As I was browsing the TOI today, I saw what looked like a harmless survey titled “Poll: Should consensual teen sex be treated as rape?” Since this is something I have very specific views about, I didn’t hesitate to click the link and give my opinion. What I saw however shocked me. It’s easily one of the most insensitive, illogical, and stupid polls I’ve ever come across. Having said that, the purpose of the poll is probably to judge the way people think. So the questions probably don’t reflect the views of the TOI in general. It does show however the bigoted and harmful way of thinking which is so prevalent in people’s minds today.
The poll wasn’t to judge whether or not underage consensual sex should be legalized, but to find out whether people believed that marriage was a way of excusing the act of rape. Four out of five questions related to whether or not a boy should be let off if he consented to marry the girl he just raped. Now I understand that this is merely a poll, but it still bothered me. The very idea that a man agreeing to marry the woman he raped somehow excuses this crime is offensive to me. It’s not difficult to understand why. But just to be clear, here are my reasons in no particular order.
1. It propagates the view that marriage is punishment
Our system of justice is predicated on a person facing negative consequences for a crime. This is why different kinds have varying prison sentences. The very worst crimes however received the death penalty. The message is clear – the more severe the crime, the more severe the punishment.
So what do you think it signifies when a judge, the courts, or even the law itself contemplate letting a rapist off if he “agrees” to marry the victim? It doesn’t take a genius to make the connection that marriage is viewed as a punishment for the man and as a “compensation” or “reward” for the victim. As if the sole aim of a woman’s life is to “trick” the guy into marriage and rape gives the perfect excuse!
2. A woman’s life is “ruined” after rape or sex
There are actually two problems here. One, it assumes that a woman’s marital prospects are entirely spoiled after she’s been raped, or she’s had sex. A corollary here is that every man is assumed to want a “virgin” bride for himself and the absence of virginity is a complete dealbreaker for him. Such a view is actually offensive to a man like me because it insults my intelligence and assumes that I’m a shallow and prejudiced individual.
The second problem is assuming that without marriage, a woman’s life is worthless. As if the sole aim and purpose of the existence of a human female is to attach themselves and “capture” an unsuspecting male by dangling the promise of their virginity in front of them. How can someone know that they think like this and not feel sickened? Or is it just that all of this thinking is below the surface and people are not really conscious about how they feel?
3. No one ever asks if the girl wants to marry her rapist!
To me, this is got to be the most outrageous assumption in this whole mess. Just look at the questions that are asked in the poll:
- Should it cease to be rape if the boy agrees to marry the girl?
- If the boy is underage and therefore cannot legally marry the girl, should he be booked for rape?
- Should the law agree that it is not rape if he swears that he will marry her at the age of 18?
Do you sense something blatantly wrong with these questions? None of them seem to pay any heed to the wishes of the girl in this matter. They all revolve around whether or not the guy agrees to accept the girl in marriage as a punishment for his crime. As if it’s a foregone conclusion that any woman who’s raped would jump at the opportunity to marry her rapist. It’s almost as if she was waiting for this! Waiting for some excuse – any excuse – to “trap” a man into marrying her and that she should be happy she got anyone at all.
4. If a man wants to marry a girl, he simply has to rape her!
This one is pretty self-explanatory. There’s no question that introducing rules providing a laxity in punishment if the man “agrees” to marry the woman cannot but encourage the rape of women by men who wish to marry her by force. This consequence is so clear to me, but I’m astounded how a newspaper like the TOI can even question people about these things.
I’m not a woman, but my blood boils at the implied assumptions underlying all of this. That people can have such a low opinion of both men and women – and by extension, myself – irritates me no end. What makes it even worse is when the law itself extends tacit support to this kind of primitive, medieval thinking.
There are a lot of people who feel that the law must reflect “society’s” views. This is simply untrue. The law is expected to strive towards the ideals enshrined in our Constitution. This is why homosexuality was decriminalized in India even though the majority of people didn’t like it. This is why the law doesn’t criminalize live-in relationships even though they face the overwhelming disapproval of that unthinking mass we call “society”. Whenever there is a conflict between the law and what the majority of people feel or think, the law must do what is right. In this case, there is no doubt whatsoever about what is right and what is wrong. Rape is a crime. Marriage is not a punishment. A woman is not an object to be bartered or sold off. And it is not the be-all and end-all of woman’s life to get married.
