India’s Daughter and India’s culture

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna.
Reflections on India’s Daughter. The documentary India’s Daughter depicts in a blood chilling way the horrible gang rape of Jyoti Singh and the cold bloodedness of the perpetrators of this ghastly crime. It also depicts the courage of Jyoti Singh and the progressive mindset of her parents in trying to take her to success in her life.
Any incident of violence, especially a rape, and a brutal rape like this is very correctable and reprehensible and it deserves to be strongly condemned and punished. And to find sustainable solutions to this crime, this kind of crimes in general of violence against women, we need to look deeper at the causes and in any treatment, diagnosis of the problem is vital. If there’s a wrong diagnosis, the whole treatment can go wrong.
And this is where many times in the media, the diagnosis is simplistic and suffering from over generalisation based on pre-existing biases. So in this talk, I’ll discuss about how there is misrepresentation of the cause in this particular movie as well as in the media in general. And then I’ll talk about what are the root causes and what are the ways in which this problem can be dealt with.
The movie talks about, this particular documentary gives a lot of time depicting the mentality of the rapists and the utter lack of any regret and the self-righteous tone is horrible. But to extrapolate from this and to say that this is the mentality of men in general in India is horrible. It is just like extrapolating that because there are some, even a significant number of Muslims who become terrorists, so all Muslims are terrorists.
Now this will immediately in today’s media be criticised as Islamophobia. So we have something of the converse over here wherein a particular mentality of a particular social pervert is labelled as the mainstream mentality and this is nothing but Hinduphobia wherein the whole culture of India is being maligned as a culture of rapists. In fact, the German professor in a German university who refused admission to Indian students saying that Indians have a rape problem.
Of course the German Chancellor condemned the statement and she apologised eventually. But this just indicates the gravity of the problem. So this sort of generalisation is a misrepresentation and this misrepresentation does more harm than good.
But this is not to say that there is not a grave problem of safety of men and not a grave problem of crimes against women. But there is definitely a problem. But to extrapolate this is the general mentality of all Indian men and this mentality comes from the traditional Indian culture is a horrendous misrepresentation because if we look at the agitations that have happened there have been men who have participated in the agitations for the prosecution of the rapists and for stronger rape laws in general.
So that’s the first point. And now apart from this documentary itself we can look at other instances where the data gets sensationalised and misrepresented. There were two girls who were found in Uttar Pradesh in Bidon to have been hanging from trees.
And immediately in the media the narrative came that these were lower caste Dalit girls and they were raped and killed by higher caste men. And that’s how the rape narrative, the crime of rape was sensationalised by further talking about the evil of the caste system. Now subsequent investigations revealed that actually the women had not been raped.
First of all the women did not belong to the Dalit caste nor did the men belong to the upper caste. Both of them belonged to the OBCs, the other backward castes. And the CBI found that the narratives of the various relatives were incoherent and the parties had been bribed to give a particular narrative.
And the conclusion was that actually it was not a rape, it was suicide. So now this was hardly reported in the media because it did not fit the pre-existing narrative at all. So the theories that we like we call them facts and the facts we don’t like we call them theories.
So the theory we like, the theory that is being spread today is that especially in the international media, European media and to some extent American media is that India is the rape capital of the world. And so whatever supports that is being propagated. And if we look at it when Indians try to protest against this, this is that India has just hurt national pride which is blind to the actual problems.
So that sort of things are being circulated. But let’s look broadly at statistics. Now the statistics show that the problem of rape Now to try to talk about statistics, why in dealing with a problem of such great human suffering can seem dehumanising.
And that is not so, it’s not that because there are less number of rape crimes that the problem is less. The problem is definitely there and every instance of this ghastly crime has to be taken seriously and penalised seriously and the solution has to be pursued seriously. But the misrepresentation of the problem does a disservice in finding a lasting solution to the problem.
So statistics can to some extent help us to understand the pervasiveness of the problem and the misrepresentation in calling India the rape capital. So if you look at statistics, headlines came in the newspaper that three women are raped per hour in India. But if you look at United Nations statistics, United Nations statistics say that actually in Belgium, one rape is reported every three hours.
This might seem nine times less but three women raped per hour in India is in a population of 1.25 billion. Whereas one rape in every three hours is in a population of 11 million. In England and Wales alone, where the population is less than 56 million, there are 78,000 rapes.
This means nine rapes per hour. Or if you want to look at it another way, because rapes per hour doesn’t really depict the population. So according to United Nations 2010 report, there were 1.8 rapes per 100,000 inhabitants.
