[gkveda]

Originally Posted by motorsan

I am a bit taken aback by some of the comments in this thread.

I really felt, this thread should have had Thanks Button, when I read some of the posts. And your post tops everything else. Thanks for your thoughts and this post

I fully agree with you on each and every point that you have mentioned. Especially the point

Originally Posted by motorsan

when a woman wrongly accused him of stalking ...

We need to really think from this perspective. When a girl who is striving for a job tells "I can do anything - ANYTHING for you to get this job", just imagine, what could be her situation and compulsion to get the job?

Do you think, she would have told this for pleasure? I think, it is definitely, her previous experience in interviews which has played in her mind and prepared her to tell this statement. I would not take it any other way.

At the same time, I would not select her in the interview showing sympathy as well. If she really deserves the job, then, select her. Else, reject.

[aaggoswami]

Originally Posted by GTO

I could say that Moderator Samurai came to my house last night and used Kung Fu on me. But until proven, we shouldn't hold Samurai guilty. Social media seems to be thinking differently.

There are accomplished leaders who have resigned, stepped down or faced public humiliation on the basis of an accusation alone. This, I don't agree with.

On the other hand, if there is evidence, by all means, the accused must be severely punished.

In Idealistic scenario this is what has to be done, yet in practical life things can be polarizing. But it doesn't mean we just consider accused as guilty.

Here are two cases where video went "viral" against men where they were considered perpetrators and in one case they even had litigation against them. In both the cases, men were unnecessarily pilloried.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohtak...eo_controversy
2. https://www.indiatoday.in/fyi/story/...200-2016-11-27

In second second case, a man who is supposed to lead, feed and protect family is having trouble getting jobs. Why so ? What about justice to him ?
In my view, the wave of feminism has taken a sharp turn without erudite considerations. A few incidences with me concurred my thoughts that men have a feeble hope of avoiding trouble.

Justice should be delivered to any male or female, but just considering any person a criminal wont help us. As is the case with this nation, value of resources is often misunderstood.

[honeybee]

Innocent till proven guilty?



Maybe but then this is not the court. We have a media trial. Here the loudest voice wins.

Sad.

[pratyush6]

Some of the comments on this forum are hard to believe. For as long as we know, it's been a man's world with women being the weaker sex. They've taken abuse, been harassed at work, threatened with transfers, looked as incompetent and what not. I've also received Whatsapp Forwards linking this to silencing Nationalism.
There needs to be a generational shift in our thinking, on how we need to behave with women in general. I've seen some of these same male collgues who are crying foul about this movement say that women invite rapes by wearing short clothes.
I am completely for this movement, this should blow up. Yes, there might be a few who get unnecessarily dragged, that's just the nature of the beast. My personal experience has been different, I truly believe women are better than us, in most ways. Somewhere, we made this shift to a highly patriarchal society and we are seeing it's effects.
On the cases itself, look at the chilling details of the accusers. People like Vivek Agnihotri, MJ Akbar must be made accountable for their crimes.

[Chetan_Rao]

Modern media, esp. the social variety, is doing a huge disservice to pretty much any initiative, and this one's no exception.

There's only one winner in a media trial (circus?): TRPs.
Everyone else is a victim: accused, accuser, supporter of either side of the argument or just the rubber-neckers. Everyone's chewed up till there's no more TRP juice to be extracted, then spat by the wayside and another juicy issue taken up for 'justice'.

But then, one could counter-argue that our media, like everything else around us, is a reflection of us so it's probably better to look at ourselves than blame others? Masala sells, facts don't.

[ninjatalli]

Originally Posted by motorsan

I am a bit taken aback by some of the comments in this thread. There will always be bad apples trying to settle scores by coming up with bogus stories as part of #MeToo. But in the vast majority of cases, one needs to understand that it takes a lot of courage by the woman to disclose a harassment.

+100

The naivety in some of the posts is surprising but understandable - everyone goes through a learning. A proof based approach, although better, might not be possible in every situation; there are different means to get to the bottom. Especially in cases like these which are more of a cultural aspect than anything else. Also the understanding of what constitutes "harassment" has a very different meaning for different folks; and leads to situations like these.

Also in several of the cases, the noise against the accused is already prevalent within the firm/team and that adds to the accusation.

On an anecdotal note, there is a thread by @V.Narayanan on the #377 ruling celebrating the decision and inviting opinions. He clearly requested folks to be open and had given a write-up expecting views of both sides of the table to be presented. A few of the users did give a very strong and open view that bordered on how being homosexual was a "choice" and it was not "normal".