Mind you, I have no objection whatsoever if the victim and the rapist agree of their own free will to get married provided they’re both adults. What I object to is marriage as a substitute for punishment. So let the pair get married. But it shouldn’t mitigate the punishment or jail time in any manner whatsoever. The rapist still has to go to jail and he still has to pay for his crime – married or not.
Why should the girl be punished for being raped? Having said that, the survey shows the bias of the designers of the questionnaire…
In reply to Sraboney
Punished? She’s expected to fall at her “husband’s” feet in gratitude!
Men who are feminists make this world a slightly better place to live in. Thank you for being one.
In reply to Nisha
Why thank you :-)– blood never really looked at it as a question of “feminism”. I prefer the good old-fashioned term human rights!
In reply to bhagwad
I used to dilly-dally between these two terms – feminism and human rights. And then I came to the conclusion that it is necessary to fight for the rights of women and call it just that, instead of diluting it any further than it already is. :)
Keep up your good work, bhagwad. You may want to check out Yashar’s blog – http://thecurrentconscience.com/
Agree.
Regards
GV
It depends on girls and her concern, in Afghanistan also the most people think important, a bird, should be “virgin”
Otherwise after married night on the same night, or tomorrow morning they send the bird back to her family, and the groom family asks for their another daughter which is called in Farsi “BAAD” or the girl father must pay all the money which expensed by groom.
Most of afghan people even not trying to have a boyfriend, because if in emotion they have sex the girl’s family will kill both of them.
And afghan those who are “virgin” and after married night the bird family take her “virginity” blood and show to her and groom’s family and says she was “virgin”
If anyone want more info contact me at [email protected]
Agree.
I can’t imagine how we can call marriage a sacred institution on one hand and allow relationships to begin with violence (emotional or physical).
But what I suspect is many of those who are saying marriage can excuse rape are probably talking about cases where the man promises marriage to a woman, and then refuses to marry her. Many such cases are considered ‘statutory rapes’, the victims are glad to marry the ‘rapist’.
In reply to indianhomemaker
Possible. But what kind of married life are we talking about when the man gets married against his wishes?
In reply to bhagwad
@Bhagwad we know all that matters is a mangalsutra (or ‘chutki bhar sindoor’) for a woman’s life to be worth living.
@Clueless “If you break it, buy it!” it IS!
In India, rapists must be carrying a stock of mangalsutras in their pockets to dispense as “protection” once the deed is done. It is seriously some twisted logic that the woman has to suffer the trauma of rape and then go on to marry the rapist. It is like the woman is being punished by giving her a lifetime of humiliation and violence.
Marriage is not like the “break it and you buy it” policies you see at stores. When will these idiots understand that?
In reply to Clueless
That’s a wonderful analogy – “If you break it, buy it!” Indeed, a woman who’s lost her virginity seems to be considered “broken” as far as marriageability is concerned.
Absolutely agree. The very idea of marriage as punishment for rape is sickening, appalling…and dangerous. It trivializes rape. It also sends the message is rape is all right when it is committed within the confines of a marriage. If a rapist is made to marry his victim, he is being led to believe that it is okay to rape as long as you are married to the victim. The victim too will be walking into the marriage expecting to be raped frequently–and knowing that she will not be able to do a darn thing about it, because marital rape is not even a crime under Indian law. It reinforces the unfortunate mindset that rape is acceptable in certain conditions, and therefore cannot be considered a serious crime at all.
In reply to Scribblehappy
Absolutely right. That’s an issue which I didn’t address in my post. As if marriage and rape are somehow mutually exclusive.
Reading your post reminded me of this really crappy movie (you’d know it if you have a passion for bad 90’s bollywood like me:) with Anil Kapoor and Juhi Chawla. Story goes like this – AK is a real badass with no morals. JC is engaged to be married. Someone has a grudge against JC’s parents and hires AK to rape JC on the day of her wedding. Said wedding is naturally called off. This happens in the first quarter of the movie. The remaining 3 quarters are about how JC finds AK and tells him that her izzat is now his. She spends the rest of the movie convincing him to marry her and restore her izzat. And this was supposed to be ROMANCE.
