shwetank's-pad

There is an outrage going on against a documentary made by Leslee Udwin of BBC called ‘India’s Daughter‘. The documentary will be broadcast on Storyville on BBC Four on Sunday 8 March at 22:00 GMT. It was also scheduled to be shown in India on NDTV at 21:00 local time. Government of India has issued a notice, to stop its broadcast in India.

Here is the article: Delhi rapist says victim shouldn’t have fought back

Though the end outcome wished by both sides of the outraged society is the same, a safer world for women, let us put it to perspective than getting affected by the contagious outrage.

One of the rapist says in the interview “victim shouldn’t have fought back”. When being raped, she shouldn’t fight back. She should just be silent and allow the rape. Then they’d have dropped her off after doing her. The rapist further suggests “that the death penalty will make things even more dangerous for girls. Now when they rape, they won’t leave the girl like we did. They will kill.” Chilling account by all means.

The ones supporting airing of the documentary, argue that we as a society need to stop living in denial about the atrocities happening amidst us and need to face the devil within. Their argument is that it happens because in our culture, there is no space for woman. The violence against women starts with a girl not being as welcome as a boy, from birth. Many ill treatments towards girls and women prevalent in our society. When parents celebrate the birth of a boy child, not of a girl, when the boy child is nourished more than the girl, when a girl’s movements are restricted and her freedom and choices are curtailed. Along with these prevalent practices reading the article, it seems perfectly fine to hold the mirror to our society. It shows us our ugly face and we are too scared to acknowledge our prejudices.

Some in society believe that rapists are sick to the core & you don’t need any further analysis or give them a voice. Rapist’s mindset is to rape without a reason. Illiterates rape. Educated rape. We have seen Nobel laureates also rape. Rapists have nothing to do with education and you can never reform them. Hang rapists immediately, only that can deter rapes. Quite true and I agree.

However, the saner lot think that rape is a social disease and rapists loom large among us, hence every rapist must be interviewed to understand the anatomy or diagnosis or cure of a rapes, before sentencing. I agree to this too with my reservations that it should be conducted by qualified professionals in a well defined mechanism. It is important to develop a data base by conducting psychoanalysis of such criminal minds for research purposes to understand this menace.

Understanding the rapist is a very important part of combating rape. As has been done by special law enforcement agencies like the FBI’s Behavioral Assessment Unit. They do this because it is their job to apprehend rapists. Similarly other experts working on understanding or combating rape will do the same. Like sociologists, psychiatrists etc. whether employed by the police or otherwise. It is an integral part of evolving an effective law enforcement policy for combating the problem of rape.

But granting a perpetrator of a heinous crime a public forum to vent his hatred for women in general and his lack of remorse for his specific actions at best serves no purpose. At worst it glorifies the state of mind of the rapist. It creates a platform from which other similarly inclined in their views of the role of women draw support for the conclusion that rape is a suitable punishment for women that step beyond the defined notions of their role that such individuals hold to be true. It is also detrimental for the rapist as a matter of trial fairness, since it expresses a lack of remorse that is a relevant factor for sentencing.

When the likes of Shobha De suggest it as a compulsory viewership, I am fully convinced for an immediate ban. It is also important to differentiate between the fearful father and a retarded patriarch. Sadly many who are capable of louder voice like to establish that Indian men are more of latter than former.

My further concern is uses of these lousy phrases like ‘Rape culture’, ‘Majority of men think like this’ etc. These phrases are coined by a certain feminist segment, the unprofessional, dishonest and unethical feminists who are capitalizing on the tragedy of a brutally gang-raped dead girl to sell their narrow minded self serving agendas. Yes, those feminists have an agenda and they always had and there is nothing like ‘Indias Daughter‘ that will fetch a million dollar in funds the next year!

This document below suggests that the film maker is also a cheat and her intention was to only glorify the event and her intention is to defame India calling it ‘India’s daughters”. As per the film-makers claim she was also a victim of sexual harassment. It would be rather fitting for her to make a documentary on her own unfortunate incidence and show a mirror to the the Great Britain.

And then the marketing of the documentary was far worse than the idea of documentary itself. BBC World’S ethical and moral double-speak is world known regarding such interviews. The cretins at BBC World make it a point to warn the viewers even when a clip shows flash photography, but for India it’s all legitimate. Nonetheless what it reflects from the marketing and promotion of the documentary which ends up glorifying them, is an extremely dangerous exercise.

Who stands which side of outraged lot, totally depends on their individual outlook and understanding. In my opinion while the interviews conducted by professionals to understand the menace is mandatory, the very idea of the rapist’s interview with the intention to glorify it by a propagandist media is totally repugnant.

Yet the choice of whether or not to watch that should be left to the viewers.