When a man tells the harsh truth, his opponents criticise him; when a woman does the same, her opponents resort to character assassination. Amidst rape and death threats to actor and BJP MP Kangana Ranaut over her statement that rapes took place during farmers’ protest, leftist propaganda YouTuber ‘DeshBhakt’ Akash Banerjee resorted to sharing sexist innuendos to attack her.
On 28th August, Akash Banerjee, who was promoted by the US Embassy in India last month for its ‘Influence to Impact’ event, shared on X an old video of Kangana Ranaut dancing her heart out at a party. However, Banerjee exposed his misogynistic mindset and asked “What is the name of the dance that #KanganaRanaut is performing?”
In another display of his sexist mentality, Akash Banerjee shared an old video of Kangana Ranaut from an ad-related event and made a derogatory comment against the actress seen in a fun mood in the video. He equated BJP reprimanding Kangana Ranaut for her comments with getting ‘whipped’ and said, “From being whipped for fun in parties, To being whipped seriously from her own Party. #KanganaRanaut has had an exciting journey.”
Beyond deflection from the issue Kangana Ranaut raised, Akash Banerjee and others using personal or unconnected aspects of someone’s life to damage their credibility is a classic character assassination strategy employed by the left-liberal ecosystem. Sharing the BJP MP’s old videos is a blatant attempt to trivialise her as a person and undermine her voice.
As reported earlier, Kangana has already been getting threats of violence and sexual assault, and by mocking and assassinating her character, people like Akash Banerjee are implicitly instigating the worst online harassment she faces. Since Banerjee’s post, several social media users shared the same videos along with sexist innuendos.
Such behaviour reflects a deeper misogyny wherein the opinions of women including those of a democratically elected public representative are discredited and belittled by disparaging her personal choices or past rather than arguing the merits of the arguments she raised.
Ironically, the US Embassy in India chose a misogynist like Akash Banerjee as an influence of change to teach Indian youth how to ‘harness the power of social media’ and become active citizens. ‘Influencers’ like Akash Banerjee cannot encourage active citizenship or “meaningful change” rather they can only disseminate lessons on how to be a misogynist and use it as a weapon against women who express unpleasant facts.
The US Embassy in India should answer if they agree with Banerjee’s remarks. Do they approve of the blatant display of misogyny by the influencer they promoted against a sitting MP of opposing views?
It is, however, not shocking that Akash Banerjee shared sexist and derogatory innuendos targeted at Kangana Ranaut since he had in the past casually trivialised the brutality suffered by rape victim Nirbhaya just to score political points against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP.
Back in 2021, Akash Banerjee, in his efforts to use ’eminent intellectual’ Pratap Bhanu Mehta’s resignation to propagandise against the Modi Government, compared the incident with the heinous rape of Nirbhaya. He claimed that Mehta’s resignation was academia’s ‘Nirbhaya moment’, comparing a resignation with rape and thus, trivialising the horrendous brutality Nirbhaya suffered.
No wonder, Banerjee used sexist remarks against Kangana since it is normal for him to use rape analogies just to peddle his propaganda. Even as the social media users criticised Banerjee for his remarks against Kangana, the leftist propagandist shamelessly defended his contentious posts and dropped a sarcastic post that he will take coaching on how not to be misogynist and how not to objectify women from BJP IT Cell and Kangana as well as lessons on workplace safety for women from BJP leader Brij Bhushan Singh. Very shrewdly, Banerjee turned the issue into a BJP IT Cell and BJP supporters versus him debate, even as it is a matter of a woman being character assassinated by her ideological opponents.
Probably, Akash Banerjee and his ilk would like to take coaching from Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan, who once made sexist comments about actor and BJP leader Jaya Prada. He should learn from Khan how to recognise a woman’s ‘reality’ from her underwear. Banerjee can also take coaching from Congress leader Randeep Surjewala on how to objectify a woman MP from the opposing party saying that “MP MLAs are elected to raise issues of people and they are not like Hema Malini who is made MP just to lick her.”
He can also take coaching on how not to be misogynist and how not to objectify women from Rahul Gandhi, the unannounced supreme leader of the anti-BJP ecosystem who on multiple occasions made derogatory remarks about former Miss World and actor Aishwarya Rai Bachchan saying “Aishwarya Rai naachti hui dikhegi”. In fact, he can avail a crash course on how not to be misogynist and how not to objectify women from several Congress leaders and its supporters who leave no opportunity to make sexist comments about BJP leader Smriti Irani for her statements against Rahul Gandhi.
What is this obsession with Aishwarya Rai and Amitabh Bachchan @RahulGandhi ??
— Mr. Pritish (@MNihilio) February 20, 2024
Sick Mentality! @INCIndia pic.twitter.com/92SXQw4rzZ
Khalistan enthusiast and SAD (Amritsar) leader Simranjit Singh Mann’s rape comment against Kangana Ranaut
Making sexist comments against women politicians has become an inextricable component of political discourse in India. In continuance of the same, former Sangrur MP and pro-Khalistan leader Simranjit Singh Mann said Kangana Ranaut has more “experience of rape” so she must know better. “You can ask her (Kangana Ranaut) how rape happens so that people can be explained how rape happens. She has a lot of experience of rape,” Mann said triggering a backlash on social media and a strong reaction from Kangana.
“It seems this country will never stop trivialising rape, today this senior politician compared getting raped to riding a bicycle no wonder rapes and violence against women for fun are so deeply rooted in the psyche of this patriarchal nation that it is casually used to tease or mock a woman even if she is a high profile filmmaker or politician,” Kangana Ranaut said.
As reported earlier, during one of the promotion events for her upcoming movie, Emergency, Kangana Ranaut lauded the Union government for its actions during the farmer protest. “What happened in Bangladesh, it could have easily happened here too. bodies were seen hanging and rapes were taking place,” Kangana said while referring to criminal incidents that were widely reported during the first farmers’ protest. Soon after, the BJP distanced itself from Ranaut’s remarks.
In no time, Ranaut started getting multiple threats for speaking up on the farmer’s protest as well as for her upcoming movie, Emergency. While some alleged ‘influencers’ threatened that she would meet an Indira Gandhi-like fate, others issued threats of physically assaulting her or filing a defamation case.
While the nation is yet to recover from the Kolkata horror wherein a doctor was brutally raped and murdered inside the RG Kar Hospital and Medical College, the continued trivialisation of rape and usage of misogyny as a weapon against women by political opponents as well as ‘influencers’ who receiving recognition from US Embassy, India can never win its fight against misogyny and rape culture.
