PS: This post is written from a guy point of view, so all ladies out there please feel free to modify it as you read.
As I had promised in my previous post, here is the follow up. Meanwhile, after my previous post, I got a lot of interesting feedback. A lot of appreciation along with a lot of guys who choose to take a stand against the issue. Which I think is very commendable.
I discussed this issue with a few of my friends who are into psychology, human behavior and that kind of stuff on why do people do this kind of stuff. And here is what we concluded from the discussion:
- It gives them a sense of superiority. The fact that they can outrage some woman’s modesty without her being able to do anything, provides them a self ego boost. Something similar reason to why seniors get pleasure by ragging juniors. I didn’t think it was just this so we explored further and,
- Lack of healthy interaction with the opposite sex came up as a major factor.
This is very true in a closed society like India where we are still struggling to define a lot of new found liberties (read my posts under Indian Sexual Revolution). This is quite a concern since even today two guys getting close is not as much a problem as a heterosexual couple even holding hands ( Read the post on how Darjeeling banned holding hands in public). This may also be coz 2 guys can be thought of as friends but a guy and a girl cannot be accepted as friends freely in the otherwise homophobic society of ours. In fact, its an irony that our society gives freedom for its citizen to become homosexuals but refuses to except homosexuality ( ever wondered about this when a lot of parents never have issues with you hanging out with a group of guy friends but wanted you to take it easy when it came to spending time with your females friends). Growing up in such a society makes it very easy for any one to become a psychopathic coz they have never been taught how to healthily interact with the opposite sex. Perhaps this also explains why its directed at women.
THIS PART IS SPECIALLY FOR MEN. IF YOU STILL ARE NOT AGAINST EVE TEASING. HERE
IS SOME BRUTE LOGIC FOR YOU TO SPEAK UP AGAINST EVE TEASING.
In the end, there was one thing that we all agreed to. Eve Teasing is causing all of us harm. yes, even the eve teasers. Eve teasing is pushing the society into conservatism and prevents healthy interaction between the opposite sexes. As our society continues to make our women more and more uncomfortable, we push them further away from the mainstream. Perhaps there will soon be a time when all our women will have to be covered in a Burqa. Now, c’mon guys I don’t thing you would want such a medieval thing as that! There must have happened at least one time in all our lives when you would have prayed to god to make a lot of beautiful women so that all of us can have have the most beautiful girlfriends. Now when we have quite a lot of them ( thanks to our society becoming a lot bolder, thanks to westernization ) why would you want to
loose all that?
Also, A woman who has been harassed is more likely to be suspicious of any man she meets. As more and more women fall victim to the menace, the chances of the men ( including the eve teasers) to find suitable partners decrease exponentially. While eve teasing gives the eve teasers a temporary ego boost, it damages their chances permanently. So if any of you guys are reading this… If you don’t want to remain single for life, then you really need to rethink your actions.
Our society needs to change. Yes, and this time the men have to take charge. It is time we give women their due respect and place in society. It is time we stop behaving like losers and stand up for what is right. It is time we stop eve teasing. It is time to change.
As to how to avoid eve-teasing. I am not really the right person to give out tips. Ill leave that to all the female readers to give the feedback. But there is one place all of can contribute, BLANK NOISE . Its a group of people who are really capable of doing something about street harassment, as they like to call it.
FOLLOW UP : Just to see how the man woman dynamics work in the real world. Me and my friends did some experiments with random people, findings of which will be up in a weeks time. Trust me, you will not want to miss out on this.
