Diffuse

Red, red, red in the oranges
of claustrophobic totality,
she roams crazed. Tearing
apart those tears of rage,
hopes set under her hoods
of void.

The rot crawls up her veins,
fed in the luxury of screams
tight; a cold compress of
thawing claws deep within.

Unfurls and unfolding, those
swirls of early grey, preys of
devolving self.

I become her, armor of blood
and rage.

Of Rakhi-tied Knights and Forgiving Fathers

The biggest conundrum of modern consumerism is the appeal of the product. So it is only natural that advertisers come up with brilliant and often emotionally persuasive ads which make use of everything ranging from identity, belonging to relationships and the universal human connections. But then and again, pop up those particular advertisements which are intended to produce that profound lump in your throat. Let it be Cadbury’s with their melodramatic sweetness, Fastrack with their quirky liberal attitude or those insurance ads, where you end up thinking about prestige and privilege. Which is why, two recent TV commercials have gone vastly unnoticed. True, there are murmurs of dissent in the social media. But, somehow the larger picture of our consumerist ownership and protection of women goes unnoticed in this melee for maintaining humanity. 

The first commercial is something which almost everyone must have seen. The gruff cop who suddenly becomes a girl’s protector and sweet bhai when she ties rakhi on his wrist. Yes, we Indians do take the pledge to consider all Indians as our brothers and sisters and then violate this with metaphorical and literal incest. But, to think that tying rakhi is enough to ensure a total stranger ending up as somebody else’s protector… unlikely and a bit fishy. The idea of a woman needing a protector or that brothers have to be their sisters’ protectors, is in itself archaic and patriarchal. It fuels the norm where the woman is considered as a piece of property which the brothers she ties rakhi to, have to keep her from any harm till she can be handed over to the next owner. We have all seen women labeling their close guy friends as their brothers. This labeling sometimes comes in hordes, since simple friendship between a male and female is uncanny in our culture. And that is precisely what drives the emotion of kinship in such advertisements; the societal ideal where it itself acts as a collective blanket over a woman’s morality, body, agency and takes over her protection. And to what effect? In a society where the girl child is sometimes subjected to the groping hands of her brothers, fathers, uncles and cousins, does a simple rakhi or the ideal of protection entail real prevention of abuse?  A child of ten or twelve whose budding breasts groped by her older cousin – what of her? Imagine her confusion and isolation when she is told that he is her protector. If simple rakhis could prevent the mass emotional and physical assaults that women and girls face every day, when why is the heartland of rakhi tying girls also that of rapes, mutilations and untold stories of other horrors? It is always better to remember that a molester, rapist, murderer or someone who coerces sex selective abortion, might also be some woman’s brother or cousin or close friend. Hence, I can safely tell you, Idea ad makers, that the only section of the audience who would have positively responded to your commercial are those gullible girls who are protected and forbidden from exploring the world as it is and the conservative ‘family’ oriented group who hold on to the status quo. Your ad might just have prompted a girl to think that the world is all peachy and wonderful enough to not be strong or have her own agency. Why have it, when you are telling her that someone else will have it for her!

Coming to the second commercial, this one is in Malayalam and unsurprisingly a jeweller’s ad. It has Amitabh Bachchan and Manju Warrier, the Malayalee heart throb and surprisingly, the gold jewellery’s commercial has not one shot with gold in it. It is all about the usual Kalyan Jeweller’s tagline, ‘Trust- Isn’t it everything?’ And as usual, it has focused on the loving, caring father and the errant daughter scenario, where AB is heart broken when his darling daughter goes with a man of her own choosing and despite several encounters, his ire does not weaken. But one fateful night, she calls him up because she is in labour and needs to be taken to the hospital. Here, it is safely assumed that the husband is ‘unavailable’ and there is nobody(?) else to take her. And when the husband comes to the hospital, MW tells him softly that she had trust in AB that he would come. And apparently AB is now the doting father/grandfather. Apart from the fact that the melodrama is enough to fill five years of some mega serial and the whole ad is at best, mediocre; the sheer force with which it advocates the protection and dependency that a father ensures a daughter is appallingThis normative idealism of equating the father with everything safe and secure loses its sheen when it comes to reality. . If this was a real case, there is a substantial probability that the woman would have gone into labour in her house itself. Single mothers, families where women are the major bread winners, they all stand on an emerging platform of social reality, while the commercial discreetly caters to the imagination of the patriarchal society which is on a slowly eroding base. As if that was not enough, the commercial also implies a subtle negative to any grown woman wanting to choose her own partner. After all, it is the father who forgave her for her ‘crime’. In a society like Kerala, where women are gradually opting to get more educated, enjoy their careers and focus on self actualization, this commercial portrays a symptom of the reactionary orthodoxy. Though, it adheres to freedom of speech, one has to wonder if it is not regressive and antisocial to kindle such emotional impediments upon the authority which the State has guaranteed to every individual. 

After watching both these ads, full of sexist and oppressive agendas which do not directly signal an intellectual vigilance, masked in the flowery and mushy language of love, faith, trust, care and relations, one feels very cynical. Commercials are simultaneously for building awareness as well as for marketing. Shouldn’t they shed off and abandon such retrograde devolution and encourage progressive thinking? In the rush for profit making, have they forgotten the real ideals of humanity? 

I still have to get my own pepper spray, but I will because I would walk the streets a lot easier knowing that my safety lies with me rather than have faith and trust that a rakhi-tied knight will aid me chivalrously if need arises. As for Kalyan Jewellers, I sympathize with the daughters of the architects of the ad, who advocate that women who are able, not be capable of making their own decisions.