Its wrong on so many levels. To hurt the father they needed to hurt his honour by physically attacking a woman of his household. Once attacked the parents are no longer in the picture. Now her ‘honour’, lost through no fault of hers, is solely her responsibility to restore. Phew! It was mind boggling just summarising that.
As a collective, that’s how we think? Still? Marriage as solution for rape? Why? So she can be subjected to it again and again, only this time being completely acceptable because she’s married? This kind of thinking makes me swing between violent rage at others’ stupidity and deep despair.
In reply to KMKH
Oh my God – are you serious? They made a movie where the “hero” rapes the heroine she then begs him to marry her?
What the hell were they thinking?
In reply to bhagwad
Oh I know that one!
There is another movie – Anil Kapoor and Aishwarya. Heroine stands up to give witness to a crime and gets raped. She presses charges and the goonda agrees to marry her. She refuses – but the parents want her to marry him. So she leaves her home and somehow lands up staying with Anil Kapoor and finally marrying him even though his mom thinks she is “impure”. The movie was nothing to write home about, but atleast one movie that got its thinking straight!
Hain jee? I cannot understand why would a person want to marry their rapist in the first place? If one is raped, and goes to the courts for justice and punishment for the rapist, how is marrying him going to do any good? In fact she will end up spending the rest of her life with him, where he will go on treat her like dirt.
Bhagwad
The issue is not as simple as that, am afraid. How we understand ‘rape’ hugely depends on the context.
1. Sex under coercion / sex by force
This is rape. Plain and simple. It is sought without the woman’s (in some cases, man’s) consent, is often violent and causes bodily harm. I don’t have accurate stats but my hunch is that this kind of rape is the least common amongst all cases of rape.
2. Sex by deception
This category itself has many subcategories – ranging from drugging someone to false promises (marriage, money, favours etc.) I think certain cases of deception could be considered criminal offence (i.e. drugging someone) but for others, I don’t have much sympathy. If someone offers sex for a role in a movie, that person shouldn’t cry foul if s/he doesn’t get that role. Ditto with marriage/money and so on.
3. Marital rape
Extremely difficult to define. (unless of course, there is clear evidence to prove that it was forced)
The poll you answered seemed to focus on ‘rape by deception’ in general and perhaps ‘promise of marriage’ in particular. If that’s the case, I don’t think it should be considered a rape at all. So the question whether the “rapist” should be let off if s/he agrees to marry the “victim” does not arise.
On the other hand, sex by force is a straight-forward criminal offence and in theory must be treated as such. Having said that, it again depends on the context. We in India would put the rapist behind bars without a second thought but in a country such as Afghanistan, different social norms exist. I am sure you’ve heard about the latest case of a girl who was jailed and then released for being raped. That girl is uneducated, now has a child from that rape, faces rejection from her family and can’t count on the state to protect her. In the society that she lives in, her best chance, and that of her offspring, is to marry the person who raped her. Unfortunate perhaps, but that’s the reality.
All said and done, the choice must be hers and she has apparently agreed to take that option, I understand under some conditions. So be it, I say. Let’s not take the moral high-ground and declare whether or not that’s right or wrong.
In reply to IndianLiberals
Welcome back Ashish – Long time no see :)
If you read my last paragraph in the post, I mentioned that I have no objections whatsoever to a woman married her rapist if she wishes to do so. My only concern is that the marriage should not be a substitute for punishment. Rape is a crime. Marriage is an event. The two have to proceed independently.
As for sex under the promise of marriage which is later unfulfilled, I don’t believe that deserves to be called rape. Indian laws are changing constantly in this matter, and different courts issue different interpretations. It is trivializing and indeed insulting to call any form of consensual sex, rape.
But there have been instances in Indian law where a court has mitigated the sentence of the rapist (we’re talking about true rape here) merely because he agreed to marry his victim. I have huge problems with that. Not just the marriage of course, but the concept of linking it to the quantum of punishment for rape.