Headline violence and silenced pleasure: contested framings of consensual sex, power and rape in Delhi, India 2011-2014

Abstract

Abstract

Though coercion and rape have cast a persistent shadow over prospects of sexual health and consent in contemporary India, other narratives, agency and tools are quietly emerging to transform collective claims of power and bodily dignity. In these narratives from collectives, NGOs, on social media and among friends, dialogues about consent and pleasure feature prominently. This paper analyses statements in the news made by highly visible political and public figures regarding the subject of rape in the context of themes emerging from ethnography and semi-structured interviews with middle class people in Delhi. Using the device of social frameworks, contested framings of rape and consent are examined in order to interrogate essentialist gender norms, compare putative “causes” of rape, and highlight local efforts promoting sexual consent, health and well-being.

Résumé

Si la contrainte et le viol assombrissent durablement les perspectives de santé sexuelle et de consentement sexuel dans l’Inde contemporaine, d’autres récits, activités et outils apparaissent doucement pour transformer les revendications collectives de pouvoir et de dignité corporelle. Dans ces récits de collectifs et d’ONG, sur les médias sociaux et entre amis, les dialogues sur le consentement et le plaisir occupent une place importante. Cet article analyse les déclarations dans les médias faites par des personnalités politiques et publiques à forte visibilité sur la question du viol dans le contexte des thèmes émergeant de l’ethnographie et d’entretiens semi-structurés avec des individus de la classe moyenne à New Delhi. À l’aide du dispositif des cadres sociaux, les contextes contestés du viol et du consentement sont examinés afin d’interroger les normes sexospécifiques essentialistes, comparer les « causes » putatives du viol et mettre en évidence les efforts locaux pour promouvoir le consentement, la santé et le bien-être sexuels.

Resumen

Aunque la coacción y violación han arrojado una sombra persistente sobre las perspectivas de salud sexual y consentimiento en India contemporánea, otros discursos, agencia y herramientas están surgiendo discretamente para transformar las afirmaciones colectivas de poder y dignidad corporal. En estos discursos de colectivos, ONG, en los medios sociales de comunicación y entre amistades, los diálogos sobre consentimiento y placer son prominentes. Este artículo analiza las declaraciones en las noticias hechas por figuras políticas y públicas muy visibles acerca del tema de violación en el contexto de temáticas que surgen de etnografía y entrevistas semiestructuradas con personas de la clase media en Delhi. Utilizando marcos sociales, se examinan marcos disputados de de violación y consentimiento para interrogar normas de género esencialistas, comparar “causas” putativas de violación y destacar esfuerzos locales que promueven el consentimiento sexual, la salud y el bienestar.

Keywords:

• India
• sexual coercion
• rape
• consensual sex
• sexual violence, women's agency

Introduction

Indian feminist scholars have long interrogated the processes of ideology, legal rulings and structural violence against women (VAW) whereby rape is sometimes normalized in Indian society. They have analyzed over 67 years of history, from India’s partition to widely publicized cases in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Badaun.^1–3 Partly due to these crimes, India ranks fairly low in measures of gender equality among countries rated by the UNDP gender inequality index.⁴ Yet, within this bleak landscape, the shapes of other narratives, agency and tools are challenging the narrative of the entrenched sexual victimization of women, and transforming individual and collective experiences of power, agency and bodily dignity. These challenges are found in conversations among urban, middle class, educated friends, at events of Indian-based collectives and NGOs, and in socially mediated print and on-line English language news coverage of rape-related statements by public figures.

A fatal gang rape on a bus in Delhi in December 2012 made national and global headlines. Millions grieved while a young woman lost her life and her male friend was left to recover from the ordeal. Amidst widespread protests, the release of a commissioned judicial report to reform Indian rape law⁵ and a national election, numerous public figures opined about rape and women’s safety. Public dialogue about how to deal with violence against women became a central debate as the protests fueled discussions of prevention, causation, punishment and accountability.^5,6 These events afford an opening to explore specific questions: how do public framings of consensual and non-consensual sexuality align with what people are learning privately? Do predominant rape narratives address the problem of intimate partner violence (IPV)? What strategies promote learning about consensual sexualities and the prevention of coercive sexual behaviors?

Theoretical perspectives

The theoretical device of social frames, originally detailed by Goffman,⁷ reveals patterns of interpretation that people use to organize, communicate about, and respond to events. Frames were later employed by Altheide⁸ in his research on fear in the news media. This paper uses the perspective of frames to consider the manner in which public figures depict problems in particular narrative structures that tend to gloss over complexity and ambiguity inherent in social situations, and suggest solutions that appear simple and clear. These processes, which produce stories that Altheide likens to “morality plays”, often obscure significant information and complexity that could result in different perspectives and more effective problem solving. Such morality plays reproduce existing social hierarchies and norms. He provides an example of how news coverage in the United States regarding child neglect and abuse often focuses on kidnapping by strangers. This distracts attention, funding, legislation and policy away from the much more frequent problem of several hundred thousand abused, abandoned, neglected and runaway children in cities in the United States.⁸

In a further elaboration of framing theory, Benford and Snow⁹ discuss how frames play central roles in how social change actors and movements construct meaning about contested topics. They delineate separate framing processes within social change movements, such as diagnostic framing to attribute blame or responsibility, prognostic framing to suggest solutions, and motivational framing to call people to take action. Using frames and discourse oriented ethnography, we examine ethnographic interviews, public events, and 25 statements by public figures in the news, as they discuss gender norms, attribute responsibility and suggest solutions regarding rape. Using the theoretical device of frames enables us to contrast how people and groups in different positions of power construct and convey the meanings of social phenomena. These meanings, in turn, influence actions, laws, and policy that affect people’s lives and well-being.

