Moral Policing, which literally means a modesty patrol, took a whole new meaning when people from the Hindu Jagaran Vedike barged into a home stay in Padil on the outskirts of Mangalore on July 28^th 2012 and created havoc at a birthday party. 12 people were hit, it included five girls who were beaten, stripped and molested. The activists claimed that the youngsters were consuming alcohol and were involved in “indecent activities”. What made things worse was the entire attack was captured on camera by a reporter at the scene and was shown on various news channels, it also went viral on YouTube just minutes after the attack.

Another such incident was reported from Mangalore earlier in 2009, when activists from Bajrang Dal took law in their hands and attacked youngsters in a pub , such incidents by the activists are not justified in the name of culture or not.

The activists claim that girls “partying” and “wearing provocative clothes” is against the Hindu culture, so is beating up girls in public and harassing them in accord with our culture is a question to ask.

The Karnataka Women’s Panel chairperson, C Manjula when asked for her opinion said that girl should skip parties instead of offering support and help

In the name of protecting culture moral policing has taken a different turn, which involves humiliating people and encroaching in their private space. The need of the hour is not harassing and beating people, which eventually lead to media frenzy, a smart call would be spreading awareness and defense among people.

Moral policing leads to censoring of ideas and thoughts .There has to be a fine balance between morality and freedom of speech. Political parties deserve to be condemned for assuming the role of culture cops and taking law into their hands, imposing values on people prove counter productive as morals and values cannot be forced on people. Values have evolved over the ages in our society, things like values and morals are also highly subjective.

India is a democratic country that thrives on Freedom of speech and expression. Curbing people from living life the way they want to do more harm than good. Politicians and activists should concentrate more on issues that make a difference to the people and society like drunken driving, eve teasing.

Article Posted By : prajwal316  On March 17, 2013lView All Articles

Article Source :

http://www.veethi.com/articles/harassment-in-the-name-of-culture-article-1780.htm

Keywords :
moral policing , culture