By Saurabh Kirpal
The summer of ’69, as the song by Bryan Adams proclaims, were the best days of his life. Sadly, life wasn’t quite as good for the LGBTQI+ community in the June of that year when, faced with consistent police brutality, riots broke outside the iconic Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York.
The riots lasted six days and marked the first time that the queer community stood in the open and fought rather than hide in the shadows. That act of defiance in now commemorated as Pride Month not only in the US, but across the world. It is an occasion not only to remember the past, but also declare proudly to the world that we exist.
So, it seems like a good time to take stock of not only how far we have come in our fight against discrimination, but also what the next steps for the community are.
Fighting prejudice
The battle against the archaic section 377 was won in 2018, but the fight against prejudice towards the queer community has barely even begun.
The written words of the law as well as the uneven and unfair application of the rules deny LGBTQI+ citizens of our country the right to attain their full potential.
Hostile discrimination against the community is one of the last areas where the law allows the state to treat people unequally on the basis of an innate attribute, i.e. their gender or sexuality.
Same sex couples cannot marry and thus do not have access to a host of spousal rights and benefits taken for granted by heterosexuals. The issue is not only about access to monetary benefits, important as they are. The pandemic has also shone a spotlight on the fact that even the basic right to meet your partner in hospital when they are sick does not exist for the queer community.
Even when discrimination is not written into the law, in practice LGBTQI+ people face daily harassment. Access to employment is difficult, particularly in male-dominated professions and businesses. The absence of a general anti-discrimination law allows private landlords to refuse accommodation to LGBTQI+ people. While there is no bar in law from any two people opening a joint bank account, convincing a branch manager of a bank to permit a same sex couple to open an account is a herculean task.
Making positive change happen
The queer community cannot wait for society to evolve and gradually earn their basic human rights.
There is in any event no guarantee that the evolution of society will be progressive. To make positive change happen, members of the community, along with their straight allies, will have to demand and fight for their rights.
The courts will be the first places where a citizen would seek fulfilment of the constitutional promise of freedom and equality.
But the battle will also have to be carried to the court of public opinion. Civil society will have to be convinced that we are not asking for special rights, just the basic right to live with dignity. The war against hate, prejudice and discrimination can be won, but that requires perseverance and courage.
One can only hope that Pride Month will not be just another moment for corporate gimmickry, but would inspire a new generation to reach out and take what is rightfully theirs – their humanity.
Do you have a coming out story that you’d like to share? Write to me at: Namita.bhandare@gmail.com
GENDER TRACKER
Great news from Australia, where half of prime minister Anthony Alabanese’s cabinet, or 13 ministers, are women.
But, worth remembering that worldwide only 28 women are heads of state, another historic high, but far too low with just 8% of all global heads of state.
Source: iKnowPolitics
WE HEAR YOU
“In our society, the paternal grandparents will always take better care of their grandson.”
A two-judge Supreme Court bench chose to hand over custody of a five-year-old Covid orphan to his grandparents over his maternal aunt.
STORIES YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED
A week in the life of Indian women
When Sher Md Sheikh learned that his wife Renu Khatun had got a job as a nurse at a government hospital, he reacted by…chopping off her hand. The 26-year-old was apparently afraid that his wife would get posted to another town.
In Gwalior, a Congress youth ‘leader’ Rishabh Bhadoriya, out on bail in two murder cases, shot his wife dead in the presence of their two children over her suspected infidelity, says the police.
The Sports Authority of India moved fast to sack cycling coach R.K. Sharma after it found merit in the complaint of an unnamed woman cyclist who accused him of barging into her room and asking her to sleep with him during a training camp in Solvenia.
And, an update on India’s rape crisis:
Hyderabad police has arrested two more juveniles in connection with the gang-rape of a minor girl on May 28 in what media is dubbing the “Mercedes gang-rape”. Of the total six men accused, five are minors, one of them the son of an AIMIM legislator, and another a relative.
Meanwhile, a two-judge Delhi high court bench of justices Mukta Gupta and Mini Pushkarna has sentenced three men to life imprisonment, for the remainder of their natural lives, for gang-raping and murdering a three-year-old girl in 2012. Life sentences usually run for 14 years. These men will never walk free again.
And in Rajasthan’s Alwar district, a 13-year-old girl has been detained and sent to a juvenile home for murdering a 45-year-old man who had been blackmailing and raping her for the past six or seven months, according to the police. The girl told the police that the man had also forced her into sexual relations with three other men in the village.
THANK YOU TO…
Mithali Raj who announced her retirement from all forms of cricket. The tributes just keep pouring in. “An inspiration to young girls wanting to play for India,” tweeted Sachin Tendulkar. “Inspiration to millions,” said Dinesh Karthik. “I had no idea that women’s cricket existed,” said another women’s cricket star, Hamanpreet Kaur. Mithali sowed the seeds for young girls to dream big.
Mithali emerged as her own person, politely reminding journalists that she was not a ‘Lady Sachin’, and once responding to a reporter’s question on who her favourite male player was with another question: “Do you ask male players who their favourite cricketer is?”
But perhaps her biggest legacy over a 23-year-career is her message of the possibility of sport to women everywhere. To say she paved the way is an understatement. In becoming a role model, she gifted girls everywhere a dream.
Read Vidhi Choudhury’s 2017 profile of Mithali Raj in Mint here.
AROUND THE WORLD
50 years of the ‘Napalm girl’
June 8 marked 50 years since Nick Ut photographed what is perhaps the defining photograph of the Vietnam War: The ‘Napalm girl’, a picture of a naked nine-year-old girl running and screaming in pain. In the decades since there’s been a ton of commentary including an autobiography about the nine-year-old, Phan Thi Kim Phuc. Now living in Ontario, Canada where she runs the Kim Foundation which aids child victims of war she has written an incredibly moving piece in The New York Times: “We are not symbols. We are human.” But, she adds about her 50 year journey, “I am proud that, in time, I have become a symbol of peace.”
Read her article here.
Credit: AP Photo/ Nick Ut
A woman’s place
Colombian presidential candidate, Rudolfo Hernandez, 77, may or may not win his country’s elections on June 19, but his views on women can leave no room for doubt. The construction magnate who has a woman running mate for vice president, is quoted in El Pais saying, “Ideally, women should devote themselves to raising children.” He added that even though women should not have a role in managerial positions, “it is good for them to make comments and to provide support from their homes.” How kind.
Kamala Khan rises
Critics can’t get enough of Kamala Khan, Disney’s first onscreen Muslim superhero who made her screen debut on Disney + Hotstar on June 8. Financial Times gave it a four-star review while The Guardian said the character played by Pakistani-Canadian Iman Vellani ‘effortlessly bats off preconceptions’. Kamala Khan has featured in Ms Marvel strips since 2014 and within five years topped Marvel’s digital sales chart with 500,000 copies sold, reports The Economist.
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| That’s it for this week. If you have a tip or information on gender-related developments that you would like to share write to me at: namita.bhandare@gmail.com. |