Background: sexual violence versus pleasure in the global and Indian contexts

In 2013, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared that, globally, violence against women (VAW) is a “health problem of epidemic proportions”. WHO estimates that one in three women experience physical and/or sexual violence by an intimate partner, or non-partner sexual violence. WHO estimates also show that rates of intimate partner violence (IPV) far exceed rates of non-partner sexual violence.¹⁰ These global findings are largely corroborated in India.^11,12 For example, in a recent analysis of Indian National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) reports and National Family Health Survey results, Aashish Gupta finds that, by conservative estimates, the incidence of sexual assault by husbands may be as much as forty times that by other men.¹³ Furthermore, according to the NCRB report from 2013,¹⁴ the incidence of reported rape has been increasing since 2009, and Delhi has the highest rate at 18.6 per 100,000 women compared to the national average of 5.7 per 100,000. In 2013, offenders were known to the victims in 94.4 % of reported rape cases. Research that compares survey results with crime reports indicates significant underreporting^13,15,16 that may be a result of several factors: social tolerance for physical punishment of women, lack of support from agencies and police, and social mores which claim that IPV is a private matter. It bears noting that as of this writing in 2016, forced sex within marriage is still not considered rape and therefore does not appear in the crime records.^5,13,17

While sexual violence has always been framed as a human rights problem, it is increasingly becoming understood as a significant health issue.^18–20 In Delhi, scholars and members of urban-based NGOs and collectives have expanded upon the human rights perspective, publishing and promoting materials, curricula and guidelines for comprehensive sex education that work to prevent and oppose gender violence for both adolescent and adult audiences. A well-developed network of mostly urban, Indian NGOs and collectives, many based in Delhi itself, conduct related workshops and panels. They also release print and digital web-based media teaching about sexuality, education about consensual sex and alternatives to coercion.^{18,19,21–23} Other NGOs and feminist publishing houses have produced edited volumes and annotated bibliographies about sexuality as well as histories of women’s rights advocacy.^23–25

Increasingly, scholars and advocates have been addressing issues of women’s sexual pleasure, consent and agency within South Asia, both in the present and with historical lenses. Expanding beyond Eurocentric feminisms and Foucauldian analysis and discourse, they have excavated histories that have sometimes preceded, merged with, or subverted colonial and nationalist versions of sexual repression.^23–28 Social and historical evidence indicates a history (and present) of variation in kinship practices, sexual expression, and gender norms in India that were diminished by a combination of local patriarchal controls, colonial laws and nationalist projects.^23,25,28

Sexual violence, agency, and consent are also development issues. Development practitioners have noted that far from being silent, mainstream development has long engaged with sexuality, albeit often focusing on medicalized, negative and dangerous aspects such as population control, sexually transmitted diseases, and sexual violence.^21,29 Others focus on the need to listen to women’s own perspectives of their sexual and reproductive experiences.³⁰ More recently however, in the context of engaged development practice, advocates and NGOs have also conducted projects and research in India that have brought attention to the pleasure and power of women’s sexuality, focusing on more affirming aspects of sexuality, such as pleasure, agency and consent.^22,29,31 One project emerging from recent development work by an education NGO in Delhi documents rural women discussing their experiences with sexuality, and their desires for more egalitarian relationships. Women named their own desire for sexuality as “the hunger of the body”.²² Shilpa Phadke examines the conundrums of Indian middle class women’s sexualities and explores the contradictory expectation that women must be traditionally virtuous and yet appear sexually desirable to men in a rapidly globalizing society.³²

In the midst of these rapid social changes, the concept of women’s agency plays a central role in consent. Kabeer³³ defines agency as

“…the ability to define one's goals and act upon them. Agency is about more than observable action; it also encompasses the meaning, motivation and purpose, which individuals bring to their activity... It can take the form of bargaining and negotiation, deception and manipulation, subversion and resistance as well as more intangible, cognitive processes of reflection and analysis. It can be exercised by individuals as well as by collectivities.”

The landscape of sexual agency in India has been changing over the last several decades, due in large part, to the work of NGOs and collectives whose works are in the public domain.^34–36 Among the NGOs leading this work in Delhi are TARSHI, which stands for “Talking about Reproductive and Sexual Health Issues”, Nirantar Centre for Gender and Education, which is affiliated with the Institute of Development Studies, and CREA (Creating Resources for Empowerment in Action), a feminist human rights organization. The founders of TARSHI started a phone help line in 1996 to answer anonymous questions people asked regarding sexuality and sexual health, and it has since grown into an agency that conducts sexuality trainings, publishes literature about comprehensive sex education and consults with government and transnational agencies about sexual and reproductive health issues (see www.tarshi.net).^35,36

Some Indian NGOs and collectives working on sexuality, sexual pleasure and consent have experienced significant crackdowns by conservative social groups in the past, which may explain why members of collectives working on these issues choose to remain anonymous.^36,37 In Delhi, Hidden Pockets is an example of a collective, whose members are anonymous, with creative approaches to creating a sex positive environment.