Whereas in Belgium, there were 30 rapes. There are 27.3 in US and 28 in the UK. Now, of course, the standard counter to this will be that rape is a hugely underreported crime in India.
And that is true, not just in India, but that is true all over the world. In the American organisation called RAIN, which is involved in countering rape crimes, said that actually only around 3% of rape victims will spend rape criminals, rapists, will spend even one day in jail. So the rate of persecution of the crime of rape is low everywhere.
And even if we say that a crime is underreported, that underreporting happens everywhere in the world. So if we say even 1 out of 10 crimes is reported in the West, and 1 out of 100 crimes is reported in India, still the statistics, if you see, 1.8 rapes per 100,000 in India, and 13 in Belgium, or 27.3 in US, 28 in UK, that means still the number of rapes in India, statistically, turns out to be less. Now somebody might argue that the police are not accepting the rape cases or because the social stigma is so great that people don’t report, whatever it is.
That means ultimately, if we want to believe a theory, whatever facts we get, we just neglect the facts. So as an American comedian once said, I’ve already made up my mind, don’t confuse me with the facts. Don’t confuse me with the facts.
That means that if I’m not interested in the facts, then how have I made up my mind? Now, if we go further, apart from Europe also, in the Islamic countries, the reporting of crime of rape crimes is far, far lesser because it’s extremely difficult in those countries within Islamic law to get punishment, to get the rapist punished, and quite often the woman is also penalised. So the reporting is much lesser over there. So this is not at all to trivialise, to minimise the problem of rape in India, but this is to highlight the unfairness, inaccuracy of labelling India as the rape capital.
So if rape is, as a statistics subject, just a grave problem all over the world, what is the cause of it and what is the solution? Essentially, rape centres on objectification of the victim. Where the person, the rapist, sees the victim not as a conscious person with feelings, but as an object to some end. It can be lust, where one wants sexual release without considering the other person at all, or it may be seen as power, where one wants to stamp one’s authority on somebody else and rape is used as a tool for humiliating the other person.
Systematic gang rapes are often done during ethnic cleansing campaigns, where one group brutalises the woman of another group, which they are victimising and they are eliminating. So the point is that whether it is power, whether it is political agenda for eradicating a particular race, or whether it is raw lust, the point is that rape centres on objectification of the other person, of the victim, where the victim just becomes a tool for a particular end. And this objectification comes naturally as a consequence of a materialistic way of life.
The materialistic way of life focusses on the thinking that material things are the only reality and material pleasures are the only pleasures. So controlling others, dominating others, using others for our gratification becomes a natural concomitant result of the materialistic worldview. And the objectification of women happens in the mainstream media today.
The same media and the same culture which demonises rape, often that same media glamorises the objectification of women. Even in mainstream entertainment, whether it is Bollywood or Hollywood, women are depicted frequently as sex objects. And beyond that there is a pornography industry where women are depicted as nothing other than sex objects.
At least in movies there is some acting talent, there is some dancing, singing talent, there is some artistry over there. But the pornography industry has become far, far bigger than even the world’s biggest sport industries. The porn revenue in America exceeds the combined revenue of all the franchises for basketball, baseball and football.
So the point is that this is where objectification of women is being done in a completely unabashed way. Now when people’s minds are polluted by this kind of terribly sensualized depiction of women, then naturally people want to act it out. Some people may quote some statistical surveys to show that pornography doesn’t necessarily lead to violence.
But this is simply misleading. If what we see doesn’t lead us to act accordingly, then the whole advertising industry would become pointless. And the big big companies which pump millions, even billions of dollars in their advertising campaigns, they do so not because of wanting to do some social service.
They do so because they know that what is depicted in the media whatever is enacted in the media, people will want to enact it themselves in their lives. So even if statistics are misrepresented or inaccurate and they don’t depict a correlation, that is a misunderstanding. What is depicted will be enacted sooner or later.
So objectification of women happens because of materialism and one prominent way in which objectification is happening is through what is called the entertainment industry, especially the pornography industry. Now, in the western and westernised cultures, there is increasing freedom for women. And freedom for women in terms of the career that they can pursue, the choices that they can have.
And this seems liberating for women. But still, even in these countries, there is still fear. And the crime of rape is there everywhere in society.
As I said, statistics show that it is there equally in the western world also. Now in India and in countries where the traditional culture is still there, there is a different dimension to the conflict which is there. The problem of objectification of women, the problem of violence against women, the problem of potential violence against women also, that has been dealt by most traditional cultures by a certain division of labour amongst males and females.
