT IT, IS JUST AS BAD COMITTING THE CRIME ITSELF. Let’s not be that unresponsive bystander that we claim to hate!
Now, to address the elephant in the room, the #NotAllMen enthusiasts – NOBODY THINKS ALL MEN! Do you really think you deserve trophies for having basic human decency? For not raping a woman? How insane are you? You are those bunch of smart-asses who want to make everything about yourselves. As soon as you feared your image will be tarnished, you ran and made a burning issue all about yourselves! You dived in to protect your big egos over the dignity of so many women! You should all be ashamed of yourselves! How irresponsible and insensitive it is to dissociate yourselves from everything with the use of a single hash-tag! The only way to finding a solution to the persistent crimes against women – is to first admit that WE DO HAVE A PROBLEM! If all of us keep running away, by saying that #NotAllMen abuse and #NotAllWomen are abused, we’ll only be doing what we Indians do best- playing the BLAME GAME! How will we be any different from the ministers that we stand up against?
I can almost hear some of you, shouting out there, “Men also get abused! You feminists, (whoops! My mistake) Feminazis don’t care about them, do you?” Of course, we do! You pseudo-intellectuals who claim to be “egalitarians”, I am really not sorry to be the one to break it to you- YOU ARE NOT! You’re just another bunch of people who don’t even understand feminism in the first place! FEMINISM IS ABOUT EQUALITY BUT WE CAN NEVER CALL IT EGALITARIANISM! You can’t just completely dissolve a movement just because it doesn’t suit to your needs. And about your claims- Yes, men get abused. And women fight for them! Read more about – CLICK HERE
And to all you “cool” boys and girls out there, who claim with so much pride that you aren’t feminists and just turn a blind eye towards anything that’s even remotely related to feminism, let me tell you- standing up in support of victims of abuse isn’t something only a feminist should do! Yes. It’s something a HUMAN SHOULD DO! And if you find pride and pleasure in sitting on your couches claiming that you don’t have anything to do with this, you’re deeply disillusioned. It’s not even about being a woman, or a feminist any more, it’s about BEING HUMAN! And if you think you’re too busy to stand up for the sake of humanity, there’s no hope for you. EVER! So, live happily in your shell and wait for the clock to tick, until one day the tables turn around and it’s you or your sister or your mother left as helpless as that girl who was molested just 50 meters away from her house! Until then, revel in your hypocrisy! Celebrate the bigotry!
It’s time to decide- IF YOU WANT TO WAIT UNTIL YOU’RE PUSHED DEEP INTO THIS ISSUE OR TAKE AN UNSELFISH STAND FOR SOMEONE JUST BECAUSE YOU SHOULD! WHAT WOULD IT TAKE FOR ALL OF US TO STAND UP FOR HUMANITY?
P.S: When I wrote this, contradictory reports of the alleged molestation of the burqa-clad woman had not emerged, yet this doesn’t disprove the facts stated! A survey conducted in 2013 in the state of MP, suggests that 48% of the rape victims were burqa-clad women and 41% of them were all in sarees!