Welcome back CC! You were missed🤗
Res
(because I be too lazy to type right now but needed to let you know how chuffed I am to see you back😃)
EDITED:
Hmmm so there seem to be several aspects to this.. let me see how many I can successfully address..
First, if it really was a case of attempted rape of Mukti, then Alya herself would not be sympathetic to her own brother let alone asking anyone else to do so.. Mainly because she herself is a woman and Mukti is her closest friend.. therefore she is able to empathize and understand the gravity of the concept of 'rape' and that would prevent her from seeking 'pardon' from him. We saw a small example of this when she found out her brother was cheating on Mukti and she completely boycotted him. The stakes are obviously much higher in the current example but the principle remains the same. She is able to 'put herself in Mukti's shoes' so she can completely relate and reacts accordingly.
Also, how naively she states that if Harshad was evil then they were just as bad.. If it were attempted rape would she have said that? No, because then she would have had complete understanding of the nature of the crime while in the present scenario her perception is severely limited.
In Cabir's case, she can sympathize because she genuinely cares for him but is not capable of empathy.. one because there is no way for her to understand and relate the to the pain, discrimination and intense humiliation a gay person (regardless of gender) goes through in a predominantly heterosexual society and two because Cabir is a guy. So he was beaten. But well then, Harshad was almost killed too. If Mukti was beaten, would she equate the two? No, because Mukti is a girl.
He revealed Cabir's video, but then Cabir did the same to him. This very comparison highlights how little she truly understands the seriousness of the devastation that video caused Cabir. She sees it but is not able to internalize it.
I'm not going to take sides here, I'm just talking about her state of mind.
Cabir's situation itself is complex..in his specific case, the two are not the same at all.. Firstly, Cabir let himself be blackmailed into the video revelation for personal reasons. So, it definitely wasn't a complete surprise and he wasn't ambushed.. The beating is a hate crime but definitely not the equivalent of attempted rape. Also, we have to factor in that Harshad and Cabir had an ongoing rivalry and things escalated gradually. This wasn't a random attack on an unsuspecting bystander. Doesn't justify anything but definitely provides perspective.
TBH, Raghav is much more an unsuspecting victim here than Cabir who still got to make choices which R didn't have any say in.
As a viewer too, I'm certain that the reaction would have been very different had it been attempted rape of Mukti because the target audience is mainly straight and female and would have had a similar reaction to Alya's for similar reasons. Empathy inspires bias. It is an inevitable consequence of it.
If you're asking me personally, then no, I felt similar amount of outrage for Cabir's forceful outing as I would've felt had it been attempted rape of Mukti. I spent several sleepless nights worrying about it and had lost interest in all other tracks until the situation was resolved. But this is just me, maybe because of my longstanding personal association with the LGBT community and also having been an actual witness to people in similar situations, my ability to empathize is greater. Our experiences shape our world views after all. It was not a rational reaction of course because the subject is such a sensitive one for me.
Now for the general perspective..
Forceful outing of a person's sexuality while morally wrong cannot be equated to attempted rape because the former is a violation of privacy and the latter is a violation of one's person..
There is a power trip for the perpetrator in both cases, but somehow I don't think the gravity of the crime is the same.
Forceful outing and an ensuing beating perhaps come close though.. This is splitting hairs.. how to differentiate between the shades of grey..because man or woman, are beating and raping the same thing? Obviously not.
The outing adds a dimension but again there are corollaries to this.. It depends on which part of the world this occurs.. if the outing takes place in a country where being gay is punishable by law then I'd say it's a far worse crime than attempted rape because here the innocent victim themselves are going to be penalized for no fault of their own.. On the other hand, if it happened in a place tolerant and respectful of homosexuality, where the perpetrator would be punished to the fullest extent of the law, atleast for the violence involved if nothing else, then I'd say it's almost on par.
Again these are not absolutes, because all the parameters will vary on a case to case basis.
It's an interesting conundrum though, isn't it?.. while attempted rape would be punished as a crime in any part of the world, just 'outing' alone regardless of how much damage it causes to the victim mentally, wouldn't be unless it was also accompanied by a hate crime or physical abuse of some kind.
But well, that is a debate for another time I suppose.
That being said, it definitely would not generate the same amount of reaction and outrage in society as an attempted rape.. the homosexuality and the gender bias in a predominantly heterosexual, male dominated society are both equally responsible for this attitude.. where women are treated as the 'weaker' sex and therefore objects of sympathy while men as the supposed 'stronger' sex are supposed to 'take it like a man'. Because naturally boys don't cry. Also homosexuality is largely marginalized and their issues brushed under the carpet for the most part. So naturally, victimization of a homosexual wouldn't make any waves unless the person involved was a celebrity or prominent name.
Edited by 13thwish - 10 years ago
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