And the purpose of this division of labour was not restriction or deprivation, but it was cooperation and harmonisation. So the division of labour wherein women mostly did housekeeping duties, and they were homemakers, and they assisted their life partners, that was a partnership. It was not a domination or subordination.
And this partnership aspect is seen most when there is a spiritual orientation to life, when there is an understanding of the spiritual purpose of life. So when men and women both understand that we are at our core spiritual beings, and we can get lasting satisfaction by realising our spiritual side, by developing ourselves spiritually and connecting ourselves with the supreme spiritual being God, and by developing our love for Him, we can get the highest satisfaction. So we have a vertical relationship with God, and we have a horizontal relationship with people around us.
And the horizontal relationship and the vertical relationships are meant to be symbiotic. A strong relationship with God enables us to see other living beings as family members, in God’s family. And we see our life partners not just as my husband or my wife, we see them as connected with God.
And that’s why marriage has been a sanctified union in most of the religious traditions, in most of the traditions of the world. So the strong vertical relationship strengthens a horizontal relationship, because the connection with God brings higher satisfaction, brings wisdom, and that brings tolerance and accommodation in mutual relationships. And a good horizontal relationship also strengthens the vertical relationship, because when we are satisfied emotionally, when we have warm relationships, we also have a peaceful mind by which we can devote ourselves to God.
So now, in the traditional cultures, there has been this division of labour, which was meant ultimately for the purpose of facilitating both men and women in their onwards spiritual journey. So now, as time has passed, Krishna said in the Bhagavad Gita, that all good things deteriorated over time. That by the passage of time, whatever spiritual purpose is there in the social structure, that spiritual purpose gets lost.
And that’s what has happened. And what has remained today is not the spiritual purpose, but the cultural shell. And when people have lost an understanding of the spiritual purpose, and when everybody has a material definition of success, then the traditional culture seems restrictive.
And so the idea that women should only be homemakers seems very restrictive. And how the spiritual purpose of life is to be pursued in modern times is an emerging challenge that every tradition has to deal with and is dealing with. In the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, Srila Prabhupada adopted quite a dynamic approach.
So although he talked about the traditional model of how women lived in his books, but in his life, when he was dealing with women, when he found them enterprising, when he found them intelligent, when he found them dynamic, he encouraged and inspired them to serve Krishna according to their talents and to do justice to their talents and to make fulfilling contributions to society. So the important point to recognise is that whatever social model is there, the social model is meant to facilitate the growth of the human beings who are a part of that model. So Srila Prabhupada was flexible and dynamic in channelising individual talents, whether they were males or females, according to what was best suited for them, according to what they were best capable of doing.
So the point is that as times have changed and the spiritual purpose of life is neither traditional nor modern, it is time independent, it is eternal and that needs to be pursued if there is to be lasting satisfaction and that is the foundation for any sustainable social transformation also. So with respect to India and Indian culture, there is without an understanding of the spiritual purpose of the traditional gender arrangements, the traditional division of labour among the genders, without understanding the spiritual purpose, there is on one side the liberal demonization of the traditional culture and there is the conservative insistence on that culture with neither a focussing on the purpose of that culture. So we have liberals saying this is the culture where women are restricted or there is so much misogyny, there is hatred of women in this culture and the whole culture gets demonised and that narrative is what is portrayed prominently in the media today.
But at the same time, this narrative gets aggravated when there are extremists at the other end, there are ultra-conservatives who insist on a rigid replication of the traditional culture without being sensitive to modern circumstances. So for example, now in the particular movie, in this documentary, India’s Daughter, it is depicted that the lawyer of the rapist, he says that it is not our culture for women to go out alone with their boyfriends at night and the rapist says that we wanted to teach her a lesson for doing this. Now, who gave them the authority to teach the lesson? These people are misappropriating the cultural values that were there in the culture for promoting an agenda of male chauvinism.
Not even male chauvinism, this wasn’t male chauvinism, this was actually female suppression. So what is happening here is that any social structure is as good as the people who are participants of social structure. So the social structure when it becomes, when its spiritual purpose is lost and it becomes a tool for poor hungry people to implement their agendas.
This happened with the caste system in India and this has happened with even the system of division of labour among the genders. So the point here is that the culture had a spiritual, the cultural arrangements had a spiritual purpose and that spiritual purpose has to be pursued. Now in India we have this huge division, this is depicted in India’s Daughter also that there are maybe the, there are some people who are progressive, they want to become educated and they want to advance in their job and their career and they are forward looking and forward thinking and then there are other people who are in poverty, they are the victimisers and they break havoc in the lives of others.
