Former BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma has been the target of an incredible amount of hate over the past 2 weeks. Ever since Nupur appeared on a TV debate on the Times Now news channel over the issue of Shivling inside the disputed Gyanvapi structure, she has been facing a torrent of abuse and threats.
Even though she has apologized for her comments on Prophet Muhammad, and even got suspended from BJP, the abuse is showing no signs of stopping any time soon. The country saw widespread protests against her from Islamists on Friday, 10th June, after the afternoon Namaz. At some places, they hanged her effigy to remind her what they want to do to her, at some places they burnt her effigy, while at other places they demanded that she should be hanged in person.
Among all these protests, a video has gone viral on social media on Saturday, which shows a bunch of kids publicly urinating on Nupur Sharma’s photo to mark their ‘protest’ if it can be called that. In the video, two kids are urinating on Nupur’s photo while being surrounded by several other kids cheering them on. The location of the viral video couldn’t be ascertained but evident from the target of this ‘protest’, it is quite recent.
यह है भविष्य,,,ऑंखे खोल कर देख लो सभी,,,,
— विनोद तापड़िया ॐ🇮🇳ॐ (@VinodTaparia1) June 11, 2022
भक्त भी, अंध भक्त भी और नैनसुख अंधे भी🙄 pic.twitter.com/zPxPRbzDwi
Re-inforcing patriarchy through this ‘urination protest’
The act of urinating on Nupur’s photo was performed with just one desire, to humiliate her. To show this woman her ‘aukaat’ for daring to say something which was unpalatable to these Islamists. Growing up in a highly patriarchal society, these kids have learned from childhood that it is totally normal to piss on a woman’s face if she has dared to make you angry.
FIRs for comments on Prophet Muhammad have been registered against Nupur Sharma and Naveen Kumar Jindal, both were suspended from the party on the same day, and both are facing the same real threat to their lives right now, but with one difference. We did not see Naveen Jindal’s effigy hanging from cables, we did not see YouTube influencers making mock-beheading videos featuring Jindal, and we obviously did not see boys urinating on Jindal’s poster.
Even though threats to Jindal’s life are all too real, and he is trying his best to at least save his family from the imminent attack by moving them around, the Islamists are only interested in taking his life, not in humiliating him like they want to do to Nupur.
That is because apart from the “crime of blasphemy”, Nupur has committed another crime, to be born a woman in a highly patriarchal society. It is not enough to wait for the legal proceedings in the case to finish, no, she should be punished, and it should be done publicly because her punishment will not be over till they haven’t added public humiliation to the mix.
Promoting ‘rape culture’ by making the penis a tool to humiliate women
As mentioned earlier, the Islamists up in arms against Nupur Sharma don’t just want to see her getting punished, they want to see her humiliated before that punishment as well. This mindset that a woman should be humiliated for what she said contributes a lot to the ‘rape culture’ because, in these patriarchal societies, a woman’s dignity is tied to her vagina. If a woman gets raped, she is the one who faces more humiliation than the rapist, so if they want to humiliate a woman, that is their “go-to” move.
By cheering on these kids for urinating on her face on the poster, these boys have also been told now that their penis is a tool to humiliate a woman. They can just bring it out anywhere and use it to hit back at a woman who angers them at any time.
Some people will say these are just kids having fun and we should not read too much into it, but the foundation of the youth is laid in childhood itself. Kids will not stay kids forever, they will grow up, and how they turn out in their youth will depend on all these little lessons they will accumulate along the way. Further, as the recent Hyderabad gang rape case by minors told us, sometimes we don’t even have to wait till their youth to see the result of these lessons.
