Recent articles suggest that the rape incidents are bad as it is in India, it's just as bad or worse elsewhere. Both place heavy emphasis on percentages and reportable numbers.
A reality check on those numbers please, and on articles where the premise rests on how it might be worse outside India because of reported numbers. It reminds me of when older female relatives in India would cluck and sniff about how "We in India don't get divorced." To which I'd usually say, "Well of course not, where would you have gone after a divorce?" First you'd hear crickets and then you'd hear a loud change of subject.
You know why the numbers are shockingly high elsewhere, especially in the west? Because they're actually *reported.* Because victims can be survivors and have somewhere to go.
Numbers in India, frankly much of South Asia, might be higher if women actually reported sexual assault more. We don't. Because there is NO upside in a culture that shows little compassion for survivors, shames the whole family - potentially for decades, and involves legal systems that aren't just corrupt and sclerotic, but sometimes collude with the assailant. Compare that to the west, where it's not perfect but victims are by and large taken seriously, investigated by police who have been required to be more professional and sensitive in the last thirty years, in societies that offer compassion first (especially in emergency rooms or via 911) - rather than a grilling, followed by castigation or ostracism - upon survival, and don't shun the entire family because one person had a horrible thing happen to them.
India simply isn't one of those places. It wasn't when I was little, and nothing tells me that's changed substantially, not even with Damini's passing. I'd love to be wrong.
Nowhere's perfect. But it's frequently less perfect in India for women, and two weeks ago it was way less perfect. We just happened to hear about it, courtesy of a hafta diary.
One more thing - "Sweden leads the world, where almost every other woman is being raped." That's a pretty big statement. Can you tell us which which report that came from? (I remember something about this, but the numbers were problematic. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19592372)
from sohini
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