Puzzled

I try

touch that shadow
lurking misery
beyond memories,
buried in esoteric
valleys of pieces
scattered inane,
regardless of
what you were
to all and none.

They float by,
remindful of all
but you. Pieces,
ashes of a puzzle,
vainly frozen in
my arms.

What were you?

OH MY GOD!

I was born in a Hindu family, have followed Hindu traditions, still celebrate festivals even though am a non-believer now. Above all, I consider myself as someone who respects a person’s resolve to hang on to faith. It is between him/her and his/her god. So, when I came across the article ‘Don’t Like This Temple? Choose Another’ by Madhu Purnima Kishwar in The Hindu, I had my hopes up, thinking that this was about that choice. But turns out that only the headline was appetizing. What followed was a half baked meal which has caused me serious intellectual indigestion.

Madhu ji, I am one of your ‘self-proclaimed modern liberals’. I like art. All sorts of art. I like music, with an eclectic mix. There are tens of thousands like me who love everything Indian without feeling the need to subscribe to any religion. So forgive us when we do become annoyed at your case study. The first course which contributed to my indigestion was the object of the report. Rahul Easwar. Yes, we all have come across this face on TV. The young Neo-Hindu who has completely rewritten soft Hindutva and become a master at packaging the pills of passion for the Hindu youth of today to consume. I am sorry, but everything you wrote after you presented him as the central figure seems a bit fuzzy to me. Here you are, with an interesting topic. But you prefer to lead with someone whose views margin on extremism, who has no regard for personal liberty, who stands for everything fascistic that this nation is striving to get rid of, whose sense of humanitarianism is religion based. So forgive me when I say that you could have made the article appealing to lot more people had you left that reference out of it. 

But, as a writer, it is your discretion. So, be as it may, let us move on to the rest of the courses of this wonderful meal. My next problem is with your contention that us, the ‘modern day missionaries’ aren’t talking about oppression of women in other religions than Hinduism. One has to pause and wonder exactly in which world this article was written. Us ‘MDMs’ cut across all religions, castes and classes. We talk about every sort of injustice with regard to each and every parameter. The issue here is visibility. India being a Hindu majority nation has media which will bring Hinduism related oppression to the limelight more. If you happen to read and watch news and discussions from states like Kerala where the representation of Christians are more and participation in social progress is cross-sectional, you will find diverse topics. 

I do have to digress here and say that, yes; I view Hindu rituals as extremely oppressive and misogynistic. I can say that because I have Brahmin friends who are not allowed to touch food when they are on their period, because each and every ritual, including Karwa Chaudh, Thingal Vrtham, etc programmed so as to prevent women from escaping the patriarchal set up. Yes, there are women exclusive temples, but very few. In the majority and major temples, menstruation is considered unholy. In this age when stem cells can be harvested from menstrual blood, our ‘culture’ cannot move past viewing women as anything more than their wombs. In the case of Sabarimala, though I do agree that everyone has the right to worship their gods in all the diversity, criticizing that worship falls within the freedom of expression. What if I say that the entire premise of Sabarimala makes permissible one popular notion of our rape culture? That women are responsible for men and their sexuality, that the presence of fertile women can be tempting and tantalizing to men. What use is a god who can’t even be held accountable for his choice to remain celibate? Even in the case of THE Delhi gang-rape case, a version of this argument is being propagated. So however might the likes of R Easwar try to club the exclusion of women from Sabarimala as ‘diversity’ or anything else, one cannot deny the inherent misogyny present in the system. 

One does have to take exception to the reference of ‘Following in the footsteps of our British rulers, who despite their disdain for our gods and goddesses… But their disdain for those who treat them as objects of worship remains as ferocious as that of our colonial rulers. ‘When did Indian culture stop with religion? And when did religion stop with rituals? Hasn’t art always been a part of it? Are we supposed to infer that one has to adhere to Hindu religion to properly appreciate and understand art with Hindu themes? Can one not be a connoisseur of art and simultaneously have a disdain for organized religion? The references to ‘colonial rulers’ and ‘westernized elites’ are purposeful attempts at portraying the non-believing sections, those who criticize antiquated religious rituals as somehow not in touch with reality or the people. Somehow the undertone seems to suggest a deliberate malice at someone espousing the same diversity and tolerance of views which the writer wishes to see. Irony.

As to the writer’s dig at sugar free diet - why not? When this country is going through a phase of high morbidity and Central and State Govts giving emphasis to prevention of cardiovascular and lifestyle diseases, why not? Do you mean to say that religion should be static or that gods shouldn’t change their persona according to the need of times? How exactly is religion going to survive if it can’t socially adapt? 

The tourist centre allusion was extremely amusing. On one hand, the writer tends to forget that the architecture, art and history associated with temples do make compelling rewards to visit them. India has always banked on them to bring in more tourists. It has nothing to do with religion. Nor is it marketed as something religious. Again, the writer makes the mistake of suggesting that culture, faith and religion are synonymous. One does wonder though, nowhere in this article are tribals mentioned. They have their own rituals, many tribes don’t consider themselves Hindu. But there are likes of Rahul Easwar who try and bring them into the fold of Hinduism. Isn’t that impinging up on the diversity and freedom of worship and views? Yes, I know, it is very easy to forget them since they don’t form part of our ‘culture’. 

So, you can see why this article has caused me a minor irritation. It tries to speak about something profound. But in the end, it turns out to be extremely biased and bigoted. Hence, I stop this note of disagreement with a slightly curved smirk of an arrogant westernized elite non-believer.