India has begun to talk; about a lot of things. One of those things is sexual assault. But, with conversation comes the importance of getting it right. It is very easy to talk about this issue incorrectly. In fact, it happens everyday. From the mouths of our family to our friends; to celebrities and to politicians. You cannot have missed these glaring red flags in conversations about the issue of sexual assault.
1) ‘Yeh Bollywood ne sab bigada hai’ (This Bollywood has taught all these terrible things)
Ok, let’s get this straight. Yes, Bollywood has let women down on SEVERAL occasions. Yes, many item songs are part of these. But, let’s break this argument down in two parts.
A) Item songs are not the only problem in Bollywood movies. There are plenty of songs picturised on the hero of the film that are concerning. The most infamous is ‘Tu Mere Agal Bagal’ from Phata Poster Nikla Hero which had the lines ‘Tera picha karoon tho rokne ka nahi’ (Even if I follow you don’t you dare stop me). Yeah, no one’s talking about that because, again, the blame is always on the girl. Even fictional girls are not safe. Sonakshi Sinha is the biggest example of this. She stars in pathetic movies with her character being kissed without her permission, stalked, and harassed, but nothing is ever said of the hero who does all this. Shahid Kapoor, Akshay Kumar, can do whatever the hell they want because ‘Boys will be Boys’ but Sonakshi… how dare she?! Right? So, unless your argument about the correlation between Bollywood and sexual assault includes the disgusting antics by the men in the industry… don’t bring it up.
B) Having said this, Bollywood can’t influence people to actually sexually assault, as is implied by many people. If that were the case, engineering institutions would have radically changed their policies after 3 Idiots. Let’s stop making up yet another excuse to let the actual criminal go scot-free. Yes, Bollywood is a big part of our society. It plays a part in reinforcing the patriarchal notions of sex and power that our society creates for retaining the traditional roles of men and women. But it is not a causal relationship. It is a part of the problem and not the whole problem.
2) ‘Why was she there? Why was she wearing that? Why was she alone? Why was she there with a boy?’
Yeeeshh. So much ignorance. Stop blaming the victim. Stop blaming the survivor. Stop blaming everyone and everything but the criminal. ‘She’ has just as much a right to occupy public spaces as he does. Is this not her country? Is this not my country? She can wear whatever she wants. Mini skirt, dress, gown, jeans, salwar, sari, burqa, suit, etc… I could wear a bikini and walk outside if I wanted to and nobody would still have the right to lay their hand on me without my permission. Unless you’re willing to pay for hiring a bodyguard for every girl then she has every right to go wherever she pleases alone. So, it’s my fault if I’m alone and it’s my fault if I’m with a boy?! What, am I supposed to go places with freaking Narsimha?! These arguments do one, and only one, thing. They make women feel like no matter what they do it is always their fault. Then why even go to court? Why fight for justice when the world has already decided that it is my fault?
3) ‘Not all men rape’
Congratulations! You’ve just reached the ‘DUH’ room! What this one sentence does, especially when said by a man, is it shows the person you’re conversing with that you’re much more interested in saving the self-esteem of men than discussing the issue of rape. Sure, not all men rape. I’m sure you won’t find a single person who disagrees with that. So, when discussing rape why is it that we feel the need to reinforce that? Maybe, it’s because we’ve always valued, as a society, the problems of certain groups (in this case men) more than the problems of others. So, the gross act of sexual assault against women becomes less important than the inconvenience men feel when us feminists don’t specify the list of men who are rapists. Oh, my bad. Not ALL men are inconvenienced.
4) ‘Real men don’t _____’
Now this one’s harmful effects are trickier to understand. It’s often used in public service announcements encouraging men to learn how sexual assault like street harassment, molestation, or rape is wrong. Just Google ‘Real men don’t rape’ and you’ll find an umpteen number of hits, particularly videos, of people telling you how ‘real men don’t rape’. The problem with this is that, actually, real men are raping. You heard that right, folks! All these rapists are real and not a figment of the world’s imagination. What we are really doing is invalidating the millions of people who have suffered and are still suffering through the various forms of sexual assault. The problem is that real men do do this and we should focus on educating and reforming these mentalities rather than pretending we can just ‘Reset’.
5) ‘What if she was your *insert relationship*?
This one always bothered me. Because for some reason, sexual assault is the only crime we use this ‘problem-solving method’ for. Think about it. We don’t tell pickpocketers ‘What if this pocket was your father’s or sister’s?’ We don’t tell people ‘The person you might murder could have been your grandmother so don’t murder.’ No. We just say ‘Don’t murder because it is humanely and morally wrong to do that to another human being.’ Which is where the fundamental problem with this ‘PSA style bullshit’ comes in. We are teaching people, especially boys, to see women as something other than human beings. The only thing stopping you from harassing me on the street, from molesting me, or from raping me should NOT be that I might, in some parallel universe, be related to you. I am a human being. And that’s why you shouldn’t sexually assault me. I couldn’t care less for being your sister or mother. I have a tigress of a sister and a lioness of a mother already, thank you very much.
So, there you have it people: some of the problems that commonly arise from discussions surrounding sexual assault. This isn’t intended to be a complete list but we all know that saying too much many a times dilutes it all. I hope that I have managed to bring out the importance of tackling this issue in the right places and not becoming the Khap Panchayat and blaming cell phones or Chowmein. If you have any more to add or have any personal stories, feel free to comment below! Let’s start talking India!
