Friday, February 05, 2010

''bound to titillate the senses''

Statement made in response to the 9 year old being raped in Goa
"You can't blame the locals; they have never seen such women. Foreign tourists must maintain a certain degree of modesty in their clothing. Walking on the beaches half-naked is bound to titillate the senses," New Delhi's Mail Today newspaper quoted Pamela Mascarhenas, Goa's deputy director of tourism, as saying Friday.


Action Heroes respond:

No woman of any colour, dress, age, character deserves to be sexually violated or what some might lightly call 'eve teased'.

By making the statement above you are blaming women instead of taking responsibility of the issue. If you believe a person's dress is culturally inappropriate, you may continue to believe so, but you cannot defend any act of violence. A person inappropriately dressed according to your idea of 'Indianness' does not deserve to be attacked, assaulted, molested, raped or even whistled at.

For your information, women from across age groups be it 3 month old babies of 90 year old have been raped. They have been raped in saris, burkhas, salwar kameez, school uniforms, bikinis, jeans, skirts, shirts,lungis. Women have been molested, assaulted, raped at all times of the day, and in public places.

We hope this will direct you towards taking responsibility of these incidents by actually addressing male behaviour and men in Goa, for which you will first have to address yourself by accepting this truth.

We have evidence even though we don't really need it.

No woman of any colour, dress , age, character deserves to be sexually violated or what some might lightly call 'eve teased'.

Thank you for your attention,
An Indian girl who loves her saris and her hot pants.


A detailed letter to the Deputy Director of Tourism, Goa is here:
http://blog.blanknoise.org/2010/02/to-deputy-director-of-tourism-goa.html


Support this campaign by being an Action Hero:

1. taking a photo of a garment you wore when experienced
street sexual harassment, street sexual intimidation, street sexual violence, or think you were 'eve-teased'.

2. upload the photo on this event and also make it your facebook profile photo for 1 week start Monday Feb 8.

3. Feb 13 onwards will witness clothes collection drives in different cities, starting with Bangalore. More information coming up. You can help organize one. You can be the Blank Noise agent and collect clothes from women around you. Take the word where you can. Be an Action Hero

4. we want out BN guys to propose ideas via which men can be involved, addressed in the issue of street sexual harassment.

5. tweet it #blanknoise
http://twitter.com/blank_noise


No comments: