Navigating Solutions and Darkness

The threat of further violence - the threat of death as a punishment - is very clearly an effective deterrent when it comes to women reporting rape as a crime in India.

Blogtober 2018 is turning into Feminist Blogtober 2018. Lol @ *Nudes Give Me A High* Comic Guy,* and thanks to all the women who brought the truth of his actions to light. *Attributed to Twitter user @Alp_enliebe. There's a guy I really want to like. I say really want to like because sometimes I like him, and sometimes the alarm bells in my head blare too loud to be drowned out. When I talk about his latest exploits, people inevitably ask me that cringe inducing question: "Why do you still talk to him?" Some of them, they know why. They know whom he reminds me of, albeit in a diluted fashion. "He gives me insight into the average kind of guy," I tell them. "The kind of guy who isn't bad, bad, but not good, good either." The enablers, y'know? The ones who profit from male privilege without actively hurting people and without doing anything to dismantle the sources of their privilege. "It's rare that I am attracted to anyone," ...

CONTENT WARNING: RAPE, NON-CONSENT - DISCUSSION Photo by Isaiah Rustad on Unsplash I recently went through the unfortunate experience of having to sit a grown man down and explain to him why his sexual encounter had been non consensual, and what he should have really paid attention to. He was shocked at the allegation, but also, to my great relief, open to the conversation. He didn't deny it, didn't attempt to shift the blame, apologized profusely, and made it all better. Rape is now yet again at the forefront of our news cycle, and the outrage wave seems to be growing in strength. This time, it's because of a couple of high profile cases in which children were brutalized and murdered. Horrifying, yes. And predictably, everyone* is very vocally anti rape and anti child rape. *Everyone that isn't utterly disgusting by nature, or would like to think they aren't. Be that as it may, I'm yet again reminded of the hypocrisy that once led these outraged to blame t...

Photo by  RD Gray  on  Unsplash I came back to Kerala for a few days, and for once, it's been a trip I don't regret (so far). And honestly, I feel like at this point in India's political climate, this is the place I need to be in. A place where "meat puff" refers to beef. Seriously, chicken tastes disgusting in a "puff."  Perhaps it's the incessant rains. Rains have a way of lifting my spirits. Of making everything feel less bleak.  Perhaps it's the fact that, for once, travel did not prove to be an ordeal. I've been travelling constantly since Saturday, and it's all been pleasant, all the way.  Well, there was that incident where a drunk dude kept trying to press his erection against me in the bus, but I was well armed - with a blue sketch pen. When he realized that I planned to mark up his white dhoti in blue every time the dhoti ventured close to me - incidentally marking the exact spot where his penis would be, he ...