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The Bangalore incident on the New Year’s Eve is a gruesome reminder of many such previous incidents in Mumbai, Kolkata et al and the fact that not much has changed over the years when it comes to women’s safety. The male section of our society often tends to use ‘alcohol’ as an excuse and ‘mobs’ and ‘crowds’ as shields and disguise to harass women among them. And it somehow gives them some sort of a kick or Adrenalin rush or some sort of sense of adventure.
We keep on harping about treating women with ‘respect’ but what baffles me is ‘understanding’ even before ‘respect’. Why is it so difficult to understand a woman’s – or rather a person’s – right to her own body? Many men now condemn rape as horrific and criminal, but why is groping and eve teasing taken so lightly? Even the dictionaries are seemingly diplomatic about the harsh choirs of groping (Grope (verb) - fondle for sexual pleasure; Fondle (verb) - touch or stroke lightly in a loving or endearing manner). But there is nothing loving and endearing about being rudely touched by a stranger without your permission. The moment a girl feels an uninvited hand grab her body she is filled with confusion, vulnerability and unequivocal disgust. Why do men not understand that it’s not their prerogative to have an overriding right on a woman’s body just because chance made them male? Leave alone just women, every living being, human or otherwise, has an un-abrogable right to their bodies and nobody – I repeat, nobody – should mess with that.
Time and again people use mobs and crowds to get away with things that are not allowed or forbidden. People have gotten away with heinous crimes like sexual assaults and murders. The problem is in a crowd not only is it difficult to identify culprits but also to fix responsibility. Men grope women all the time using crowds as an excuse – in public transport, in queues, in cinema halls; and then behave as if nothing happened or as if they do not even understand why we are glaring at them. Subways, public transport systems and crowded streets are prolific breeding grounds for those lurking with bated breath to viciously cross lines on some clueless figures. There’s no categorical description of groping because it happens all the time in literally every imaginable situation. We ask ourselves why it happens to us and we even ask guys why they do it. But I still can’t fully grasp the reason behind the uninvited, unwanted touching. What is it about human nature that basically makes one attempt to make others feel a way they would not want to feel themselves? Do guys who harass girls feel powerful because they can shift their own vulnerability onto someone else – a woman? If a woman yells back, the perpetrator can be quite pleased because they’ve upset her and reached their goal of projective identification. They know she cannot prove anything. It’s just her word against their own. Groping has become a UFO phenomenon. Even if you have witnessed one, reporting it becomes a problem, for the lack of validational elements.
In a culturally old-fashioned society where the boys are not allowed to feel emotions, they are allowed to inflict them on women, who again are traditionally subjugated as a weaker sex. The worst part is girls are also part of these societal expectations, where it’s far too common that sexual harassment can cost a woman her reputation. It’s the biggest cultural problem in terms of maintaining a culture of sexual harassment.
Most men today try to come out as empathetic and aware of women’s right to security. Some consider it a fad and brag that they are not like those people “who do such things.” “Not All Men” is the new trend. And yet women are groped everyday and everywhere. Not all men grope. But most who grope are men. And it’s not even taken seriously. Victims of groping, take protection under the compassionate blanket of ‘once bitten twice shy’ and are constantly on the alert. Whereas a groper is susceptibly high on the maxim, ‘once a groper always a groper’ because he can easily get away with it. It is like being inside an esteemed museum. We see the warning, “LOOK, BUT DON’T TOUCH.” However, we all know the rhetoric potential of that sign. There will always be those who will want to just touch it, for the sheer thrill. The excitement. In other words, an erroneous sense of intellect that it is their birth right to touch it.
Practically and sadly, there is no end to groping. Only a heightened sense of awareness, and a belligerent trickle of proactive and preemptive remedial measures that can be put in place to tame and subdue this disturbing deed. But how do you reach that stage until men can be made to feel that “they cannot get away with it.”
