Is being vulnerable the same as
being weak? I have been thinking about this the last month, when in the wake of
the Delhi gang-rape and many subsequent rape incidents, like all other women I
too have dramatically increased my safety precautions.
I still remember my first brush
with the word ‘rape’. I was 8 years old and on holiday in Delhi, when I
overheard my grandmother telling the story of a movie to a friend. When she
said the word as it appeared in the fairly common revenge sagas of the
Bollywood films of that era; she was unable and unwilling to tell me the
meaning. A year later in the same city, I was standing by my father when news
came of the ravaged body of a young girl my age being discovered near the “safe”
neighborhood of Som Vihar. He was horrified and concerned but when I asked what
had happened, all he said was “something very bad.” It would be years before I
understood the meaning of the word and ever since then I have never felt truly
safe.
I still remember the outrage I
felt as a teenager at a Bollywood movie where the heroine is forced to marry
her rapist and then gradually falls in love with him! Easy as it is, the blame
does not wholly belong to Bollywood. The film industry creates stories about our
society & culture as it is and those that we pay money to see. Marrying the
victim to the rapist was considered a ‘solution’ by many! The current trend of
popular box office winners is not so different than it was twenty years ago.
It’s still the macho misogynist films which reduce worthy actresses to “items”
that do well in pulling in the crowds and the money. The women are objects with
hot bodies, revealing clothes and the shame is theirs when men are driven to
lust. We see victims as vamps. As women, we must be careful not to provoke. To
hold ourselves in, to hold ourselves back, to shrink into ourselves to avoid
the lustful gazes we cannot avoid.
I still remember how violated I
felt at every incident of sexual harassment I have suffered. The old man who
groped me outside Dadar station, the young boys who brushed pass me on crowded
streets, the elderly relative who hugged me a little too long as my family
watched benignly, the classmate who thought stalking me would get my attention….they
are all equivalent to rapists to me. They saw an opportunity to assault or
threaten me and took it. What if the window of that opportunity was wider?
Would they stop from going further? I wonder. Perhaps, they wonder too.
I understand the women who have
bought guns in the last month. I had thought about it too. If the government
can’t protect us, then the least it can do is turn a blind eye when we protect ourselves.
Yes, I understand there is potential of misuse. In fact I would want to deliberately
misuse this as would every other woman. Why should we not misuse our freedom as
much as those who target us misuse theirs? I would pull the trigger at the
slightest threat while perhaps prosecuting lawyers would prefer I wait until
the narrow legal definition of rape is satisfied so they can agree that I was truly
victimized. Perhaps they find it easier to deal with me as the victim instead
of the vigilante who did the job that they were supposed to and quite unable or
unwilling or most likely, both.
The truth is that while some men may be predators, it’s the so-called protectors I resent and rage against. Women
are told to keep themselves safe but men are taught different. The same fathers
and brothers who talk of honour are the ones who sometimes tell their daughters
and sisters to let an incident go. Our fears and resentments are dismissed as
‘little things’ and if it comes to the big thing that no one likes to mention
then often enough it’s the victim who is put to shame. Everyone, whether family or friend or neighbor
or colleague, feels the right to comment on how a woman looks and what she
wears. If she’s going somewhere, there’s a huge discussion on the modes of
transport. Is teaching us to live in fear the only way to keep us safe?
This is not a ‘woman only’
problem, as some journalists have pointed out. It is a social disease and its
rampant spread is an indication of a sickness in society. From almost the
moment of conception, females are treated differently. Yes some go so far as to
outright reject and abort or abandon a girl child. Yet even those who keep her
are not as kind as they might believe. She is fed less, educated less and
constantly told that she cannot do all that her brother can. And even when she
grows up and proves them wrong, she is consistently given subtle and direct
messages that she is less of a person than a man. Either she is cossetted or
she is neglected – in both situations, she is taught to see herself as something
less.
And when the woman is treated as
an equal in her home and/or her workplace, the self-esteem & confidence she
builds is respected only in her home and/or her workplace. In commuting, she
encounters the ‘other’ society that still claims she is less and is eager to
remind her of it and put her ‘in her place.’ Cab, bus and rickshaw drivers,
fellow passengers, random people on the street – with their indifference,
disrespect and lewd behavior make her aware of her vulnerability. It is in
these public spaces that she needs to feel safe – to know that she can travel
to and from home, safely without threat.
Today many companies are taking
their own measures to protect their women employees. Tomorrow there’s a fear that
they might decide that it’s easier not to hire or promote women at all. Broader
changes in the work culture that apply to both men and women might serve us all
better.
Today, we need to accept that it
is not the “dented and painted women” who are leading the country astray but
the demented and tainted politicians, self-styled ‘godmen’ and other self-appointed
‘morality keepers’ who care more for pointing fingers at others for political
mileage than actually doing something actually useful for society.
Today, the public blame and shame
is shifting as it needs to. It’s not the victim but the villain who needs to be
identified and shamed. Nirbhaya/Damini fought bravely for 13 days and gave her
testimony twice before she died. The villains have been identified and
hopefully, they will not escape the full weight of justice in a maze of
loopholes and technicalities. Let them not get away with a light sentence. And
have much harsher punishments for all the degrees of verbal and physical harassment
and abuse that women face. Let the intent count more than merely the window of
opportunity in deciding the punishment.
Today, with widespread media
coverage and finally, an outburst of public outrage, I doubt any of my nieces
and nephews will ever enjoy the innocent interlude from the concept of rape
that my generation did. Hopefully, this means that they will also not be the
vulnerable prey we were to sexual harassment and abuse; which we found
uncomfortable but didn’t know enough to complain about. We were bound into a
conspiracy of silence because we didn’t have the vocabulary to break it. Today
the silence is broken. It is a step forward.
Today, we need to understand that the weakness of a woman does not make a man strong. Strength is not just physical brute force, strength also means the courage to look at oneself and control one's behaviour.
And if every woman is vulnerable,
then by the same logic, is every man a potential predator? Just as most strange
men look at me as if I am a ‘thing’ not a person, should I look at them as ‘potential
rapists’ not people?
Behind this body
That you leer at,
There is a person.
Behind this face
That you stare at,
There are thoughts.
Behind this chest
That you follow with
your eyes,
There are feelings.
I am more -
More that you’ll ever
know.
I don’t know
If behind the letch,
There is a person?
If behind the obvious
Pop-eyed fantasies,
There are thoughts?
If behind the creepy
Looks that molest,
There are feelings?
I don’t know you
&
You don’t know me -
So why do we act as
if we do?