That is understandable - as a society we are yet to change; laws are just a phase of it. Similar is the case with the #meToo situation.
Also as @navin rightly pointed out, the #meToo situation is gender independent. It could be M-F/F-F/M-M/F-M; over the last few weeks there are cases shared on the public domain.

Originally Posted by GTO

Tweet went live yesterday morning & Tata put Suresh on leave the same evening. Can a slow behemoth like Tata complete the due processes in 1 working day? I don't think so. It was only done to douse the fire.

Not necessarily - there are guidelines for prevention of sexual harassment at workplace. Some firms do follow it diligently or try to. The firm's possibly following the guidelines and asked him to take a leave of absence; while they try to figure out the truth in the accusation and the complete picture. Someone at Tata HR could easily validate this.

If he's guilty he's going to be able to make amends. If he's innocent; he's going to face a lot of bad noise in the workplace which is not going to be good for him. Putting him on leave doesn't make either of the above scene not possible; but it potentially reduces the possibility of it happening.

If this wasn't made public, the word around the table would have been some "personal issues" to cover the leave. Unfortunately (for the firm), it went live and hence the noise on social media and forums like ours discussing what is right and what is wrong.

[chakri400]

Originally Posted by honeybee

Innocent till proven guilty?



Maybe but then this is not the court. We have a media trial. Here the loudest voice wins.

Sad.

Sadder part is the speed and justness of justice in India. If that were good, media trial wouldn't have been this popular now.

[dark.knight]

Originally Posted by pratyush6

Some of the comments on this forum are hard to believe. For as long as we know, it's been a man's world with women being the weaker sex. They've taken abuse, been harassed at work, threatened with transfers, looked as incompetent and what not. I've also received <>
I am completely for this movement, this should blow up. Yes, there might be a few who get unnecessarily dragged, that's just the nature of the beast. My personal experience has been different, I truly believe women are better than us, in most ways. Somewhere, we made this shift to a highly patriarchal society and we are seeing it's effects.

This comment scares me out of my mind, and sadly is what a majority of Indian men think these days. I'm pretty sure in a decade or so when we men are cast unto the jungles like pariahs, a majority of them will go "yeah we deserve it, we men evil, women goddesses".

Maybe it is how I'm wired, but ever think why the feminism bandwagon is so easy to agree upon? As I said before I've a lot of women friends and most of them disagree with the concept of feminism and it is spreading like a virus in the pond. What we need here are strong police laws that define, compute and
process sexual harassment - in the workplace, on the road etc, also one needs to make it easier in case of rape, for the complainant to register a complaint and the courts must act upon it at the highest importance.

In the end, equality is the need of the day.. not that one gender is lesser or greater than the other. If anything is passed of as the "nature of the beast" and that repatriations are due from modern man towards modern women for 10,000 years of oppression then sorry, I've to only laugh at that logic.

"Patriarchal" society was formed when the Greco-Anglo term was first coined circa 400 years ago to say that a house, institution or country was run by the "elders" of men.. it wasn't even indicative of men but of elder men. How or why or what great sin led to this coinage I'm not aware but I'm sure no one were complaining then, women included.

Its known history that men and women have different skill-sets and different interests, sure many times the both overlap as some if not all of the best cooks on earth are men while there are women who are truckers, mechanics etc. By saying this I'm NOT saying that skills cannot be learnt.. any skill can be learnt irrespective of the gender, I'm just talking of voluntary interest. Often times its the men who're the grease-monkeys, the screwdriver-hammer toting people who've made the world what it is today.. I don't see how just for the sake of feminism, one can brand all men as lesser than women. I want to see a world in which they are on the same level, only in different ways. Then again, I'm already preparing myself for the great ousting from society and incredible male-bashing era that is soon going to happen thanks in no small part, to self-depricating men themselves.

Originally Posted by Chetan_Rao

But then, one could counter-argue that our media, like everything else around us, is a reflection of us so it's probably better to look at ourselves than blame others? Masala sells, facts don't.

I'm not a reflection of the present media.. in fact I detest it. They sell a story more than the cause and at the end of the 1 hour of cacophony, no one is the wiser. The television is in fact living to its standard of being an idiot-box all too well. It is all shaping up into a rather well-defined fascist era, where for the crimes of a few, many millions would be hanged.

