Outlook English - Print Subscribers Copy Outlook English, 07 May 2018 | Page 40
T H E L IST
OPI NI ON
NO POETRY AFT
PRIYAMVADA
GOPAL
#MeToo wasn’t the Holocaust. Nor were the accusing women killjoy
F
EMINISTS critical of the List of Sexual
Harassers in Academia (LoSHA), compiled by
Indian-American lawyer Raya Sarkar, were
probably ill-served by academic Shiv
Visvanathan, when he tried to rally to their
cause recently. Oozing an astonishing lack of
self-awareness, Visvanathan’s essay in this magazine
(The Chilly Justice of the Gulag, April 16) cast forensic
light on exactly what is at stake in the, at times,
falsely polarised battle between those who empha-
sise institutional due process and those who sought
to ‘name and shame’ problematic behaviour which
slips through institutional radars. An impassioned
lament for the loss of heterosexual male entitlement,
each self-pitying sentence in Visvanathan’s essay
ironically ends up bolstering Ms Sarkar’s case. The
LoSHA lists male academics who have been identi-
fied by different women as sexual predators and
suggests that patriarchal power and institutional
status have given some men a sense of entitlement
and access to young women’s minds and bodies.
Whatever the merits of Ms Sarkar’s case,
Visvanathan’s essay is, unfortunately, expert testi-
mony to the general existence of a sense of entitle-
ment. It is important not in itself but as a symptom
of a greater patriarchal malaise.
Full disclosure: as the LoSHA unfolded on social
media, I expressed a measure of support for what it
sought to achieve and have defended Ms Sarkar and
others against some of the more virulent charges
against them—such as being a ‘lynch mob’ like the
vigilante gangs of Hindutva. This does not mean that
I cannot see why the LoSHA was criticised. We abso-
lutely must have ‘due process’ where possible, we
must strengthen institutional mechanisms of red
ress, and we must ensure that justice is served for all,
including the accused. In a recent essay in this mag-
azine, Sehba Imam argued that activist-scholar
Khurshid Anwar, who committed suicide after accu-
sations of rape, had been ‘swallowed’ by a social
media trial which did not allow for the ‘due process
of law’ and that the accused too are entitled to justice.
In institutional terms and in relation to such a
serious charge, she is right.
It is clearly possible for mechanisms of naming and
shaming to be misused vindictively and in political
40 OUTLOOK 7 May 2018
It is rather
astounding
that a
cultural
critic could
even offer
that the
‘normative’
is a zone
free of
power.
ways, and for innocents, particularly targeted min
orities, to be caught up in serious charges without
legal recourse. These dangers are obvious and we
have a duty to consider them soberly. Yet, the singu-
lar focus on ‘due process’ appears at times to miss
one very important point. In addition to drawing
attention to multiple institutional failures on the
question of sexual harassment, what the admittedly
desperate act of the LoSHA sought was to draw att
ention to an endemic culture of harassment, preda-
tion and abuse in academia. If due process is vital for
changing institutions, what mechanisms can be
deployed to change cultures?
Visvanathan’s piece is ironically helpful here, for