Incidents of sexual harassment and rape have marked an alarming rise across the country.
We see the reflection of this horrific situation in the newspapers every day. In the prevailing socio-economic, cultural and politico-religious settings women cannot play an assertive role in development activities, either in the family or in the state. They are still treated as the weaker segment of the society and are subject to various social and domestic repressive measures. Violence is a product of social, cultural, religious and traditional value systems which perpetuate patriarchal attitudes at different levels of society and restrict female empowerment.
Rape violently asserts masculinity in a patriarchal society, which assigns women a subordinate position. Masculinity is associated with traditionally ‘male’ traits such as boldness, manliness, bravery, muscularity, machoism etc. A woman is what a man is not, if men are expected to dominate and women refuse to submit, ‘peace’ and ‘harmony’ will be disturbed. Unlike sex, masculinity or femininity is not biological. Both are social, cultural traits. our society is male-dominated and denies women any identity other than that of a wife, mother daughter or sister.