The contested meanings of sexual coercion and consent become visible in the experiences of middle class people through the processes whereby they engage with information. How they learn about sexuality, engage with media, and interact in their social worlds reflect and are affected by the narratives we examine in this paper.

Methods

For the research described in this paper, both authors conducted interviews with middle class people in Delhi to understand how they learn about consensual and non-consensual sex. Thematic data from these interviews are triangulated with analyses of newspaper crime reports and highly publicized statements about rape and women’s safety by public figures in the media. In addition, we analyze notes from observations of two public events in Delhi, a hackathon for women’s rights and an erotic photography show.

Respondents for the interviews included 31 women, 11 men, and four transgender persons. Eight of 31 women identified as Lesbian or Bisexual. Overall, 17 out of 46 respondents self-identified as Queer/LGBT. Thirty-three of the interviews were conducted in 2011, and the remainder in 2013-2014. Five of the male respondents were in a focus group discussion (FGD) of LGBT/Queer identified men in 2013. The respondents’ age ranged from 20 to 53 years, with the majority in their 20’s and 30’s.

The choice of targeting middle class individuals as interviewees and informants was influenced by a desire to study sideways instead of “down”³⁸ in order to cultivate collaborative problem definition, analysis and solution finding. In addition, the middle class is thought to be “under-mapped”,³¹ that is, not often considered in social research.

Respondents for interviews and the FGD were selected by stratified purposive sampling³⁹ using three inclusion criteria for “middle class”: English fluency, education past twelfth standard (high school), and use of public transportation (metro, bus or auto-rickshaw) at least once a week. Public transportation criteria tended to exclude people in the highest wealth bracket.

Most respondents were recruited by the authors during casual conversation in coffee shops, bookstores, shopping malls, craft shows, and the Delhi metro. Localities included West, Central and South Delhi. People were engaged in conversation and were invited to participate if they indicated interest in our research. We recruited respondents in different networks and neighborhoods in order to get a sampling of people who did not know each other. Women were deliberately oversampled, as well as LGBT people who were recruited through snowball sampling. LGBT people were invited for inclusivity, and to ensure responses included diverse perspectives.

Research protocols were approved by Cornell University’s Internal Review Board (IRB) before the research began and all respondents received written and verbal information and provided written consent. IRB approval and consent materials were submitted to and reviewed by Jawaharlal Nehru University. Interviews were conducted in places chosen by the respondents, usually at private tables and booths in coffee shops in Central and South Delhi. The FGD was conducted at an outside table at a coffee shop in Connaught Place. In each of the establishments used for interviews and the focus group, we used areas that were secluded from the main thoroughfare, drinks and snacks were purchased beforehand, and the staff were requested to grant us privacy for study and discussion.

The same questions were asked of interviewees and FGD participants. Questions began with open-ended queries such as “How did you first learn or hear about sex and sexuality?” Questions progressed to more directed topics including what and or how respondents first learned about sexual health, rape, and women’s sexual pleasure.

Interviews were recorded, transcribed and were anonymized. Notes were taken at the FGD. Thematic coding was used for interview and FGD analyses, using memos and coding informed by grounded theory techniques as described by Charmaz.⁴⁰ Interviews were analyzed with open coding, which progressed into focused coding in an iterative, abductive process to engage with the data and look for prominent recurring themes. In order to increase reliability, the interviews and FGD were followed by ethnographic and news analyses for method triangulation.³⁹

We conducted an analysis of reports of crimes against women in two Delhi papers, the Hindustan Times and Times of India, during the four months from August to December 2013. Those newspapers were selected because they were in English, widely distributed and had large readerships. Out of 84 reported crimes, there were 31 distinct reports of rape. Of these, we noted whether a relationship between the victim and offender had been reported.

Directed ethnographic content analysis^41–43 informed by discourse-oriented ethnography⁴⁴ was used to analyze newspaper reports of the statements of public figures about rape. These statements were reported in English language print and online news media during the period July 2012 through December 2014. Twenty-five separate statements were analyzed, which is not an exhaustive list, as there were many more such statements. These remarks were chosen because they were made during public speeches by influential people, including government ministers, elected representatives, political and religious leaders. In addition, they could be verified in multiple print and online sources (see Box 1), and were covered in Indian print and online news media as well as in some international media sources. They drew media and public attention because they reflected views of vocal public figures making pronouncements about rape and women’s safety. Statements were analyzed for themes regarding gender, attribution of causes, and suggested solutions.

