'One kiss?'

nosianai

@Indianworker,

It is not just about Indian women not being able to stand up for themselves because they are submissive. There is the threat of "shame" not just for the girl but her entire family! For example, in many movies the raped girl is killed off or kills herself since "there is no life for her after rape". Or, in reality, many times the girl's family tries to solve the problem by marrying the girl to her assailant. Can you even imagine this humiliation? Or they say the girl "eloped".

I am not making this up. It was one of the topics in my course "social problems in India", and if you look at this, it is not surprising why women in India choose to bear an attack alone.

You see, one reason I can think of why your Indian friends at the night club did not quite understand your reaction may be (I am only guessing here) because in India, the woman is not necessarily seen as the victim. Many times she is considered easy even though she has been the victim of an assault. People here like to point their fingers and if a woman has been assaulted something must have been wrong with her. In India, it is very important to keep up a public image.

Finally, I recommend the movie Bawandar. It fits this discussion so perfectly. I saw it in a hall in Bangalore in 2001 and boy, the hall was almost empty. After seeing the movie you may want to think why is that.

srthompson917

Gertie-

So sorry to hear about your situation at the City Centre. I myself had not had anyone do this, but my best advice is to stay very aware of your surroundings. I think the comment made to wear a sindoor is good advice. Walk confidently and purposefully. Don't ever look lost and if unsure where you are - just wait and ask the best dressed woman you find. This is advice I received when I moved to Chicago years ago and find it works well for India too! (Well the sindoor advice I didn't get for Chicago, but the rest applies!)

Nick-H

The difference in perception of foreign women and Indian women by Indian men is very simple: Foreign women have sex; Indian women do not.

If you look back to Britain in the 1950s, we had exactly the same idea about long-legged, blonde Scandinavian girls: not only did we think them wondrously beautiful (whether we'd ever seen one or not), we also thought them from a more permissive culture and more likely to have sex.

All these ideas, stereotypes, perceptions etc etc can be challenged and may be found to be wrong. There is plenty of infidelity in India, just as there was in 1950s UK. But the perceptions are there.

As for the modern films and the dance scenes --- I find them disgusting, with their mimes of intercourse but not so much as an actual kiss. But then, I hate the film music, which doesn't predispose me towards the films!

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gertie

Thanks for all the replies.

What I can't understand is how anyone, regardless of their level of education or exposure to media, can possibly think it is acceptable to objectify and violate another person.

You may have guessed from my first post that I was angry. Having had time to think about it, I am fuming. That a phrase such as 'eve-teasing' even exists makes my blood boil. That some men, for want of a better word, think its a joke to harrass a woman makes me mad. That the police are ineffectual at best, abusive at worst drives me insane. That ten women show up in Delhi for a march against sexual harrassment frustrates me.

I don't care about how many films these 'men' have watched, or what clothes the woman was wearing at the time. This kind of behaviour is wrong, plain and simple. Thats not an ethnocentric viewpoint, its a fact.

How would the man who grabbed my butt feel if another man did that to his sister?

And whilst I appreciate the suggestion of wearing sindoor, and I understand the poster's context, I wholeheartedly resent the implication that unmarried women are fair game. It shouldn't make one iota of difference if you are married, unmarried, foreign, Indian, wearing a saree, wearing a skirt, rich, poor or an alien with three heads!

Ah, for Utopia...

Rant over!

Gertie

phantom

As somebody has already mentioned that this is more of "law and order" problem than a cultural issue, I strongly believe in that. Men do it coz they think that they can get away with it.

I wouldnt say that indian girls are submissive, at least not the ones of my generation and later. I have seen young school girls who, after being groped, ran after the boy and get him handed over to the policemen, during school festivals. And I have seen girls laugh it over after they get away from that person. Its more a question of the girl's personality which has nothing to do with culture. Some are introverts/shy and some are extroverts and aggressive.

phantom

And it doesnt.. no matter what you wear, no matter if you are married or not, foreign or indian, if you go into a crowd, there's always a possibility of a grope, if you are walking alone in the evening, theres always a possibility of someone making an 'indecent proposal'. As I said before, law and order has a lot to do with the problem and not the films or any other media.. !!

shashank.aggarwal

hey Gertie, I understand how frustrated you might be feeling. However no one is trying justify these actions. Its just the reasoning that is being given.

They are culprits, they are plagued by a very small thought process, they consider women as an object. This is a very deep problem in India, I am sure that this would be there in other parts of the world, but this is worse in India..

I have no words to pacify you..as I am myself feeling ashamed by all these things..

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gertie

Hey, I'm just having a vent.

I completely understand no one is trying to justify sexual harrassment - they couldn't if they tried!

There are stupid, ignorant people the world over - your comment about the 'small thought process' made me laugh! So, so true!

I guess the important thing is that discussions about this kind of behaviour are opening up, and awareness is the precursor to change.

Cheers,
Gertie

shashank.aggarwal

Phantom, I feel that these problems goes deeper than the law and order...its about the mental attitude..

Infact I mentioned earlier that it was about education, but even that is not entirely correct..

Now when I sit back and think about it, I realise that the people who have moved up social circle or seem more cultured, they also have the same mindset..its just that they will not do these things physically, they in their mind they are no less...

not going much further, lemme admit it..it gets frustrating for me to sit my best and close freinds..even though they are well educated people with decent jobs and business, but somehwere they have the same mentality, if a girl is wearing a skirt and someone harasses her, they will simply say that the girl is at fault and what was the need to wear a skirt..even they believe that girls needs to covered up all the time..

They need a life-partner who is preserved (read virgin), however they will never see what they have been doing all these years..

its not about law and order..law and order can only help to avoid the physical incidents..but its about the mind..unless and untill that changes .. nothing concrete will materialise..

Nick-H

Shashank, I nearly responded to your comment about education, but couldn't order my thoughts into words. You have done so yourself.

Indeed no-one has tried to justify, I don't think one word has come anywhere of justification.

nosianai

I agree. None of this should make a difference. But it does. The sindoor (or any other visible sign of marriage like chudas or mangalsutra) brings down encounters with those apes close to zero. It's almost as if this signifies that someone already owns you, has made his claim on you, so for some reason those monkeys stay put (Now we all know wives are seen as property around here). It's annoying, but it keeps you safe, and though it's great to have this discussion here, none of this will have any impact whatsoever.
It is one of the issues that leaves Indians surprisingly complacent. Nobody cares enough to make a ruckus. It's not cricket.

lotus blossom

oh, but a western woman, speaking for myself, can also fully understand this pleasure BB. upon returning home, never have i felt so free of this harrassment. i no longer have to be hypervigilant ALL of the time, which made it a real chore just to go out whilst in india. i got to the point where i didn't even want to go out, it got so bad.

this was my 4th trip to india, and i can say that i had never experienced the level or intensity of harrasment as i did this last time. even bringing the issue to this forum produced the attitude that this is just india. bullocks to that thinking!

when i was attacked on the ghats in varanasi, a place that i love btw, i realized that i need to learn some swift self-defense moves. because i don't do violence and my voice does not carry far, especially in open spaces. when i relayed the incident to the director of a women's domestic violence shelter she told me that indian men see me as an easy and willing target because of their conceptions about western women. of course, we've all heard this before, but in truth, that's a flimsy excuse. i have a lot of indian guy friends that have the manners and intelligence not to abuse women in this degrading nature.

i am sorry that you experienced that gertie. it is such a violation. i fear that the problem is only growing worse with the titillatiing programs being aired on indian t.v., so self-defense seems a good thing to consider. the worst position to be in is as a helpless victim. and if some of the lechers experience a swift kick or a karate chop, they might start thinking twice before messing with women!

yes, i understand this too. the more i thought about the attack that happened to me, the more enrgaged i became, because as women we have to endure this sh*t all of our lives. and when it happens to us we can more completely empathize with our sisters; some of whom deal with this violence on a continual basis.

but, i realized that if i let my anger continue to eat away at me, and since it was my breast that the attacker grabbed and mutilated, there was the potential for a cancerous growth to develop if i kept the poison inside of me. i do think that anger can be an effective fuel however, that can help us to rise up against injustice. it's just important not to keep it locked up inside, so thanks for bringing this issue here for dialogue.

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ISN

That is exactly what my sister would do, you have to learn the local laws, if you find a stranger trying to break into your house in Texas, USA the first thing you do is shoot and then ask questions. In India if you face harassment like this first thing you do is react and then ask questions. Recently my sister-in-law had to deal with a horrible situation, she was walking on a street and there were no pedestrians at that time and a guy who was on the bicycle spit on her and took off, she was shocked and helpless. I did not know how to console her.

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Brigit

just to through in my penny, I do as all my Indian family has told me to. I answer men with a real question, ignore those who try to talk in an ok kind of way, and slap the ones who have the wrong tone of voice or say the wrong kind of things.
Thats what my sister in laws do. Although less men who don't know them try to talk to them at all (thats just not on, talking to a person of the opissit sex who you don't know!)
It helps take out all the other stresses of living in India and its great when their mothers see and add to the slapping.
Also just a note, I get more hassle when wearing sari then in jeans and t shirt with sindor and mungalsutra.
How ever the sindor and munglesutra do tend to mean I get much more looked after in othe situations for exsample traveling with out my husband.
With the marks of a married woman I become DiDi to the people at the ticket counter or imergration or where ever. Very helpful.

shashank.aggarwal

fyi ..Didi means elder sister !!