I remember the ban on sun-films was also for the protection of women. I'm happy if it reduced the women-related crimes in moving vehicles but I'm only unhappy that it came with the cost of everyone being branded a potential criminal nation-wide across all vehicles. Yes, that's how the cookie crumbles, and I should be ok with it without grumbling.

[pratyush6]

Originally Posted by dark.knight

This comment scares me out of my mind, and sadly is what a majority of Indian men think these days. .

On the contrary, let's agree to disagree. Most men think otherwise.
Did I ever mention feminism? As human beings, one must accept facts which are as clear as daylight. What's so difficult to understand that women have been victims of a male dominated society since ages? It continues even now, in some form or the other.
For simplicity, let's just discuss the people who have been shown in poor light. Do they even have a defence to put out? On the other hand, you have some anonymous accusers writing on twitter too. These incidents have been thoroughly denied by facts of the cases.

[dark.knight]

Originally Posted by pratyush6

Did I ever mention feminism? As human beings, one must accept facts which are as clear as daylight. What's so difficult to understand that women have been victims of a male dominated society since ages? It continues even now, in some form or the other.

True, it does. I'm not arguing that. All these problems are because of two reasons, one being that in 99% cases there is little to no proof to back-up an office or outdoor harassment incident, Google glass might've helped but its very concept was illegal to begin with and a secret recording eye-glass might lead to 100 times more exploitation of women than at present. The second reason is that there are varying views of what constitutes harassment and what doesn't (as seen in one of the present case of a comedienne kissing another comedienne, one saw it as a PR stunt, one saw it as harassment).. and when further processed by the law, it all begins to fall apart and genuine victims are left with utter helplessness as the perpetrators go scot-free.

Historically though, when one thinks about it.. women were not as much as a "victim" as one would like to imagine. In almost all of Greco-Roman societies and also Egyptian societies, every war would mean that wives and children of men and warriors were to be secured in their homes as the battles took place outside the land. The Hammurabi Code (on which the 10 Commandments were based) were also very holistic, encompassing women security, punishments for being disloyal to spouse, and settlements in case of dissolving a marriage etc. Of course the punishments and definitions were rather archaic as can be expected of the times going back 4000 years but it did serve as a rather rudimentary human-rights and marital laws code.

For simplicity, let's just discuss the people who have been shown in poor light. Do they even have a defence to put out? On the other hand, you have some anonymous accusers writing on twitter too. These incidents have been thoroughly denied by facts of the cases.

I'm in no support of the garbage that exists in the name of movie entertainment. Enough skeletons have tumbled out of the closets of Hollywood and Bollywood. It is basically due to the fact that this is a heavy money-spinning industry and those that sit on the throne and get to decide who is selected, wield incredible leverage upon those who want to get selected.

In my view the only way to purge the entertainment industry is to literally boycott it. No auditions, no newcomers, no supporting cast etc, until the old guards of the industry (mostly within the same family) fall apart and bankrupt themselves. But going by the dozens of Indian masala internet-streaming shows that are coming up.. there seem to be no shortage of women for any and every role. Case in point the garbage that is Sacred Games.

[subraiyr]

What a tragedy !!!

An interesting campaign #MeToo has now become one of the most trashed at least in India thanks to all the sudden hullabaloo here. Let us just look at facts and then view these facts with our specific lenses. Let us not look at it from a global perspective, but localize it to the countries we live in. To me it is India and therefore here i go

Fact 1 - It has been a man's world for a long time. Women have had little to do with decision making processes that alters the course of humans individually and in a society. There has been far and fewer instances of women doing thus.

Fact 2 - There has been male oppression of sexual nature in India. With the population we have and the employment market the way it is, there has been a steady state of fighting for survival by all and herein anything goes

Fact 3 - India over a period of time had become a repressed society when it came to matters of sex. And therefore by logic, what is banned or a taboo is what people gravitate towards


Mind you all these are known to us and all of these are hard truth.

Onto the #MeToo campaign then. Why suddenly ? Why did the Levee break just now ? And as a nation, do we have more predators ?

To me there are varying degrees of truth in a lot of these questions and issues raised. The relativity is what needs to be checked

Why Suddenly - Multitude of factors - Growth of social media, Higher levels of education amongst people, expansive knowledge due to travel, growth of media to various sections of society, broadminded legal systems are just some of the few that point to the reason why things are coming out of the closet.

Do we have more predators - Tough one, but i will go to say no. The % break up probably is the same as earlier. The sheer nature of information reach is what makes it look big.

