We are doing little to prevent the creation of toxic masculinity, our focus is more on how to fight it

Kolkata Police recently announced its five-day workshop on self-defence learning for women, titled Tejashwini. The programme kicked off on Saturday May 19, with very encouraging response (156 women have enrolled and a second workshop will be organised soon, the Kolkata Police authorities said).

Twelve- to 40-year-old women are being trained in self-defence skills to fight sexual harassment (this is a basic training for women to tackle situations when they are touched inappropriately or sexually harassed in public transport, according to the Kolkata Police Facebook page).

Martial art, judo, karate, capoeira, Tai chi chuan, kung fu, Tae kwon do, Aikido, Jujutsu, Hapkido – are various forms of self-defence and unarmed combat that people learn worldwide. Some of these are practised as sport, for self defence and/or for spiritual development.

Learning self-defence skills is necessary for all of us to fight hostility and aggression. As long as it is not linked only to sexual offences or meant only for women. Also, it becomes both dangerous and problematic when it is taught to women in order to fight sexual harassment. It is a quick-fix, short-term and “easy” approach. Perhaps that’s exactly the reason behind its popularity.

Self-defence training for women are very popular with the state governments in our country. Recently, I received a series of videos (on WhatsApp — forwarded by a group of friends) prepared by Delhi Police showing a woman – a demigoddess, hero-like figure fighting male aggression with such aplomb and perfection, it looked achievable only in reel, not real life. Such popularity of self-defence workshops and publicity exercises may be because a majority of the decision-makers are male.

Last year, I had conducted a series of workshops titled “Dear Boys” for teenage boys in various schools of Kolkata. I am grateful the Kolkata Police authorities agreed to support this programme because it was something governments in India had perhaps never taken up before. The idea was to discuss with young boys (and girls) the need to stop violence against women. Since most of the sexual violence come from men, they must be told to stop the violence. In other words, we must create sensitive, responsible men who will never harm women, or other men.

Tejashwini and Dear Boys are therefore, contradictory.

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The more we talk about female empowerment, the more the dangers of creating a superficial embodiment of that power. There has been a gradual building up of a version of glamorised, kickass women in order to combat toxic masculinity. The problem is that we are doing little to prevent the creation of the toxic masculinity. Instead, we are focusing more on how to fight it.

Popular Hindi films have a large number of feisty women who fight for their rights, who often transform from shy, tongue-tied women to aggressive characters who are out to take revenge on male predators.

Hema Malini to Rekha, Vijayashanti to Priyanka Chopra, Tabu to Esha Gupta – heroines as police officers have often come in popular Bollywood films – only, they never forget to put on their lipstick and mascara. They are the embodiment of the vulnerable, doe-eyed, lipstick-wearing, gun-toting angry young woman with oomph and sex appeal out to “fight” predators.

 

Fearless Nadia, the Australia born actor with blond hair and blue eyes who ruled Bollywood through the 1930s and 1940s, was the original stunt queen who brandished hunter whips, fighting villains and riding horses. Then there was Vijayashanti, who has acted in films like Tejasvini, Rowdy Inspector, has also been called Lady Amitabh or The Lady Superstar of south Indian films. Wikipedia describes her work thus: “She has won the National Film Award for Best Actress for her work as a ‘super cop’ in Karthavyam (1991), for depicting both aggression and feminity (sic) with balance and restraint.”

The feminine, feminised woman in popular Hindi films has become the devi, a goddess out to take violent revenge on male predators. Also, her aggression is acceptable for as long as her femininity is retained, and the woman continues to be confined to conventional gender representations.

Heroism is a masculine paradigm, and so are its prevailing characteristics. Tongue-tied, “effeminate” heroes won’t do – on screen they are ridiculed, scoffed at. And screens are a reflection of what happens around us.

Therefore women – on screen and in real life – are largely unable to escape the trappings of domesticity, and remain embodiment of sexuality in exactly the same way women armed revolutionaries are looked at. A gun adds to the glamour. And that’s exactly what’s wrong with using aggression to combat aggression.

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The Dear Boys workshops aimed at discussing with teenagers the need for men to be sensitive and responsible, and to understand that the onus is on them to stop violence against women.

In these workshops, the boys expressed how it never struck them earlier that it was important to understand the hard work their homemaker mothers were doing, or the importance of women working and earning a living. Or that even if the mothers were homemakers, they were “equal” to the fathers who usually enjoy a superior status at home because they earn for the family. Women and men in many families don’t eat together (women usually eat after the men have finished their meals), men are not allowed to cry, they are pushed to getting good jobs to support the family while women are encouraged to do the cooking and cleaning in the house. When they discuss these things, children are able to relate it to the violence on the women in their own homes. It enables them to understand how the role-playing they see around them is not “natural” but “imposed”.

 

These are so deep-seated and the conditioning so powerful, it is often difficult to change the mindset or to mould the young men into believing that women and men are equal. Therefore all the more the need to discuss this with the young. The young should be told to look at both women and men as equal and as human. This is a difficult path, time-consuming and long-term. Perhaps that’s why we don’t see governments taking up such programmes very often.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with learning self-defence skills. In fact, it must be made compulsory for both girls and boys in every school. But the problem is when such workshops are meant only for women, and if the purpose of learning is to fight sexual harassment.

Authors Paro Anand and Ranjit Lal had sent me messages to be read out to children attending the Dear Boys sessions. At the end of each session, a child was given a book (one child per session) and I read out some of these messages.

This is what Paro Anand wrote: Sometimes you feel so alone, you think one thing, but everyone else seems to think the opposite, and you go along with popular opinion because it seems the easier thing to do.

Don’t.

Stand up, speak up. It is your right and your duty to make up your own mind. Don’t hear prejudice and go along. Be the voice that will make the change. Challenge it, if that’s what you believe.

That is what Like Smoke wants to do. Make you think. And then make up your own mind. Sometimes, just that much can help you move away from the edge you may find yourself on. Sometimes it is just the one voice that can make all the difference in the world. Be that one voice. Others are waiting to join you.

Ranjit Lal wrote this: Your job, guys: Make a world where your sisters, girlfriends and all the other girls in the world do NOT have to learn self-defense techniques – like karate and judo – in order to protect themselves because there will be no need for them to ever do so.

We need inspiring words to make the young think differently, aggression and violence are not the answers to fighting sexual harassment and rape.