Thursday 25 May 2017

HEADLINES: Raped Again
- Survival is a shame.



This post was featured on Women'sWeb in June!
To read this post on Women's Web, click here.


NEWS HEADLINES in last week's papers:

Woman raped for years by her husband survived.
A 3-year old girl raped and thrown into the woods survived, rapists at large.
An old lady raped and murdered in her apartment, murder reason unknown.
A woman tortured to have sex till she gave in, victim hospitalised.
Another girl killed.
Raped girl survives.

I wonder why isn't anyone enraged by these?
There are so many things wrong about this.

The media that portrays only the victim and their status-raped.
None of the headlines were about the rapists and the murderers.
Every page has the headline raped, tortured for sex, acid attacks, raped and killed, which was so entertaining for most of us and has now become just another boring story.
The word 'survived'.
SURVIVED.



The raped-tortured-almost dead-girl-with haunting memories-broken dreams-full of fear survived.

What do we do about this?
We read and we move on.
Not caring to want to know the girl, her feelings, her thoughts, her rage!
Not caring why the person raped/murdered her and wondering why 'she' was raped.
Not caring enough to see whether the culprits and rapist animals were punished for their crime.
Not caring enough to check whether the girl really survived or not.
Not caring enough if her family stood by her or if she had to fight all this alone.

Because survival is staying alive.
Staying alive to worry who will marry her.
Staying alive to only be looked down at.
Staying alive to receive a status perceived as impure by the society.
Staying alive to see her offenders roam freely searching for another victim.
Staying alive to survive all this.

Of course she will survive and she will live for a hundred years.

But not for this.

She will live to see that her offenders are punished for their actions, for not respecting her and her body, for not asking her consent, for not being able to contain their cruel intentions, for leaving her to die, for not being human.

Its such a shame that we who talk about feminism, and pray to women in the form of goddesses and deities still do not respect even the tiniest form of female and dash to destroy it in the most vicious manner ever.
Its such a shame that we who talk about gender equality limit females and their importance to their sheer body and its parts which define their purity, character, decency, modesty, education, success, eligibility to marry and to have a family.
Its such a shame that we live among the same people and call them hypocrites when all we do is popularise misogyny and support the same hypocrisy that we criticise.
Its such a shame that we do not understand the meaning of survival unless 'it' happens to us.
Its such a shame that 'it' shouldn't be happening to any of us, not even the rapists, yet we do it.
'It' is such a shame.
Such survival is a shame.

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