One question i keep asking myself is this

What came out is from the past. This is good since the balance of both genders were very skewed.
What if today's actions came out through #MeToo. Isnt there enough guidelines and strictures that such things when it comes out, has to be taken through rightful channels within the organization or entity. Or are we now saying that equality of gender is still a dream. I think it still is, but i would like to hear from all. Does it make sense to pursue the course of social justice in our current times ?

Many popular figures are now in the cynosure of a media storm. What has come of it other than shaming them in public. Cases and counter cases filed without any action from parent bodies. Politicians blaming Opposition vendetta and such blatant excuses.

Is the power of #MeToo to just shame people or bring them front and center in front of justice ? Has #MeToo lost its flag in India ?

[mayuresh]

This stuff is showing some totally undesirable side effects. I have a first hand incident to share:

My wife had a fall from a staircase while going to a bank. She was struggling to get up. A few men passing by stopped and showed concern. But none of them moved forward and helped her stand on her feet. Men are increasingly getting worried about being victimized as well.

At workplace when you have male and female candidates to choose from, male managers are likely to have at least a slight tilt in preferring male candidates.

I am not saying all the noise is false. But definitely many men are becoming extra cautious. Not necessarily a nice thing.

Purely analytically, I think the cases fall in 3 categories:

1. Genuine cases of misbehavior
2. A relationship gone awry, later conveniently termed as exploitation to settle scores
3. Totally fake cases, whatever the motivation (money/otherwise)

I do not know what would be relative %age of each though.

[dark.knight]

Originally Posted by mayuresh

Purely analytically, I think the cases fall in 3 categories:

1. Genuine cases of misbehavior
2. A relationship gone awry, later conveniently termed as exploitation to settle scores
3. Totally fake cases, whatever the motivation (money/otherwise)

I do not know what would be relative %age of each though.

Absolutely true, I for one am terrified of the corporate conditions today, I too will not help a woman or girl up after a fall/trip unless there is an absolute need. Reminds me of the time when in our business center, a girl raised hell with a watchman (well he's slightly eccentric and on the lazy side but having seen him for a long time he sure isn't outright foolish), all he did was ask for ID and she went off on him for always "targeting" her for identification. As far as I'm concerned he was within her rights as long as he was only asking for company ID and nothing else.. now if he did that each time she went in, that's not his problem, either. Hell was raised, though, seniors were involved and he was given a reprimand (the only complaint being he repeatedly asked her for ID, nothing else, no suggestive behavior or anything). When I asked her directly if it warranted such a complaint she chewed my head off saying we shouldn't be so tolerant of such people (who knows why).

At the same time I've also seen genuine cases of harassment/suggestive behavior mostly within HR circles (surprise surprise) but complaints very often do not get past the workspace BFF because jobs are at stake at that level.It goes without saying that the greater the power the more is the obnoxiousness and high-handedness.

I say its time to put an end to gender wars... most of the men and women in companies or banks or showrooms are the nicest people you can run across and they are very adept at consumer relations and customer treatment and work well as a team too. Exceptions shall always exist but you cannot blame or distrust an entire gender for that reason.

ANY movement that pits one gender against another is but another movement to shred the fabric of humanity. Those that have wrongfully exploited women for their selfish needs whilst holding leverage over them should be fully processed according to law and deserve every bit of hatred and shameful looks they get.. that is up to the police (investigation, interrogation) & law (analysis and judgement) to arrive at a conclusion.

My view will always be - one humanity. Your gender ONLY determines your proclivities/hobbies/rationale over due course.

[GutsyGibbon]

I am seeing some shocking responses here, that I did not expect to see. I am not sure what data points people are looking at. EEOC releases stats every year. There are many publications that use such data and publish summaries. As those may be labeled pro feminism and what not, I chose to not post such articles.
https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/statistics...harassment.cfm

Even though 50% of workforce in the US are women, 85% of the sexual harassment charges are from women. As a society we need to focus on bigger problems. Sure, harassment of men are also an issue, false claims are an issue. But by shining light on that, we totally steal the attention needed by the bigger issue here. And no, this is not about generalization of gender. #metoo is not labelling all men as pigs. They are making specific allegations against the men in power who abused them. Country after country, we see a culture of women being shutup, India is no different.

[Samurai]

Came across this article on Scroll.

BTW, the writer's name is familiar to me. He had once contacted me over email 25 years ago, while researching some story. Internet then was a small world. I remembered his name only because of his unique surname, his father was a popular police commissioner of Bangalore in the 80s.