So the point is that there is the objectification of women to which everyone is exposed and in the West there is a culture of, the widespread culture of consensual sex whereas in India that culture is not there. So there are people who are exposed to the objectified depiction of women whether it be in Bollywood or whether it be in, whether it be through the internet. Nowadays with smartphones available, porn has become available even to people who don’t have proper houses, who have cell phones with them.
In the Shakti Mills gang rape that happened in Mumbai, the rapists, they actually had porn on their cell phones and they forced the victim to do the various things that were being depicted in the porn. So the point is that the objectification of the women which is done through the mainstream, through the mainstreaming of porn in today’s society that creates wild desires in people and then those wild desires people try to fulfil in whatever way they can and then they use that to justify, rationalise that using whatever, using the excuse, the alibi of the culture. So when we talk about the broad culture of India we have to understand that this culture centred on a healthy respect for women.
The Vedas declare that in a house where the women are not happy the Gods will never shower their blessings. In the Vedic culture, women are traditionally referred to as Devi. It is called whenever a woman gets initiated she is given the name Devi Dasi.
Devi means Goddess and Goddess, Devi indicates a great respect and when a woman comes to the house and women in the house are often considered to manifestations of Lakshmi Devi, the Goddess of Fortune and even from the empirical point of view we will see that actually in India if we just want to say that insist on the narrative of female domination then India is among the few countries which has had a female as the head of the state one of the strongest heads of state of India Prime Minister was Indira Gandhi. America, despite its history of progressiveness how many female heads of state has it had? Not even one till now. So the point here is simply that even from the empirical point of view as I said in today’s society how the spiritual purpose which is the solution to the objectification of women then as long as we tend to see women as long as we have maternistic conception of life then naturally there will be objectification of women and that objectification of women happens in the West and that happens in India but in India there are some people who rationalise their violence against women by taking the alibi of the traditional culture and this is demoniac and this is a horrendous misrepresentation of the culture so India as I said with its tradition of venerating the female goddess India has many states where women has been the chief minister and there have been women heads of state and there have been women who have been not in power and yet in power through a remote control kind of government the point is not that any of this is to be endorsed or to be appreciated the point is if you are just looking for objective facts the story in India is much more complex than what is depicted by the simplistic demonization of the entire Indian culture what we need for healthy relationship for healthy relationship between men and females and for healthy society at large is a broad spiritualization of Indian culture it is only when we understand ourselves as spiritual beings we understand others as spiritual beings then can we avoid their objectification and that spiritualization is very strongly encouraged facilitated and intellectually boosted by the spiritual wisdom of India by the Bhagavad Gita by the tradition of Yoga by the tradition of Bhakti if you look especially at the tradition of Bhakti many of the greatest saints in the Bhakti tradition have been women and they lived and thrived when at a time when there was the patriarchal culture that was predominant in India so the spiritual devotional culture is a culture of universal empowerment and it is a culture which goes beyond the outer shell whether it be male or female and focusses on the essence of the person that is the soul, the spiritual essence and it helps in bringing out the best within the person so that is why actually people all over the world are adopting the spiritual practises of India Yoga, meditation, prayer, bhajans, mantra meditation, singing, kirtans these have been adopted by people why? because they find that it helps them to grow grow internally, grow spiritually, grow holistically and it is this inner growth that will bring a more humane vision of humanity that will prevent the objectification that is inevitable when there is rampant materialism so if we want to understand the root cause of the problem it is not just a simplistic demonization of the whole Indian culture based on the mindsets of some perverted individuals if you look at the broad objectification of women coming from the materialism coming from the spread of materialism and that plays out in various ways when it interacts with its traditional culture in England itself in certain parts of England where the Muslim population was in large numbers so at that there many of the Muslim youth were regularly used to engage in raping the local girls over there but the police could not charge them because they would be targeted as racially singling out certain people and the crimes of rapes went on and on for years and years without any action being taken so the point is that the interaction of various social forces and how that comes from the objectification of others and how it plays out will vary so in India also it is playing out in a particular way where misunderstanding of the traditional culture among both the liberals and among the conservatives where the liberals who simplistically want to demonise it and among the conservatives who simplistically want to impose it without being sensitive to the modern concerns that is causing this massive misrepresentation of the problem so the solution is countering the objectification and that countering the objectification happens through spiritual education and spiritual education is the elevation of consciousness by which we all start seeing each other as individuals as spiritual beings and not as objects or tools for one’s own gratification Thank you.
Hare Krishna