‘The Girl’ and a few uncomfortable truths

Samantha Geimer and her book The Girl — a memoir of one the most famous rape cases in history, in which famed film director Roman Polanski was accused, should be made required reading for anyone who wants to understand sexual abuse against women. India has lately usurped the tag of ‘no country for women’ and the recent case of a 15-year-old girl, who has named a “holy man” from Gujarat for molesting her, shows yet again that this country has gone off the rails when it comes to treatment of women.

Samantha has given a series of interviews that have now gone viral and strangely enough, she lets off Polanski and blames the judge who presided over her case. Her startling comments upends the conventional wisdom on rape; she is scathing about the judicial system, the media and the public at large. She talks about the mantle of victimhood imposed on her by the family, the vigilantes, the judge and the media.

The victim, she says, is hit by a double whammy — not only has she had to endure the ordeal, but she now faces the wrath of the media if she does not fit in with the narrative they have been pursuing.

It is chilling to hear Samantha tell her interviewer that the rape itself was less painful and humiliating than what she had to go through afterwards in the courtroom with the media vilifying her and her mother.

Coincidentally, in India, a video satirising the antiquated and misogynistic views on rape has also gone viral. It features actress Kalki Koechlin and DJ Juhi Pandey and lampoons the controversial comments made by politicians, the police, “holy men” and assorted public figures. The video, It’s My Fault, brings misogyny right into our living rooms and poses hard questions on sexual violence against women.

Misogyny is a word that frequently gets mentioned in rape culture, but not always is it fully understood. While hatred of women may be its principal definition, its all-pervasive presence in religion to mass culture comes as a terrible shock as well as widens its meaning. Music to video-games, philosophy to literature, Bollywood to corporate boardrooms is its reach and that is a frightening stretch.

Acclaimed psychoanalyst Sudhir Kakar has written extensively on Indian attitudes to rape and sexual violence against women and misogyny. He paints a very complex picture and what emerges is unsettling. He uses Urdu writer Rajinder Singh Bedi’s haunting and disturbing book called Ek Chadar Maili Si (A sheet somewhat soiled) as a template to probe Indian sexuality. The story in its early chapters reads like any novel rooted in rural India, but where it suddenly breaks mould is when it explores an incestuous relationship and the embedded violence ever present covertly or overtly in many Indian marriages.

The rape statistics of India are horrifying and revealing. The Indian story, like in most things, has its own narratives and draws on caste, endemic poverty, ancient beliefs and falsehoods perpetuated by charlatans masquerading as holy men. Sexual violence within marriage is one of the highest in the world and close-knit family life masks an alarming amount of abuse of children and teenage girls by family members; 76 per cent of respondents in a survey admitted to being abused as children — 40 per cent of those by family members.

Another activist who has done considerable work in this field is Bollywood icon Aamir Khan, who ran until recently a reality show called Satyamev Jayate (Truth will prevail). What was surprising was not the common thread of domestic violence seen in each case, but that women were complicit: The very same mother-in-law who, as a child was abused, perpetuates the cycle of violence by either egging her son on or at least looking the other way when he mistreats his wife.

Which brings us back to Samantha and her mother. This book is Samantha’s side of the story and she relives her nightmare to set the record right. But does it? In her interview, she makes a compelling case to see things as they unravelled through her eyes. There are nevertheless sticking points; for however much our heart goes out to her, there are disquieting questions that come up.

First, the book has some explicit visuals of her, all taken during the infamous photo-shoot. Frankly, it is disingenuous to deny it was not put out there to help sell the book. Second, the mother; however much the judge and the media made her out to be manipulative, there is no denying that she showed poor judgement. Indeed all the three protagonists — Polanski, the mother and Samantha — showed poor judgement and in that order.

Looking back, Polanski’s actions were indefensible. He took advantage of the vulnerability of a 13-year-old, but we do not live in an idealised world. Men do behave as sexual predators, at least a sizeable percentage of them, as surveys have shown. If so, Samantha’s mother should come under much greater scrutiny than what she has.

Rape is perhaps as old as antiquity or even older, it is far too complex for facile analysis.

Ravi Menon is a Dubai-based writer working on a series of essays on India and on a public service initiative called India Talks.