Shit that goes down when you are looking or not looking for love
TW: sexual abuse
Dating is tough. Maintaining a steady relationship is tougher. I have enough insights about how I have single handedly jeopardized two relationships because I cannot seem to control my mind. But today is not about my dysregulated emotions. Today I am angry. Well, I have been angry for a while.
Carrying a female body is difficult to say the least. Violations are commonplace. I was exposed to sexual abuse at a very early age in my childhood. It’s become a vicious cycle that never seems to stop. Being vulnerable is not a pleasant space to be in. And the impact is so deep that it has made me hyper vigilant about my space. I am hyper vigilant about how my body is seen and perceived. Unexpected sexualization of my body induces a lot of pain, brings back trauma that I have locked away somewhere in my brain.
Interactions with men are confusing. Its almost like I should step out expecting disappointments. Because these are well read men with progressive politics. The first story is about an activist. I have known him for a few years, worked with him, learned from him and most of all looked up to him as a mentor and elder brother. Under no instance did I hint at anything rarely romantic or sexual. Yet one night last June he suggestively invites me to the bed of his chang ghar. My fault? Engaging in a conversation with him till midnight. His justification? He cannot find a woman in his small town to have intellectual conversations with. The next story is about a very vocal intellectual. The same story repeats. I was introduced to him when I was an impressionable teenager who had just moved to the big city (Guwahati). We kept meeting at protest rallies and political discussions. We reconnected after a similar blog post I had shared on social media. Conversations became frequent, which ranged from our shared depression to reading Marx. This time too he was a mentor figure with no indication of any emotion but respect. Yet a few nights ago he gets drunk and goes on to ask me to date him. Why? Because he is lonely and seeks the adventure of dating someone young. Because I am not normal, my psychological disorders set me apart. He says things like he wants to explore me. According to him I look okay-ish too. He assures me that his company will cure my psychological disorders. And that he will guide me to academic success. Regardless of how many times I tried to change the topic he kept pestering if I would be able to love him. What do I wake up to the next morning? A one-liner lame apology. What it does to me? Keeps me anxious the whole day in anger and disgust. I keep thinking about what and where I went wrong.
Why do men think they can make advances at anyone and disrespect the boundaries of the other person. Why do they think they can ruin the sanctity of a relationship and still pretend like everything is okay? How does one confront these men because these are seemingly casual instances to have any consequences?
Things get worse when one is actively dating. Early this year I came back from a date with scars on my body. This wasn’t a chance encounter. This was a man I had talked to for more than a month. It turned out that he thought asking for consent once guarantees that I have consented to everything that might happen next. I don’t have the strength to describe what went down. I remember making desperate calls to people at the dead of the night. I remember asking my brother to come to my cousin’s home because I needed a hug. I haven’t processed that trauma. I haven’t processed the fact that I was slut shamed by a lot of people. This was also the moment when I learnt that people turn away in times of crisis. It was in April that a research scholar from Tezpur University went to masturbate because he saw my chest (not bare but clothed). He thought it was okay for him to persist to see my bare chest despite my visible discomfort. He thought it was okay for him to ask me if I enjoy the attention of men in public spaces while wearing clothes that expose my cleavage. He thought it was okay to invalidate my protest by quoting mumbo jumbo about biological urges and animal instinct. He also though it was okay for him to dismiss my psychological diagnosis. He thought it was fun to dare me to die when I expressed that I was extremely suicidal.
Do I trust the legal machinery? No, I don’t. 2019 taught me a harsh lesson about how the police can trivialize my trauma and absolutely deny to do their jobs. I often question myself, am I a bad feminist? Should I have taken the legal recourse? Or at least should I have shamed these people on social media? I don’t have an answer. But I am in absolute awe of the confidence with which these men operate. In awe of the power that they wield that concepts of boundaries, consent and respect are nothing but words to them. I don’t know how to alert other women about the huge damage that these men are capable of unleashing. But know this that the woke guy who casually quotes Kimberlé Crenshaw might not practice what he preaches.
Justice is a blurry idea. My body shrinks when my mind brings flashbacks of these incidents. Declare me a feminazi, but men terrify me. The daily experiences of grouping, teasing and flashing are not even taken into account here. The faintest hope of feeling safe with a man has completely evaporated. I was in 10th standard when I wrote in somebody’s slam book that I feel the safest at home. It is at this point that I truly understand that sentiment.
