Street sexual harassment is a massive social problem in India. But only a few are doing something about it.
Despite its disgusting nature and pervasive habit among men, its considered by men AND women largely taboo to discuss. To help this issue stay in the dark, its was even given a unobstusive name to evoke pleasant and Mother-Goose like feelings: Eve Teasing.
Finally, a few women in Bangalore have decided to speak out. An local twentysomething artist is working to publicize the issue- no matter how painful it may be for society's hypocritical ruling class of men or for the women who were victimized to openly face the issue.
No one likes to talk about the real extent sexual harassment has infected Indian society. It's never easy facing your own deep-rooted ugliness. But its no excuse to shirk responsibility for the vicious and nasty treatment society allows innocent women to be subjected to.
Blank Noise Project is a movement in Bangalore, Mumbai, and Dehli to end street sexual harassment. Visit the site, read these women's stories.
An example from Blank Noise:
"....And another girl, barely 17 years old. She is buying bangles from a kerbside stall when a hand snakes up and grabs one breast, twisting it brutally, in full view of about a hundred onlookers. Seconds pass, frozen, endless, agonizing. The crowd titters. No one comes forward to help as the girl struggles to escape, trembling with rage and humiliation. Then he vanishes, leaving her to pick up the pieces of her dignity.
That girl was me. Now, why on earth would I choose to publicly rake up my own, forgotten, sordid little secret? Precisely because I am vexed by the fact that it has taken me 20 years of hesitation, one marriage, two kids, and the psychological armour of respectable matronhood to do it. ..."
The Blank Noise Project also put on a demonstration in Bangalore to demand it be discussed in the open. An article which describes the event:
‘Why are you looking at me?’Parts of the article-
"...... At Blank Noise we’re saying NO it’s NOT. It’s NOT OK to be groped, leered at, pushed, pinched, rubbed, cat-called. The project is out on the streets. Groups of volunteers ask people to define “eve teasing” (that ridiculously underplayed term we’re always using in India when what we actually mean is harassment). There are opinion poll boards they carry around at different city locales, bus stands, for instance, asking people what they would consider harassment; is it looking, staring, ogling, stalking, groping, touching….
This is often accompanied by interviews on what punishment it should merit and whether they would intervene if they saw harassment take place. These interviews give us some priceless insights into how people view harassment of women on the streets.
“Girls ask for it when they dress provocatively,” both women and men have said.
“We cannot control ourselves when we see someone dressed like that.” "
.....more.....
".....Jasmeen has been taking photographs of her eve teasers over the last two years and putting them on the Blank Noise blog along with section 354 of the Indian constitution. Photographing the eve teasers has reversed the power of the ‘perpetrator’, thus making him vulnerable to being exposed. Each photograph speaks of a unique encounter with the eve teaser; there was one where a young man insisted he only had a ‘crush on her’, that he did not mean to sexually harass her, that he was a ‘decent man’.
The fact is that eve teasing is not always street sexual bullying for the eve teaser;
he is not always a perpetrator in his own eyes, its true that in some stratas of Indian society it is seen as a form of wooing. This has been further propagated by Indian mainstream cinema. The guy gets the girl by chasing her, teasing her, wooing her.
In another instance the eve teaser pleaded and begged Jasmeen to not publish his photograph. This was after molesting her in a crowded bus. He got off the bus saying, “ please don’t do this to me, I am a father of two children.”...."
Stories like this happen every day. Every women I know here- myself included- has endured some form of agressive street harassment. Its beyond appalling.
This will be a recurring theme on the blog, as I've begun to work/fight from within my company to internally change grossly patriarchal and biased beliefs about Eve Teasing. So far, there has been an unimaginable amount of resistence to admit that sexual harassment is a problem that needs to- or even can be- addressed.
I've organized countless meetings, arguing with professional, well-educated Indian men
and women, that this is an unavoidable fact of living in India, and which we shouldn't ignore. Most after "strongly worded emails" to them will admit its an issue-- but only as an abtract problem that has no realistic resolution.
(I'll get to the root of these company meetings later on, as a long story accompanies the explanation of my cultural/corporate entanglements.)
I can understand feeling powerless when your country has long faced with staggering levels poverty and uncontrollable levels of air and water pollution. But sexual harassment is a direct threat faced by millions of women every day. This is a social ill which could theoretically evaporate completely overnight- if the men simply stopped.
The inaction to tackle a problem is almost as revolting as the act of grabbing a women itself.
If you didn't already read it:
http://imaginingourselves.imow.org/pb/Story.aspx?id=410&lang=1&g=0 is the story on the latest Blank Noise demonstration.
And
http://www.blanknoiseproject.blogspot.com/ is the homepage for Blank Noise.
