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In his interview in Tamil, actor Mansoor Ali Khan said, "I have flung many an actress like Khushboo and Roja onto the bed. But they didn’t show Trisha to me even during the shooting schedule.”
Recent comments by actor Mansoor Ali Khan have earned the wrath of many. In a video that has now gone viral, the actor who recently featured in the Trisha-Vijay hit movie Leo made misogynistic statements.
The original video is in Tamil, and translates roughly to, “In the film, I had hoped to have at least one bedroom scene with Trisha. In my career, I have done many rape scenes. I have flung many an actress like Khushboo and Roja onto the bed. But they didn’t show Trisha to me even during the shooting schedule.”
She posted on X (Twitter) that she found these comments vile and repulsive, and vowed to never work with Mansoor again. Members of the film fraternity have come ahead to support her.*
Singer Chinmayi Sripada shared Mansoor’s interview along with a note on X, where she made several important points.
“Men like Mansoor have always been talking like this. Never been condemned, with other men in power, money, and influence laughing along.”
She called out other actors like Radha Ravi and Robo Shankar who have normalized such behaviour. Upon facing backlash, the 61-year-old Mansoor retracted his remarks and insisted that it was only said in jest, that his daughter was Trisha’s fan, and he respected the actress. He even claimed that this was a conspiracy to demean him.
Talking about rape causally and boasting about such scenes is a new low. Kudos to Trisha and Chinmayi for their strong stances. These aren’t isolated cases. Salman Khan during a grueling shooting schedule compared it to rape. He later apologized for it after receiving reprimands and backlash and it has remained forgotten.
The irony is that when a shameful incident happens, people are shocked, condemn the criminals, and support the survivors (if any) through candlelit vigils and marches. But on the other hand, they giggle when someone makes a shameless remark like this. Why are rape jokes normalized in the first place? What is so funny about an inhuman crime that violates a person, and destroys lives?
The problem is more deep-rooted than you think. Think of the Boy’s Locker Room Chat where teenage boys from Delhi causally talked about rape and objectification.
A friend of mine shared a personal experience where a senior manager in one of the companies she worked for once made a flippant remark, “The meeting was so bad; the director raped us with his persistent questioning.”
No one batted an eyelid. Otherwise, the manager who made this remark was a good person; polite and reasonable. He was only being funny. No biggie, right?
Wrong! Rape is NOT a joking matter.
No. It’s not OK. The woman you are making a misogynistic remark about is someone’s daughter or sister too! What gives you the right to demean her? This is NOT comedy; trivializing something as heinous as rape is crass, crude, and vicious.
Because too much has happened for us to turn a blind eye or a deaf ear. In a country where rape is the fourth most common crime against women, where an average of 31,000 cases are registered in a year (2021 NCRB statistics), and 86 crimes are committed in a day, it is impossible to take a ‘chill pill.’
In 2019, one rape was reported every 16 minutes in India.
Do you know what is more heartbreaking? The fact that these are only the registered numbers. The unreported cases are far and many, and these numbers are far under-estimated.
Children learn from their parents. Use a cuss word or a swear word by mistake in front of them, they will lap it up and not hesitate to reuse it because they think it is normal; it is cool. That’s where the internalization and normalization begins. The irreverent and flippant use of rape Jokes, irrespective of gender, should be made a punishable offense! Teach our boys better! Only then we can have a safer world for women, one where jokes are not cracked on the crimes against them.
*This is a developing story.
Lalitha is a blogger and a dreamer. Her career is in finance, but writing is her way to unwind! Her little one is the center of her Universe. read more...
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