Complicit to the Core

If men choose silence in the face of sexual assaults on women and children, there will, sadly, be no last man standing

- Urvashi Butalia IS A FEMINIST WRITER AND DIRECTOR, ZUBAAN PUBLISHERS

LAST week, Asha Achy Joseph, a film-maker from Kerala who had filed a complaint of sexual assault against a powerful political figure and film director in Kerala, chose to come out of anonymity. In doing so, she made a strong point: "If the survivor remains anonymous," she said, "the accused gets all the space." Other survivors, she said, would come out similarly, as part of a campaign against the shame and silence that attaches to survivors.

Asha's words echo the ongoing global conversation on sexual assault as more and more women choose to discard silence and demand to be heard. Perhaps the loudest voice here is that of Gisèle Pelicot, the French woman whose husband offered her inert body freely to strange men. In waiving her right to anonymity, Pelicot powerfully spoke against the culture that shames women for being victims of sexual assault, but she also made another important statement—that she had given herself the right to be happy.

Carrying the terrible knowledge of what has been done to them, and living with the silence that is imposed legally and socially, has made it not only difficult, but often virtually impossible for survivors to get on with their lives. Many who choose to speak out struggle with themselves to do so. Years ago, I spoke to Marrewa-Karwoski, a US-based research scholar and a survivor of sexual assault by a person she considered a friend and mentor. Holding on to her silence for months, she realised it was eating away at her from inside, turning her into someone she did not want to be. This was what led to her decision to speak. Here is what she said: