Just when I’m about to log out of my FB account I come across a breaking news. Yet another gang rape. In Mumbai now. A 22 yr old photographer. By five men.
Four or five years back, I would probably have felt enraged. Clicked on the link and read the article in full detail, silently express my rage. Curse the men who did it.
Not anymore. They say India will never cease to amaze you. But in this aspect, it has. Every new rape case, for me, is just a reminder of how some things will just never change in our country. That it’s a country full of hypocrites only, who worship goddesses like Lakshmi and Kali in the day, and become Ravanas in the night. Actually, wait. My bad... Even Ravana respected Sita when he kidnapped her. Not these animals.
Hypocrites. Seems too clichéd a word to describe my fellow citizens. It doesn't seem too powerful a word either, to express what I have in mind. For lack of a better, stronger word let me stick with it.
Let me start by rewinding close to a decade back. Bangalore it is. The peak of the IT boom. A woman by the name Pratibha gets raped and murdered.
As a teen, this was the first time I personally noticed outrage among people. Calls for better public security were made. More protection for women deemed necessary. Companies respond. Introduce more security for those travelling in cabs. Women shall not be dropped last, smart login facilities in the cabs, and more.
The government responds too. Not by better policing; but by banning women in midnight shifts. The message? We can't protect you, go hide instead.
Nothing uncommon in our country. Safety first, our elders teach us. And so we believe. We believe the lies that have been fed for generations now.
Safety first may have worked at first. So well that it convinced its advisors of its infallibility. Conveniently, it was also the perfect excuse to avoid responsibility.
It has evolved into a mass delusion today. A delusion that as long as you hide, you are safe. It may work initially, but ultimately it will fail. As the saying goes, you can run but you can't hide.
It is a disgusting delusion. People sit quietly as girls around them left, right and centre get hurt. Not just fathers but mothers too. Always blaming the girl for not taking enough precaution. Convinced of the righteousness of their sons.
It is all a part of being Indian. Being Indian means being adjustable.This adjustment phenomena may be poked fun of in underwear ads, but it goes much deeper than that.
We Indians have always found comfort in adjustment, even taking pride at it sometimes. I've never understood that. What is in reality our failure to solve a problem we pass off as adjustment. For 60 plus years we have done that. Now it’s time to pay the price.
A month or so back, I came across this song by the Manic Street Preachers. It said, "If you tolerate this, then your children will be next".
How perfectly that line fits the current situation in our country. Our parents and their parents tolerated it during their time and now, we, their kids, will pay the price.
It’s not this that disgusts me. They may have had reasons to stay silent when this problems of rape started budding, but they certainly shouldn't now. Instead, they are busy brainwashing another generation about the benefits of adjustment, breeding another generation of monsters along with it.
People may curse and call for strict punishment when they hear of new rape cases, but fail to realize the role they themselves are playing in the occurrence of such incidents. They will call for stricter punishment, but completely ignore the reason why this menace continues to plague the country.
Guys may call for the rapists' heads to roll, but won't stop dominating over their own sisters. They enjoy movies where the girl is always forced to seek a hero to rescue her, permanently accepting that a girl is always weak, and needs a rescuer every time she is in trouble.
How many will get her to take self-defence classes instead? Or buy her pepper spray? Anything, in fact, for her to protect herself? Or even more conveniently, they will get her married off, blaming her youth as potential invitation for trouble and eager to wash themselves of the responsibility to protect her.
It is this kind of attitude that will make obsolete any law we bring in to deter rapists. Both the media and the public keep harping about how tougher laws are needed to deter rapists. But will it work in a country like ours? There are lakhs of rape cases pending in the country, many pending for years or decades; how will rapists be deterred? As long as the perception of women as weak is not changed, there will be no deterrence for rapists, change whatever you will.
Take into account the police too. A majority of them again have a chauvinistic attitude towards rapes. We have heard plenty about policemen themselves involved in rapes, or dealing in an equally disgusting manner with rape victims. Will bringing in harsher punishment be enough to deter these law enforcers themselves?
Women have also become easy targets to express men’s frustrations. Among men of socio-economic class, they not only get to exert their male dominance, it becomes an outlet for other economic frustration too. For the upper-class men, it is a way to continue to remind women that however ‘modern’ they might appear to be, they will always be a level below men.
Then of course, there is marital rape to consider. And rape by family members themselves, who mostly go unpunished as the fear of losing public ‘prestige’ is too great for other members to even consider the pain of the victim.
With such bigger problems to solve, is it really going to be enough to bring in harsher punishment? It is time we simply went along with the chorus, but also actually reflect on the causal problems. And not just reflect on it but also act on it.
If this menace is to be eradicated, the change needs to start with our mindset and attitude, not just voicing out loud public opinions to look good in front of others. And time will tell if we have been honest to ourselves. After all, there really is no escaping this menace.... if you tolerate this, then your children will be next indeed.