Box 1 Public figures and 25 rape-related remarks 2012-2014^a

1. Chiranjeet Chakraborty, July 2012, Member Legislative Assembly of West Bengal:	“One of the reasons behind the increase of incidents … is short dresses and short skirts worn by women. This in turn instigates young men.”
2. Jitendar Chattar, Oct 2012, Leader Khap Panchayat of Haryana:	“To my understanding, consumption of fast food contributes to such incidents. Chowmein leads to hormonal imbalance evoking an urge to indulge in such acts.”
3. Om Prakash Chautala, October 2012, former Haryana chief minister, agreed with lowering marriageable age of girls to “prevent” rape:	“I’m with the Khaps, this will protect women.”
4. Mamata Banerjee, October 2012, West Bengal Chief minister:	“Earlier if men and women would hold hands they would get caught by parents and reprimanded, but now everything is so open. It’s like an open market with open options. Rapes happen because men and women interact freely.”
5. Abhijit Mukherjee, December 2012, Congress MP (Pranab Mukherjee's son):	…The "sundari, sundari mahila" (pretty, pretty women) "walking on the streets with candle", were not students.
6. Banwari Lal Singhal, Dec 2012, Legislator:	…banned skirts as uniforms in schools: "The intention of this demand is to keep girl students away from men's lustful gazes and for their comfort in hot and cold weather conditions."
7. Mohan Bhagwat, January 2013, RSS chief:	"Such crimes hardly take place in Bharat, but they frequently occur in India. You go to villages and forests of the country and there will be no such incidents of gang-rape… Besides new legislations, Indian ethos and attitude towards women should be revisited in the context of ancient Indian values."
8. Kailash Vijayvargiya, January 2013, BJP Minister Madhya Pradesh, referencing Ramayana:	“Just like Sita was abducted by Ravana, a woman will be punished if she crosses her limits.”
9. T Thiagarajan, January 2013, Puducherry Education Minister:	…suggested that girl students should be made to wear overcoats to prevent men from lusting after them. [note: Puducherry is a tropical city]
10. Asaram Bapu, January 2013, self-proclaimed godman:	“She [Delhi gangrape victim] should have taken God’s name and could have held the hand of one of the men and said ‘I consider you as my brother’, and should have said to the other two ‘Brother I am helpless, you are my brother, my religious brother."
11. Nanki Ram Kanwar, January 2013, Former Chhattisgarh Home Minister:	“Harm can come on a person if the stars are in adverse positions. We have no answer to this, only an astrologer can predict rape.”
12. Ramesh Bais, January 2013, MP:	"The rape of grown-up girls and women might be understandable but if someone does this to an infant, it is a heinous crime and the offenders should be hanged (barabari ya bade logo ke sath balatkar samajh me ata hai, lekin nabalig bachhiyo ke sath is tarah ka jaghanya apradh karma. Inko to fasi par latka dena chahiye)."
13. Babulal Gaur, January 2013, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader:	“Western culture is not good for India. Women in foreign countries wear jeans and t-shirts, dance with other men and even drink liquor, but that is their culture. It’s good for them, but not for India, where only our traditions and culture are OK.”
14. Nusrat Ali, January 2013, Jamaat-E-Islami Hind Secretary General:	“Co-education should be abolished and proper education facilities meant exclusively for women should be available at all levels of education. Educational institutions should prescribe sober and dignified dress for girls.”
15. Satyadev Katare, April 2013, Congress leader MP:	"No man will harass a woman till she looks at him in a suggestive manner (Jab tak mahila tirchi najar se nahi dekhegi, tab tak purush use nahi chedega).”
16. Ranjit Sinha, November 2013, Director of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI):	“Ranjit Sinha, on Tuesday made out a case for legalising betting in sports, arguing ‘if you can’t prevent rape, enjoy it’.”
17. Asha Mirje, January 2014, National Congress Party (NCP) leader:	“Girls should be very careful what they wear and what time they move out in the city. Their body language should not invite the attention of potential rapists lurking around in the streets.” “Did Nirbhaya really have to go to watch a movie at 11 in the night with her friend?" "Rapes take place also because of a woman's clothes, her behaviour and her presence at inappropriate places."
18. Mulayam Singh Yadav April 2014, Party leader:	"Boys will be boys" they "make mistakes" "Rape accused should not be hanged. Men make mistakes." "When their friendship ends, the girl complains she has been raped."
19. Abu Azmi, April 2014, Samajwadi party leader:	"Rape is punishable by hanging in Islam. But here, nothing happens to women, only to men. Even the woman is guilty." "Solution is this: any woman if, whether married or unmarried, goes along with a man, with or without her consent, should be hanged. Both should be hanged. It shouldn't be allowed even if a woman goes by consent."
20. Tapas Pal, May 2014, Minister, to opposition CPM workers:	"Earlier, you guys have bullied me on various occasions. If you insult the mothers and daughters of Trinamool workers. Then I won't spare you. I will let loose my boys in your homes and they will commit rape. I will teach each of you a lesson."
21. Babulal Gaur, June 2014, Home minister of BJP-ruled Madhya Pradesh:	“It [rape] is a social crime which depends on men and women. Sometimes it’s right and sometimes it’s wrong.”
22. Ramsewak Paikra, June 2014, Chhattisgarh home minister:	“No one commits rape intentionally. It happens by mistake (koi jan bujhkar nahi karta, dhoke se ho jata hai dushkarm).”
23. Murali Mohan Maganti, August 2014, Telugu Desam Party MP, in the context of a Lok Sabha discussion on atrocities against women:	“Women should dress decently and in a 'dignified' manner” and added that “women should uphold Indian culture.”
24. Mathe Mahadevi, October 2014, Lingayat spiritual head:	“Girls working in MNCs [multinational companies] and at late nights wear tight westernized clothes which attracts male attention and leads to crime,” and "As long as women continue to wear revealing clothes, rapes will happen. Women, especially girls, should give up western clothes and wear costumes that reflect their culture and tradition. I see a strong vacuum of cultural values among the young generation."
25. Meenakshi Lekhi, December 2014, BJP MP:	"I have lived in Delhi for a very long time and I have seen the changes happen. These days, you see more women occupy the public space as compared to then. But it is not 100 per cent safe. With the advent of technology, with more women being on roads and with more women challenging men, the onslaught is also higher."

