Right now the certain murder of the newly married husband and the possible abduction/murder of his brand new wife seem to haunt the social media in India. The couple from Indore was supposed to go to Shri Lanka for their honeymoon. Instead, they chose to go to Meghalaya, and the horrible tragedy began to unravel itself without any end to cheap speculation(s) in the near future.
What, and how, happened to the couple, where the wife could possibly be, nothing is definitively clear as yet. Yet many titles/thumbnails of videos and, much worse, the comments below these by 'netizens' blame the young wife. The wannabe Hercule Poirot's are dead sure-n-certain that the culprit has to be the wife who must have cooked up the plan in Indore itself!
This is how it has always been. Remember, the Bible blames Eve for the fall. Milton, a great poet, shows in Book IX of the 'Paradise Lost' how Eve manipulates Adam in to eating the fruit of the Forbidden Tree, while Adam, having failed to convince her to the contrary, finally eats it for his love for her!
Shakespeare's Hamlet, even when in two minds about to believe or not to believe the Ghost, is certain, however, that "Woman, thy name is frailty"! If the 'Iliad' blames Helen for the defeat of the invincible Troy, even when she is a mere tool/toy in the hands of the Divine Powers that be, our own 'Ramayana' hints at Kaikeyi, not to forget Sita herself in the case of the Kanchan Mriga/the Golden Deer, as the cause behind Ravana's crime. Look at the women in Mahabharata, from Ganga to Draupadi, to understand how women are thought to be the reason behind any/every crime in the societal imaginary.
Yes, women, too, ARE heir to all the faults that make human beings devilish. But why begin the blame game with women? Look at the Vaishnavi Hagwane case, for instance. By definition, the sister-in-law is the culprit in the media trial. Ugliest things are said about her by the intellectually lazy, loose-tongued 'netizens'. Conveniently it is forgotten that there can be at least two sides to the coin. The "woman as woman's worst enemy'' motif is an ancient patriarchal trick, it is conveniently overlooked.
In such a scenario, it is a sin to be an attractive woman who is brilliant, talented, and extremely well-behaved. Whatever you do is by definition wrong. If you are the quiet type, you are 'proudy', aloof, worse still, a beguiling temptress. You have to just smile, even to yourself, and your dimples are sure to create sensational storms of imaginary affairs in the minds of the 'curious' (in all senses of the term) even when the only companion you most often have is books, or a lappie or a musical instrument! Why, the creepy thinking, of both men and women, can make such a virgin in to a sex bombshell with many steamy affairs, nay, abortions to her credit. It does not occur to such sick dastards that she is never ever even seen with a man!
The logo of womanhood, hence, I think , should be "woman, thy name is victimisation." One's humane divinity consists in standing up to such sick nonsense with quiet dignity and courage-n-conviction! Show them not thy tears nor thine vulnerabilities. Shame them, instead, with more and better self-actualisations that totally belittle them!
Pratima@Thy name, Woman, is total transparency born out of self-reflexivity!