As per the book Tipping Point , ( and since I have not read any other book on criminal psychology, I will take it as my holy grail ), if you want to curb a serious and major crime, you need to stop the petty crimes.
So I feel the provision to make Voyeurism , stalking and eve-teasing as punishable crime as per the new Crime Against Women bill can be quite instrumental to bring down the cases of rape in general.
In that book, when murders and thefts were quite rampant in subways and metros of New York city in 90's, the police decided to tackle the problem at petty level. Most of the people , seeing the law and order situation at such places , used to dodge taking tickets and used to jump over those turnstile. So the first thing police did was increase the vigilance at the turnstile ensuring that people do punch tickets and whosoever tries to avoid that was caught at that very moment , handcuffed and taken to police station. This not only made people follow the basic rules of subway travel but also reinstalled the respect and faith in the law and order system.
Soon people found that the murders and thefts that were becoming so common in New York subways, became extinct overnight, whereas nothing as such was drastically done for that specific problem.
So the point is that if we prevent people from even doing small basic crimes, which at times we tend to overlook, then it very much discourages them from doing even heftier crimes.
The problem with India is that no body (read public) does anything when you encounter someone teasing or passing lewd comments at public places. And if somehow somebody takes the courage to protest then the teasers don't even blink before harming them gravely.
And because of this, they slowly slowly gather enough courage to commit even more heinous crimes.
I think most of the rapists don't straight a way jump into raping someone, they have a prolonged history of eve-teasing and stalking, so if they are stopped at those points itself then it may prevent them from becoming sex-offenders.
But, we need to make sure they dont hurt people who stop them too!
ReplyDeleteYes but I think that will come with time . Initially law enforcers need to be around to ensure that culprits are caught and once the fear of getting prosecuted creeps into public then only they will think before hurting anyone who stops them in absence of police. Right now they hurt because they know that nothing is going to happen to them, once that safegaurd is removed they will fear the laws.
DeleteOnce during my conversation with Pankaj , he said to me "Criminals are more afraid in their heart than you are, so if you show them a little courage , they 'll be daunted " , and as I asked him how could you say so, he explained that roadside crimes are mostly done by petty criminals .Seasoned criminals won't go for petty stuff.So petty criminals are intrinsically scared, and with a right balance of mind you can tackle them".I saw a point in what he said.Though I don't mean to say here , to show bravery in a situation where you are easily outnumbered or outpowered- what I mean is - we can show courage - by acting - by reporting such matter or by alarming nearby people.Today we might stay quiet , for fear of getting hurt for someone else's cause, but if that continues, such things could happen with our own family members.So, the sensitization needs to start at home.
ReplyDeleteGreat thoughts Jana Sir :) , I am a fan of your blog, every post is a gem in terms of thoughts expressed.
Great thought Sandeep. I totally and completely agree with your solution. I think the key here is to stop them at the budding stage and not let them gather the courage to go overboard. And, the best is to voice when someone is eve-teasing. And gather so much attention and be so loud that he would remember the episode whenever he thinks of doing anything like that again. Awesome thought, Jana. Let's add that to our page of 'we look for solutions..'...but it's only links I've added so far. Lemme try..
ReplyDeleteThanks girls for appreciating the thought :)
ReplyDeleteDeeksha - What Pankaj mentioned was exactly the thoughts echoed by the Women Trainer invited by ST to impart some basic physical training to the women folks here. My friends who attended that told us that she asked them to be brave when confronted by such people and trained them to shout with full power. These people at times thrive on your fear, more afraid you are , more strength they gather. Of course you are right that being aggressive can backfire thats why she mentioned that whatever basic defensive techniques she taught should be used only in the rarest of the rarest conditions and whenever possible shout out loud and run.
Yes Swati, I totally agree, in fact in that book , the reason the prisoners were publicly handcuffed was to deter on lookers from trying anything illegal. One person's embarassment could be a lesson for others too.
I saw a girl getting eve teased today. I was parking and couldn't understand exactly what was happening but by the time I did understand those tempo guys who had made lewd remarks had actually driven away. The girl just turned her face towards me to ignore them. It made me furious as well as sad. In addition to what you said above, I think education is the key to a better society.
ReplyDeleteYes I am also a firm believer of that. I too think education is the only way to eradicate all these evils but I have lost faith in our current education setup and feel an overhaul is required in that too for even education to make a difference.
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