a Media sources cited in Appendix

Lastly, the lead author conducted ethnographic analyses of two publicly advertised events referencing consensual sexuality and opposing violence against women, respectively. These events were highly publicized online, on list-serves, over social media and by word of mouth, and were considered likely to attract educated, middle class, educated participants who are avid readers of print and online media. Delhi hosts many similar or related events, exhibits, and showings. The two events chosen were an Erotic Photography Show and a “Hackathon for Women’s Rights”. Some notes were jotted during the events, and most were written off-phase after leaving the event. Notes were then analyzed for themes focusing on attendance demographics, the stated purpose of the events, the content, the locations and the interactions of attendees.

We chose to analyze these news reports and events to illustrate the milieu of information about sexual consent and coercion among middle class people in Delhi during the period of 2011-14. Middle class people were the intended targets for the newspaper readership of the crime reports and the articles about public figures opining about rape, as well being as the intended guests and participants of the photography exhibit and the Hackathon for woman’s rights.

Findings

Interviews

In the interviews, for both sexes, news about rape in the news media was often their first information about, or depiction of, sex or sexuality of any sort. When people spoke of where they first heard or learned about rape, it was primarily from different forms of news media.

“Every day in the newspaper. Every single day – there is not even a single day that goes where they are not telling about some kind of rape.” (Female, 29, heterosexual)

“I’m from Delhi, you hear about it in the papers all the time.” (Male, 25, heterosexual)

Many also cited TV shows and films:

“Firstly it was the television and the movies actually. The older Bollywood movies especially in the 80s, I think they have lot of these rape scenes. So it was then I got to know there is something called rape. I was very small at that time I think 5^th standard and I’ve seen the movies and so I knew something that’s called rape and it’s wrong.” (Female, 28, heterosexual)

“The Hindi movies on TV, a lot of them had this plot where there was a hero whose sister was raped, and then he would get revenge. I must have seen so many of them when I was young, but I didn’t know what rape actually was until like 18 or 19.” (Male, 22, heterosexual)

For many, the types of sexual violence they heard about in their private circles was rarely mentioned in media or public discourses about sexual violence. This omission included forced marital sex, and forced sex in relationships.

“One of the major things that no one really talks about is when your husband rapes you…. A lot of my friends have had experiences where they have almost been raped or kind of been forced into sex when they didn’t want to, but …I don’t think they consider themselves as being raped, it’s kind of just like, oh he forced that on me, I really didn’t want to have sex with him, but I did, because I had no choice…” (Female, 35, heterosexual)

“If you’re married it’s like, you know it’s a husband’s right to have and so you have marital rape which no one talks about happening, but it is still rape.” (Female, 27, heterosexual)

“For some women, marriage is a form of legalized rape. I mean, there’s no law against rape in marriage, so she can’t say no – so what can she do?” (Female, 33, heterosexual)

The pervasiveness of sexual abuse of male or female children, usually by someone known to the family, is another theme of concern that emerged from the interviews, but was rarely discussed by public figures.

“At some point we all became aware of the fact that it is possible that everyone around us has been molested at some point, not just starting with public places, but sometimes with a relative or family friend. And then other admissions of ‘this happened to me, that happened to me,’ ” (Female, 27, bisexual)

“Every friend I know who is a girl has had something between a molestation and a rape – and that’s the economically and intellectually advanced portion of society, I don’t know what is happening for the others.” (Male, 32, heterosexual)

“A friend of mine, a boy, an older uncle forced him to do blow jobs [oral sex]. This happens a lot. And when boys are little they don’t really know what is happening or what to do to stop it.” (Male, 27, heterosexual)

In contrast to widespread public narratives about sexual violence, most respondents learned about women’s pleasure and consensual sex from private conversations with friends and, more rarely, family.

“See, we were all around the same age so none of us really knew about it so much. So we just discussed it, I had heard something from somewhere and they would tell me something that they had heard from somewhere else. We would somehow put it all together and try to make sense out of it all.” (Female, 24, heterosexual)

“I had conversations with my friends, my roommate was dating another woman. Pleasure was constantly discussed and pleasure was in the air… Of course our society is so divided so you can't say anything absolutely – but to a huge large extent people arrive at certain juncture in their lives as young adults where they can choose to access information.” (Female, 25, lesbian)

“In school, guys really said a lot of derogatory stuff about women just about how to get them to have sex and how to do it, but my Aunt told me a lot of stuff that sort of changed my ideas a lot. She told me that girls will like it when they are ready, but not when they are young and that it’s never okay to force or trick a girl. She also told me about condoms.” (Male, 27, heterosexual)

Consent came to the fore as a concept that is being negotiated, learned and communicated in processes that mirror its meaning; when both parties, by mutual agreement decide that they will enter into a sexual experience with each other. Some mentioned the bind they perceived women to be in, to paraphrase Sharma: ²² Can a woman really say yes if she can’t say no – and vice versa? Many respondents expressed that they sometimes educate others about consent, pleasure or safety or that they had learned about these issues with friends.

