Rohtak brave-hearts: The ritual of social media outrage is all ‘chutzpah’

In the movie Haider, the protagonist uses the word ‘chutzpah’ to telling effect. The English dictionary won’t tell you what exactly he meant by that; its import lies in the context of his utterances. Try thinking of a regular, and popular, expression in Hindi sounding close to it, maybe things will get clearer. And ‘chutzpah’ (sorry about using it here, but it feels apt) is the word that comes immediately to the mind when one notices the outrage on the social media and elsewhere after every incident of rape or molestation of women in the country. Does it serve any purpose other than allowing people to feel nice about themselves? This kind of outrage has taken the shape of a ritual and entrenched itself in our urban behaviour so deep that it is now difficult to make out whether it is fake or real, sincere or perfunctory. No one here is questioning the sentiment that’s behind the public anger over the indifference of onlookers when the Rohtak girls were putting up a brave fight against molesters in a moving bus. It is entirely justified, as is the appreciation of the courage of the sisters. But has our expression of anger become an end in itself than becoming a mean to an end? [caption id=“attachment_1830945” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  A screengrab from the video of the Rohtak sisters beating up their molesters.[/caption] Nothing much has changed on the ground between the Delhi gangrape of December 2012 and now? Ignore the set of tough laws the country enacted after the Delhi incident; laws are a puerile solution to such problems in any case. The streets and other public spaces continue to be unsafe for women. For every case that is highlighted on television, be sure there are hundreds that get unnoticed. This is simply for the fact that the basic conditions that allow the perpetrators of crime against women to act with impunity remain unchanged. The only change in this period has been more outrage, shriller and louder, thanks to the proliferation of the social media. So called experts and analysts still keep repeating the same intellectual rubbish about the male mindset in a patriarchal society and about the propensity of men to control the body and mind of women. A simple fact check would reveal that incidents of harassment of women happen everywhere in the world, including in the supposedly advanced cities of the West. The answer to the problem is not getting rid of patriarchy — it is not possible — but to find solutions that are more practical. The ritualistic outpouring of sympathy for the victims is certainly not one of those. It does not take us anywhere. Let’s face it, the Rohtak sisters were incredibly brave, thus aberration to the rule. Not all girls facing molesters or eve-teasers react the same way. This is particularly true of rural areas. It is not only for the fact that they have been socially conditioned to be docile in their conduct, but also for the simple realisation that there won’t be any support for them if they fight back. In this case, other passengers on the bus were silent spectators and people are no different in cities either. They always look away when they are not convinced that they should intervene. Here’s hypothetical question: what if it were a thief caught in the act and thrashed by two girls on a moving bus instead of molesters? As experience suggests all passengers would have pounced on him and tore him apart. This happens on trains, in buses, in fact, in all public places. The thief is easier to handle. His act is a threat to all. If one is not the victim today, he might be one tomorrow. Not so is the case of molesters. They target specific individuals and, in the twisted moral view of the onlookers, their act poses no direct threat to them. The women, of course, should take care of themselves. Given this attitude expecting help from them is foolish. If it comes, again, it would be an aberration to the normal. The din of the outrage around security and safety for women, always manages to leave out the role of policing in curbing such incidents. Laws come into play after the incident has already occurred and the damage is done - by then a new victim is already created. Again, if they are expected to be a deterrent against crime, evidence shows this is not the case. The solution is in prevention and the role of the police is crucial here. It is proven that a more visible police force is the strongest bulwark against street crime, in fact, in all kinds of crime. The knowledge that policemen are around is a great confidence booster for potential victims. It helps common citizen offer resistance to the criminals. Forget semi-urban and rural areas, are the police visible in crowded areas in most of our cities? No. India perhaps has the lowest police to people ratio in the world and nowhere else policemen are kept busy in non-policing work so much. There are issues of professionalism too. The state of policing needs exhaustive discussion. To cut it short here is one question: the ‘outrage’ targets every one — the politician, the common bystander, even the judiciary – but how come the demand for effective policing is so conspicuously absent in it? Are we really serious about safety of women? Outrage without purpose makes us look like a bunch of idiots. The responsibility of conscious citizens – which most of social media users believe they are — should not end with clicking the ‘like’ button or sharing harrowing tales of others. All this finally amounts to, well, let’s call it ‘chutzpah’.