Four or five years back, I would probably have felt enraged. Clicked on the link and read the article in full detail, silently express my rage. Curse the men who did it.
Not anymore. They say India will never cease to amaze you. But in this aspect, it has. Every new rape case, for me, is just a reminder of how some things will just never change in our country. That it’s a country full of hypocrites only, who worship goddesses like Lakshmi and Kali in the day, and become Ravanas in the night. Actually, wait. My bad... Even Ravana respected Sita when he kidnapped her. Not these animals.
Hypocrites. Seems too clichéd a word to describe my fellow citizens. It doesn't seem too powerful a word either, to express what I have in mind. For lack of a better, stronger word let me stick with it.
Let me start by rewinding close to a decade back. Bangalore it is. The peak of the IT boom. A woman by the name Pratibha gets raped and murdered.
As a teen, this was the first time I personally noticed outrage among people. Calls for better public security were made. More protection for women deemed necessary. Companies respond. Introduce more security for those travelling in cabs. Women shall not be dropped last, smart login facilities in the cabs, and more.
The government responds too. Not by better policing; but by banning women in midnight shifts. The message? We can't protect you, go hide instead.
Nothing uncommon in our country. Safety first, our elders teach us. And so we believe. We believe the lies that have been fed for generations now.
Safety first may have worked at first. So well that it convinced its advisors of its infallibility. Conveniently, it was also the perfect excuse to avoid responsibility.
It has evolved into a mass delusion today. A delusion that as long as you hide, you are safe. It may work initially, but ultimately it will fail. As the saying goes, you can run but you can't hide.
It is a disgusting delusion. People sit quietly as girls around them left, right and centre get hurt. Not just fathers but mothers too. Always blaming the girl for not taking enough precaution. Convinced of the righteousness of their sons.
It is all a part of being Indian. Being Indian means being adjustable.This adjustment phenomena may be poked fun of in underwear ads, but it goes much deeper than that.
We Indians have always found comfort in adjustment, even taking pride at it sometimes. I've never understood that. What is in reality our failure to solve a problem we pass off as adjustment. For 60 plus years we have done that. Now it’s time to pay the price.
A month or so back, I came across this song by the Manic Street Preachers. It said, "If you tolerate this, then your children will be next".
How perfectly that line fits the current situation in our country. Our parents and their parents tolerated it during their time and now, we, their kids, will pay the price.
It’s not this that disgusts me. They may have had reasons to stay silent when this problems of rape started budding, but they certainly shouldn't now. Instead, they are busy brainwashing another generation about the benefits of adjustment, breeding another generation of monsters along with it.
People may curse and call for strict punishment when they hear of new rape cases, but fail to realize the role they themselves are playing in the occurrence of such incidents. They will call for stricter punishment, but completely ignore the reason why this menace continues to plague the country.
Guys may call for the rapists' heads to roll, but won't stop dominating over their own sisters. They enjoy movies where the girl is always forced to seek a hero to rescue her, permanently accepting that a girl is always weak, and needs a rescuer every time she is in trouble.
How many will get her to take self-defence classes instead? Or buy her pepper spray? Anything, in fact, for her to protect herself? Or even more conveniently, they will get her married off, blaming her youth as potential invitation for trouble and eager to wash themselves of the responsibility to protect her.
It is this kind of attitude that will make obsolete any law we bring in to deter rapists. Both the media and the public keep harping about how tougher laws are needed to deter rapists. But will it work in a country like ours? There are lakhs of rape cases pending in the country, many pending for years or decades; how will rapists be deterred? As long as the perception of women as weak is not changed, there will be no deterrence for rapists, change whatever you will.
Take into account the police too. A majority of them again have a chauvinistic attitude towards rapes. We have heard plenty about policemen themselves involved in rapes, or dealing in an equally disgusting manner with rape victims. Will bringing in harsher punishment be enough to deter these law enforcers themselves?
Women have also become easy targets to express men’s frustrations. Among men of socio-economic class, they not only get to exert their male dominance, it becomes an outlet for other economic frustration too. For the upper-class men, it is a way to continue to remind women that however ‘modern’ they might appear to be, they will always be a level below men.
Then of course, there is marital rape to consider. And rape by family members themselves, who mostly go unpunished as the fear of losing public ‘prestige’ is too great for other members to even consider the pain of the victim.
With such bigger problems to solve, is it really going to be enough to bring in harsher punishment? It is time we simply went along with the chorus, but also actually reflect on the causal problems. And not just reflect on it but also act on it.
If this menace is to be eradicated, the change needs to start with our mindset and attitude, not just voicing out loud public opinions to look good in front of others. And time will tell if we have been honest to ourselves. After all, there really is no escaping this menace.... if you tolerate this, then your children will be next indeed.