“I want my niece to hear it. Like it’s okay to want to have sex and it may even [be] just because you love someone or… it’s okay also to say no to someone you are with… in a relationship, or just saying that’s okay if you don’t want to for whatever your reason. So keep saying yes, if you want to. It should be your choice and that is something that’s important. That’s something that should be told more with safe sex and protection and all of these. These things are also very, very important to be told.” (Female, 35, heterosexual)

Most respondents expressed concern about the safety and pleasure of others, even if they themselves felt informed and safe.

“The older I grow, the more aware I am that I have built a very healthy knowledge world for myself. The knowledge I associate with these things is a world in which I know I can be safe even if I am raped. I know the people with me will stand by my side. So knowing that made me aware of the people who don’t have this. They don’t have a friend to talk to about these things.” (Female, 25, bisexual)

“When I first heard that was how sex happened, I was worried it would hurt the woman. That really bothered me. It was a long time before I knew women could like it too.” (Male, 27, heterosexual)

“I think it’s very hard to grow up as a girl in India. This is a closed, patriarchal society. About sex education – we don’t do things openly.” (Male, 32, heterosexual)

“There should be two parts to sex education – one about anatomy and health, and the other about ethics, and how women are equals and not just a thing to satisfy your desires.” (Male, 25, heterosexual)

In summary, early learning about sexuality tended toward fear-based narratives coming from the media. These common messages about rape or non-consensual sex do not reflect or protect against the risks of child sexual abuse or sexual violence within an intimate relationship. Both men and women expressed concerns about the safety and sexual well-being of women, and their framings showed an awareness that the risk of coercion and the negotiation of consent happen primarily within relationships and in familiar settings rather than in public and between strangers. In general, learning about pleasure, and particularly women’s pleasure, happened much later than learning about rape.

Rape in the News: crime reports and public figures

Newspapers were almost always cited by both men and women as early sources of information about rape, and for some this was their earliest awareness of sex. In newspaper articles, while the brevity of the headlines told limited stories, the bodies of newspaper reports corroborated the findings of the criminal reports and the large survey results regarding the relative proportion of intimate partner violence as opposed to non-partner violence.^12,13,16 Out of 31 reports of distinct incidents of rape in the newspapers we surveyed, in 18 the text of the report disclosed that the victim knew the perpetrator, even though this information wasn’t in the headline. These relationships were variously identified as current or ex-intimate partners, neighbors, social acquaintances or family members. In three reports the perpetrator was a stranger to the woman, and the remaining ten did not report the relation or lack thereof. Marital rape was not reported, as it is not considered a crime. However, during that same period, eight out of 17 reported homicides of women were reported as perpetrated by a husband or ex-husband.

The print and online newspapers were rife with stories about public figures making statements about rape, and were foregrounded both due to the recent focus on high profile rape cases and the event of an impending national election. High profile cases and the campaign trail provided numerous public figures and politicians the opportunity to broadcast their attitudes about rape. The 25 statements from public figures fell into three thematic categories: 1. Causal attribution that assigns women blame for provocation. 2. Absolving men from responsibility because of external forces other than women. 3. Suggestions as to how to accept, explain, prevent or punish rape. In a cascade of logic, causes often implied or prescribed solutions. Main themes are paraphrased below (see Box 1 for statements and sources).

Attribution of responsibility or blame to women:

Girls should not use cell phones.

What was a girl doing out at night?

When girls wear western clothes, rape happens.

A man doesn’t rape unless he is led on by a woman.

When a man tries to rape, a woman should take his hand and call him “Bhai” (brother).

Non-attribution of responsibility or blame to men:

These things happen by accident.

These are boys, they make mistakes.

When people ape the west, rape happens.

Fast food, such as chowmein, contributes to rape.

Men and women should be kept separate from each other.

When the stars are in a bad position, this increases rape incidents.

We will give school girls coats to prevent them from being tempting to men.

Other perspectives:

If you can’t prevent rape, enjoy it.

Rape doesn’t happen in the villages, only in the cities.

Rape is a social crime, sometimes it’s right sometimes it’s wrong.

When rapes happen, both the man and woman should be hanged.

I can understand why someone would rape a woman, but raping a child is evil.

In summary, crime reports about rape in newspapers appeared to corroborate the findings of official crime report statistics in that when they included the relationship between the woman and the perpetrator, in a majority of cases, it was someone familiar. Presumably, women could not have avoided these incidents by staying home, avoiding strangers and wearing traditional clothing. However, undeterred by survey and crime record evidence, many public figures invoked morality plays about women being too forward, available, or otherwise to blame.

Focusing on rape comments by public figures, the media serve both to document attitudes and enable dialog, and to offer countering views to such statements. In this way, members of the media sometimes contribute to a discursive social process and work as allies to sexual health advocates.¹⁸ In addition to being picked up and circulated by other media and social media outlets, several published incidents were met with public outcry, protests and repudiations, and were sometimes followed by an apology from the public figure (see Box 1 for statements 5, 16 and 23).

Ethnographic participant observation of two events in Delhi

The first event was an Erotic Photography Exhibit called “Bound to be Free” in November 2013. In a gallery between Gurgaon and Delhi, a group of people calling themselves a collective hosted an invitational photography show. An article about it appeared in the News and Arts magazine Delhi Time Out, and an invitation on social media. The neighborhood had the air of a place filled with offices mostly used during the day. Inside the gallery, in a low-ceilinged room, the walls were covered with sensual photographs without visible faces, with scant nudity, and with decidedly erotic content including men and women. Animated faces of the public moved and reflected off the glass-covered photos as people looked closely and murmured quietly with one another. Over the course of two hours there were roughly 92 people.

A woman in her 30s or 40s came forward, introduced herself by her first name, and asked for our attention. She gave a brief description of the exhibit and the motivation behind it.

“We are a group that seeks to create awareness and strengthen visibility of our sexuality. This photo show will travel to Calcutta, Chennai, Bombay and Bangalore. We made this exhibition in order to represent our desires and who we are because silence allows gross misrepresentation – such as seen in the book 50 Shades of Grey… Consent is at the heart of kink. Consent is usually presumed, especially in the case of married women, however [here], consent is proactively sought and can be withdrawn with use of a single word or a gesture – it is sacrosanct…This community is not anti-woman. This community enables women to be completely in control, if they choose to be so, as well as a space for men to be vulnerable. It is important to challenge the typical patterns....Today is a day of celebration, so please enjoy the photos!”

The room erupted in applause. People mingled and laughed, and a small throng surrounded the table near the door, buying postcards of some of the photos to raise funds for the show to travel to other cities. Journalists took photographs and interviewed presenters as well as attendees, scribbling in notepads. Organizers mingled and answered questions of visitors. In the crowd women and men mingled as well as some people who appeared to be transgender. Women appeared to outnumber men slightly, and people appeared comfortable and animated.

The second event was called “#HACK4CHANGE: a Hackathon for Women’s Rights” in December 2013. The invitation was widely circulated on social media:

In partnership with Hacks/Hackers, [NGO] will host our first Hackathon

WHO: Developers, storytellers, statisticians, journalists, researchers, activists and you!

WHAT: Join us to create and share new stories -- data visualizations, videos and interactive projects -- to raise awareness about early marriage, domestic violence, street sexual harassment, and more.

Together, online and off, we can make violence against women unacceptable and build a world of dignity, equality -- and creativity for all.

The event was hosted in an industrial and manufacturing area in a building billed as a collaborative environment for “the collective knowledge of the community” used by startups, developers, designers, consultants, and NGOs. The spacious main room had separate rooms with glass room dividers, conference tables, and outlets for laptops. The orientation was given by a woman from an NGO that had run a successful campaign that exhorts people to ring a doorbell and to interrupt if they hear the abuse of a woman. The website of the NGO reads:

“The most dangerous place for a woman is in her own home.”

There were over 70 people, and the men outnumbered the women by about three to two with an estimated median age of 27. A majority of the attendees were designers, coders and IT people. The object of the weekend was to create apps or media to educate the public about structural and physical violence against women. The attendees were to form teams and work on one of several suggested projects, and were given access to open-source data, statistics, surveys, and recorded narratives. We could then draw upon this material for the substance to the stories we would design. The data provided related to stopping teen marriages, supporting rights for Dalit women, increasing awareness of domestic violence, mapping data about street harassment and violence posted by women, and constructing a website with recorded narratives of tribal women.

Two other women and the lead author worked on a team with seven men to design a cell phone application for women to map incidents of harassment in Delhi. All the teams engaged in lively discussions and huddled around laptops throughout several of the glass rooms. Over the course of the weekend, participants met other like-minded people and made new friends. When we presented the final products to the whole group at the end of the second afternoon, we had all created new informational media aimed at promoting women’s safety and well-being.

Three points emerged as significant during analyses of the field notes of the two events. First, the events contrasted with narratives that segregate men and women, and instead provided contexts for men and women to come together in semi-public spaces and experience each other as colleagues, friends and allies. They were able to meet and forge new acquaintances. Secondly, the organizers drew upon and discussed experience, evidence and data, encouraging participants to exercise agency and engage in the construction of knowledge and meaning and to disseminate peer knowledge for both participants and the public. Lastly, the events themselves were structured to create and share media, and to engage with multiple forms of media in order to craft messages, educate people and promote public dialogue.

Discussion and Conclusion

The themes that emerged from the interviews, content analysis of rape in the news, and the targeted ethnographies portray vast disjunctures in the social constructions of rape and consensual sex among a small sub-section of the English-speaking elite middle class. These suggest entirely different perceptions of agency and directions for solutions, with contested meanings split along essentializing and interdependent narratives for gender.

Essentializing narratives about gender harken to distinct, dichotomous categorizations of men’s and women’s bodies and social roles, roles that set them apart from each other and seem to arise from so-called “common sense”. Socially prescribed separations between men and women reinforce and heighten opposing gender identities and underpin the tendency of men and women to see their counterparts as “others”, decreasing empathy and making violence more likely.⁴⁵ While naturalizing rape narratives often espoused by public figures portray men as perpetrators and women as victims, this tendency contradicts itself and diminishes the agency of everyone by asserting simultaneously that men are not responsible for their actions, and yet insisting that women must be protected. These narratives naturalize rape and perpetuate rape myths, such as “boys will be boys”, “men just can’t control themselves”.⁴⁶

Other important trends emerge from the ethnographic and interview data. Perhaps most significant is the fact that most women and men do seek information about, and hope to enjoy, consensual sex in their present or future lives. Secondly, men often act as allies for women against violence and coercion. These trends support interdependent gender narratives. Reinforcing these silent norms and making them more explicit counteracts the simplistic, binary constructions of the sexes that pit men and women against each other, distracting attention away from IPV and other social inequalities.

