Slut Walk

The international "Slut Walk" movement that began in Toronto and went around the world was supposed to happen in Delhi on Jun25 2011. Not sure if it did go ahead. If it did, I doubt if the men who were targeted even began to get the message.

No two people are the same. You cannot designate behaviour to an area, a city, a country or a culture. You will constantly be proved wrong. I can honestly say that most of my friends, colleagues and acquaintances of the opposite sex are relaxed in the company of women. Women, to them are just other human beings to laugh with, to have a chat with and enjoy being with, as are other men.

Still one unavoidably meets others who foist their unwanted attention on women. This is how they try and justify themselves: 

• ·        women who wear tight or skimpy clothes are asking for it, whatever “it” is.
• ·        women who smile and chat with them aren’t simply being friendly but asking for it
• ·        women who are out and about by themselves are asking for the same “it”
• ·        women who go out with a man before marriage are also asking for it (from any man, especially from themselves)
• ·        if women are asking for it, they are only too ready to give it
• ·        that a man is only giving a woman what she deserves when he rapes he
• ·        that his lust which makes him paw her or rape her in the first place is an issue to be sidelined 
• .     that his desire to "punish" her legitimises his lust
• .     that society has to overlook his lust and give his actions credence because he says he only wants to dish out deserved punishment. 
• ·        that his having no control over his lust isn’t the issue. 
• ·        that traumatising another human being isn’t the issue

To change their mind set will take more than a slut walk. If anything, a slut walk will reinforce their conviction that they can and should do all of the above with impunity.

To change their mind set will take these men to start thinking of women as human beings, equal in intellect and sharing a common bond of humanity. More than anything it will take the fear of swift punishment from the law. It will also take my friends, colleagues and acquaintances and all of civil society to indicate clearly that only the perpetrator of the crime is guilty and never the victim.

We are a huge country with many different communities and varied ideas of what is okay and what is not, living side by side. If some men use the flimsy excuse of women's mode of dress to justify their touching or molesting women, let civil society not let them get away with it. Let it be as abhorrent to civil society as to the women who are so violated. Let civil society indicate clearly that the perpetrator of the crime is the guilty party and never the victim and that under the common umbrella we all share, the Indian constitution, the perpetrators will be brought to justice.

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