Rapists are enemies of civilization

This is a very serious crisis for a country and its society

In the recent past, have you heard of any Chakma, Marma, Tripura, Garo, Santal, Hajong, Bawm, Khumi being named as rapists? I honestly cannot recall any. Even though girls from small ethnic communities are raped by Bengalis, we do not see their men committing rape. Yet their girls – especially those living deep in the hills – hardly wear much clothing at all. Girls and boys work side by side in the fields. Even after seeing countless women’s breasts and most of their bodies every day, the men do not feel the urge to rape. And it is not as if the law is enforced there with any particular strictness.

In Africa there are many tribes whose women remain completely naked. At the same time, they work with men, celebrate festivals, enjoy life together. Yet no one gets raped.

People in our country think that by demanding the death penalty as punishment, a lot has been achieved. There is already the death penalty for drugs, for rape, for so many things. Has drug use gone down? Has it decreased despite so many “crossfires”? If you keep intact the hundreds of social factors that produce crime and only increase the severity of punishment, crime does not decrease. Take this gentlewoman from Noakhali, about whom everyone is now protesting – she did not have the courage all this time to file a case against the rapists or even identify them. In such a situation, hundreds of crimes remain buried. This is a very serious crisis for a country and a society.

In this country, criminals commit crimes and get away with them. In this country, there are many people who blame the victim’s clothing and her movements, and take the rapist’s side. Everyone looks for solutions by citing examples from the Middle East, where rape survivors do not even dare to lodge a complaint. There are many examples where the victim herself has ended up being punished instead. Hundreds of Bangladeshi women domestic workers, after being raped and returning home pregnant, come back here regularly – has there been justice in even a single one of those cases?

In a society where women are seen as deceitful, where women are called the embodiment of the devil, where people curse women as ill-omened, unlucky, harbingers of misfortune, prostitutes – of course men in that society will be inclined toward rape. Most people in this society do not even see women as human beings. The day people live with the awareness that – even if a woman, drunk, walks alone and naked down the street in the middle of the night – no one has the right to touch her body, that is the day rape will drastically decrease.

As soon as a girl is raped, people say her life is over! If someone records a naked woman on a mobile phone and circulates the video, they say her life is over! How many girls have committed suicide after being blackmailed like this. Society should learn from actress Pori Moni and from Prova. She did not die, nor did she drown in shame. The man who released Mithila’s video thought he would destroy her. Mithila could not care less. In the end, it was that man who was exposed. Only by shattering the balloon of “chastity” and “modesty” taught by patriarchy can rape be blunted. The weapons used to subdue women have been planted so deeply in their minds that they feel their self-respect is gone and want to end their own lives. Yet rape is a crime, and it is the criminal who should be ashamed. In the eyes of society, he should be the one despised. And yet it is the woman who must cover her face.