Unpardonable is RAPE!!
The biggest excuse a rapist gives after the crime has been done is, “I could not control myself, she was so irresistible “.
He feels guilty or not, does not matter at all for what has been done is irreversible. Rape in my opinion, is a more prodigious crime than a murder because rape does not put an end to your life, it destroys you physically, mentally and socially leaving you helpless and one has to live with it for the rest of their lives. The atrocious act of rape leaves such a deep impact on its victim that she can never get out of that traumatised state. Avishi (name changed), a post graduate student of Delhi University feels scared of dating men or getting closer to them because she was raped in her teenage and her own mother hid this from everyone and forced her to live an imaginary life, like that heinous act never happened. Her family forces her to get married now. She does not want to be married for she is scared if that happened again to her. She has lost hope of finding someone in life who would respect her unwillingness.
Counselling might help victims to overcome their agony, fear and trauma but it can just not give them their mental peace back. A lot of debate goes on every day as to how we deter rape. First of all the punishment for rape must be such that it creates a stark terror in the hearts of the criminals, secondly more rape cases must be heard every day so that more criminals are hanged till death. Yes, hanged till death in the only justice to the victim. Let’s see it this way, everyday news headline flashes, “a couple of rapists hanged”. Does that sound unethical? To me, not at all for everyday new rape news sounded just like that. To combat rape, we must eliminate rapists as well as rape culture. It is natural to feel sexually attracted towards someone or to find them irresistible. But at the same time one must know how to control themselves. A “no” means “no”, it never means yes or it never sounds like a lucrative invitation. The way sex education has been incorporated in curriculum, the same way gender equality, basics of rape culture, its psychology and how to refrain from rape must also be taught. When a boy grows reading and listening about such things it is more likely that he will learn to say no to himself.
Rapes are a medium to tell women how inferior they are and what their real place is. You murder a man for revenge but you rape a woman for the same. A woman is an object that a man can acquire with his strength and what best breaks a woman is rape. These pathetic stereotypes play a severe role in promoting rape culture. We can’t possibly devise a way to deal with every freaking psychopath. But if we really want our country to come out of the grotesque state it is in, we must do a constant struggle to eliminate what is unpardonable and those who dare to do it.
———— About the Author: This article has been contributed by Aqsa Zaidi, our intern. Aqsa is a Botany Hons. Student from Hindu College, Delhi University. She feels it’s her constant struggle and effort to understand and redefine independence and equality in its purest form through her writing . Believing in women and youth empowerment, Aqsa wants to induct the same in her readers.