1) ‘Yeh Bollywood ne sab bigada hai’ (This Bollywood has taught all these terrible things)
Ok, let’s get this straight. Yes, Bollywood has let women down on SEVERAL occasions. Yes, many item songs are part of these. But, let’s break this argument down in two parts.
A) Item songs are not the only problem in Bollywood movies. There are plenty of songs picturised on the hero of the film that are concerning. The most infamous is ‘Tu Mere Agal Bagal’ from Phata Poster Nikla Hero which had the lines ‘Tera picha karoon tho rokne ka nahi’ (Even if I follow you don’t you dare stop me). Yeah, no one’s talking about that because, again, the blame is always on the girl. Even fictional girls are not safe. Sonakshi Sinha is the biggest example of this. She stars in pathetic movies with her character being kissed without her permission, stalked, and harassed, but nothing is ever said of the hero who does all this. Shahid Kapoor, Akshay Kumar, can do whatever the hell they want because ‘Boys will be Boys’ but Sonakshi… how dare she?! Right? So, unless your argument about the correlation between Bollywood and sexual assault includes the disgusting antics by the men in the industry… don’t bring it up.
B) Having said this, Bollywood can’t influence people to actually sexually assault, as is implied by many people. If that were the case, engineering institutions would have radically changed their policies after 3 Idiots. Let’s stop making up yet another excuse to let the actual criminal go scot-free. Yes, Bollywood is a big part of our society. It plays a part in reinforcing the patriarchal notions of sex and power that our society creates for retaining the traditional roles of men and women. But it is not a causal relationship. It is a part of the problem and not the whole problem.
2) ‘Why was she there? Why was she wearing that? Why was she alone? Why was she there with a boy?’
Yeeeshh. So much ignorance. Stop blaming the victim. Stop blaming the survivor. Stop blaming everyone and everything but the criminal. ‘She’ has just as much a right to occupy public spaces as he does. Is this not her country? Is this not my country? She can wear whatever she wants. Mini skirt, dress, gown, jeans, salwar, sari, burqa, suit, etc… I could wear a bikini and walk outside if I wanted to and nobody would still have the right to lay their hand on me without my permission. Unless you’re willing to pay for hiring a bodyguard for every girl then she has every right to go wherever she pleases alone. So, it’s my fault if I’m alone and it’s my fault if I’m with a boy?! What, am I supposed to go places with freaking Narsimha?! These arguments do one, and only one, thing. They make women feel like no matter what they do it is always their fault. Then why even go to court? Why fight for justice when the world has already decided that it is my fault?
3) ‘Not all men rape’
Congratulations! You’ve just reached the ‘DUH’ room! What this one sentence does, especially when said by a man, is it shows the person you’re conversing with that you’re much more interested in saving the self-esteem of men than discussing the issue of rape. Sure, not all men rape. I’m sure you won’t find a single person who disagrees with that. So, when discussing rape why is it that we feel the need to reinforce that? Maybe, it’s because we’ve always valued, as a society, the problems of certain groups (in this case men) more than the problems of others. So, the gross act of sexual assault against women becomes less important than the inconvenience men feel when us feminists don’t specify the list of men who are rapists. Oh, my bad. Not ALL men are inconvenienced.
4) ‘Real men don’t _____’
Now this one’s harmful effects are trickier to understand. It’s often used in public service announcements encouraging men to learn how sexual assault like street harassment, molestation, or rape is wrong. Just Google ‘Real men don’t rape’ and you’ll find an umpteen number of hits, particularly videos, of people telling you how ‘real men don’t rape’. The problem with this is that, actually, real men are raping. You heard that right, folks! All these rapists are real and not a figment of the world’s imagination. What we are really doing is invalidating the millions of people who have suffered and are still suffering through the various forms of sexual assault. The problem is that real men do do this and we should focus on educating and reforming these mentalities rather than pretending we can just ‘Reset’.
5) ‘What if she was your *insert relationship*?
This one always bothered me. Because for some reason, sexual assault is the only crime we use this ‘problem-solving method’ for. Think about it. We don’t tell pickpocketers ‘What if this pocket was your father’s or sister’s?’ We don’t tell people ‘The person you might murder could have been your grandmother so don’t murder.’ No. We just say ‘Don’t murder because it is humanely and morally wrong to do that to another human being.’ Which is where the fundamental problem with this ‘PSA style bullshit’ comes in. We are teaching people, especially boys, to see women as something other than human beings. The only thing stopping you from harassing me on the street, from molesting me, or from raping me should NOT be that I might, in some parallel universe, be related to you. I am a human being. And that’s why you shouldn’t sexually assault me. I couldn’t care less for being your sister or mother. I have a tigress of a sister and a lioness of a mother already, thank you very much.
So, there you have it people: some of the problems that commonly arise from discussions surrounding sexual assault. This isn’t intended to be a complete list but we all know that saying too much many a times dilutes it all. I hope that I have managed to bring out the importance of tackling this issue in the right places and not becoming the Khap Panchayat and blaming cell phones or Chowmein. If you have any more to add or have any personal stories, feel free to comment below! Let’s start talking India!