While everyone is engaging in boys bashing on media – TV, print and social media, I am left wondering what boys are thinking right now? Surely it can’t be fun to have every finger pointed at you. I spoke to a few boys and here is what they said – “I wasn’t surprised at all! Disgusted yes – shocked No! It happens all the time. This is a normal “Boy talk”! I’m sorry to have to say that, but that’s what it is! This is how boys talk about girls!” Another one lamented the incident but felt the blame should be shared by a culture that always sexualizes the relationship between boys and girls – “Even platonic friendships are looked at with suspicion and forbidden.” Yet another said that it’s a faulty upbringing – “ No one every checks boys, while girls are given strict instructions about what they shouldn’t do and their every movement is monitored closely.” They all lamented the fact that sex was never spoken of – “it’s on everyone’s mind, but no one talks about it openly, especially not parents. We can’t talk to our parents because we fear that they will shut us down.” They all agreed that it was the double standards in the sexual morality of our society that was a real problem. The word ‘patriarchy’ as the villain came up several times in the discussion.

I feel sorry for them. And angry at a social system in which patriarchy and its inherent misogyny has such a stronghold. Equality is a cornerstone of Democracy and given the essentially unequal power structure of Patriarchy, it should be abundantly clear that Patriarchy is completely antithetical to Democracy. And yet 72 years after we became a democracy it is still solidly there, intact and in place. Why are we surprised at the way in which Boys talk about girls and women? About how badly they treat them at home and outside? Women are defined by and valued for their reproductive and sexual capabilities – as bodies, not whole persons. It is not surprising that others’ perception is colored by this, dictating what they do and what they say. Boys are raised to be boys!! No one expects them to be anything else and no one tries to teach them to be anything else. Not parents – fathers and mothers both! Not schools! Not their peers – both girls and boys! Our boys are a product of a pernicious and pathological social system and collective mindset thereof!

Whenever there is an event like the latest BOIS locker room event which receives so much publicity and the resultant notoriety, there is a cry for the necessity to ‘change mindsets’. And yet no one does anything to change that mindset and then there is another event and the cry arises again. At SHEF, we decided some years ago that schools provided the best opportunity and was the best place to change mindsets. We developed a Critical Feminist Pedagogy and a curriculum for both girls and boys which was meant to help them see that patriarchy was a cruel, misogynistic, undemocratic social structure, which had grave consequences, often lethal for girls and women. India has amongst the highest rates of gender-based violence, both domestic and public. This is a result of the toxic masculinity constructed by Patriarchy, its sexist, misogynistic sexual norms, a cruel sexual morality, which is skewed heavily against women, limiting their lives severely, their behavior and self-perception defined by shame, guilt and fear.
In a toxic social and psychological climate like this – women feel they have no legitimate right to sexual desire, never mind to free sexual expression. Sexual desire is very dangerous territory for girls. So forbidden, controlled and hidden. When some of them choose bravely to express themselves it is forced to go underground and that is fraught with risk and danger. It’s easy for boys to ‘slut-shame’ girls and they do. Most girls are terrified into self-protective frigidity and sexual silence as it were.

The rigid norms of sexual segregation, where even platonic friendships between boys and girls are frowned upon and romantic relationships with consensual sex completely out of bounds are much to blame. They are in no small measure responsible for the high incidence of sexual violence in our homes and on our streets, giving rise to activities like the BOIS locker room, which by no means is an isolated one.
We need to get real about sex and take a healthier approach to it. Remove the grim shroud of shame that we have clothed it in, and give it some air and sunshine. Let’s put it in the realm of romance and natural human behavior. Let’s learn to talk about it openly and naturally – at home, in school, in society. The only way it is talked about right now is in the form of vulgar sexist jokes, sexist abuses, and ugly locker room talk.

We also need to change our toxic, repressive sexual culture. Its because consensual sex is prohibited, that sex takes the ugly form of rape and abuse. We should be talking about it more naturally, putting it in the context of consent, romance, love and privacy. It has a legitimate place in our lives and NOT just in the marriage bed, where again more often than not, consent of the wife is not considered necessary. Sex education and gender education both should become a compulsory part of the official school curriculum.

Teachers and parents – let’s teach our boys to respect girls as whole persons, not just bodies. And let’s teach our girls the same lesson. Of course they are sexual beings, just like boys are, with sexual desires – again just like them, but they also have minds, intellect and emotions. And let’s teach our girls to respect themselves as whole persons too. They can be much more than just a pretty face and a baby-making machine. And most importantly let us become more human and humane about sex. Sexual attraction and sexual desire are natural human characteristics. Why are we so much in denial of this simple fact? No one is suggesting a free for all, promiscuous society, but unless we take a more open, less repressive approach towards sex, we will continue to have more BOIS locker room incidents and more Nirbhaya type gang rapes! Yes we need to change mindsets – ALL of us need to do that.

– Dr. Urvashi Sahni