Although Altheide writes about frames and fear-mongering in the United States news, his device and examples are useful in the Indian context. The framing of social problems constitute morality plays in which powerful actors attempt to determine the public’s perception of the causes and solutions of a social problem. The 25 statements by public figures in India can be seen as windows into an ideology that serves existing power structures and promotes rigid, essentialist gender norms. In terms of attribution of causes and solutions, the stranger-as-rapist framing in public discourse seems to justify calls to keep women at home, out of public spaces, education, leisure or work. For analysis of similar statements by public figures in the United States, see Spurlock 2013.⁴⁷

The more frequent dangers of IPV and child sexual abuse are eclipsed by the fears directed at other issues, and attention and resources are denied in areas that could provide useful intervention. The emphasis on women’s behavior as causal obscures the dangers most frequently encountered by women, and prevents the crafting of effective solutions. In addition, inflating the ever-present threat of unpredictable danger overshadows and trivializes discussion of agency, companionship and pleasure.³ In contrast to Altheide’s analysis of the news media’s complicity in creating morality plays, while some segments of the Indian media upheld gender stereotypes, other segments of the media acted as allies when calling for accountability. Subsequent circulation and social mediation of the “rape” statements offered an opportunity to the public to open up the discourse about rape, contesting the gender norms that appear to normalize it and render it inevitable.

Benford and Snow’s reference to the discursive processes of framing can readily be applied to the contested topics of rape and consent. Many health and development NGOs, ground their claims in the master frame of human rights.^{13,14,16-23,29,30,34-36} Social change movements, through NGOs, protests and collectives, employ diagnostic framings to identify accountability and responsibility, and prognostic framings to suggest solutions such as teaching about consent and empowering men as allies. These local, small scale social actions change the diagnostic frames from blaming women for transgressions of proscribed gender norms that then cause them to become victims of male predation. Instead, people are enabled to form alliances and to expose the narratives and social mores that obscure the predominance of sexual violence within familiar spheres. As Batliwala writes, local, decentralized efforts are indispensable to effectively address inequalities, empower people, and advocate for social and cultural changes.⁴⁸

In addition, new research is illuminating the fluid and socially constructed nature of masculinities and the experiences and agency of men. New interventions directed at increasing the involvement of boys and men in SRH are being employed in schools, communities and clinics. The Population Council documents some of these efforts to strengthen men and boys as allies, as well as helping them to protect themselves against sexual coercion.⁴⁹

There is reason to invest hope, especially in the agency and power of small groups to affect social changes in the arena of sexual agency and consensual intimacy. In addition, the slow machineries of government and transnational organizations are moving in significant ways toward upholding consensual bodily dignity. In March 2014, the lead author attended a national consultation on the role of the health sector in responding to violence against women, sponsored jointly by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and WHO. The meeting brought together health care providers, police, NGO representatives, advocates, and lawyers to consult upon developing guidelines and protocols for medico-legal care for survivors of sexual violence.⁵⁰ These guidelines not only standardize compassionate care for survivors of intimate partner violence and sexual violence, but they create an environment where people are more likely to report such crimes. As impunity decreases, the consequences of assault and prosecution serve as more effective deterrents. The highly visible Verma Commission Report is widely hailed as a laudable prescription for action against a social mindset that naturalizes rape, though most of its recommendations have yet to be enacted. However necessary, these top-down measures still focus on crime and punishment and overlook the issues of sexual desire, pleasure and consent. The pursuit of consent is engaged in small gatherings where people participate in building communities.

An important limitation of this paper is the small sample size for interviews and the focus groups. The total respondents were too few to make comparisons by sex, age or other criteria. To compensate, we aspired to create a richer portrait of people’s experiences by triangulating qualitative methods and drawing in media and events that targeted middle class subjects. Another limitation is that our criteria for defining middle class introduced a language bias, in that we focused on people with English fluency, events held in English and English language journalism. This omitted the perspectives representing a large population of the middle class for whom English is not the main language or who may have not completed schooling or who may not necessarily frequent coffee shops, bookstores, shopping malls and craft shows.

Nevertheless, the interviews and the two ethnographic events show that learning about pleasure and consent is a compelling part of the motivational framing that inspires people to take action. In Delhi, agency arises quietly and persistently as a counterpoint to prominent political narratives of male non-responsibility, female vulnerability, and the “inevitable” nature of sexual violence. Emerging dialogs on consensual sexuality are highlighted in collective and NGO based events that provide a contrast with narratives that segregate men and women, and instead provide contexts for them to come together and engage as companions and allies. Even in the midst of political backlash and a seeming rise in conservatism, outside of the headlines, narratives grow in which companionship and pleasure are becoming recognized as not only possible, but normal.

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to the Collective, Jaya Sharma, Mohan Rao at the Centre of Social Medicine and Community Health of Jawaharlal Nehru University, Roopali Sircar Gaur at Delhi University, Lindy Williams and Alaka Basu of Cornell University, and to the many people in Delhi and India who shared their thoughts and time, and aided us. We also thank the Boren Foundation and the Cornell University Provost for providing the fellowships that funded this research. We are deeply grateful.