Following are some men who are not satisfied with the premier’s simplifying sexual violence to be an outcome of temptation:
Osman Khalid Butt – actor
“Of course men aren’t robots. Yes, there is desire, temptation, attraction.
“Rape isn’t caused by this. Rape is about power. Dominance, a complete lack of empathy, hostility. It diminishes a woman — or a man, or a child — to a sexual object. It is dehumanising.”
In reply to a tweet, he said: “I studied in a segregated school till uni. There was a strict dress code, and boys & girls were not allowed to fraternise. Somehow I didn’t end up sexually assaulting anyone.”
Referring to the unedited clip of the interview released by the Prime Minister’s Office, he acknowledged that the premier spoke of child abuse as well. But, he pointed out, that doesn’t mean what he said about sexual violence wasn’t highly problematic.
Zarrar Khuhro – journalist
“Look here’s the thing: we all, or most of us, grew up believing wholeheartedly that rape is a ‘lust’ crime, a ‘crime of passion’ involving loss of control over the man’s impulses. Certainly this is what I was socialised into believing too.
“But as you grow (as you should) you learn that this is not the case,” wrote the senior journalist, emphasising on the need to self-reflect and evolve.
“Once you see the actual cases, the actual dynamics and atrocities (children, babies, corpses, heated rods being used as surrogate phalluses) you understand you were wrong. Now, acknowledging that is hard. Because it means that you have to give up comfortable notions that you had previously accepted, had imbibed from elders, peers, society. To accept they were wrong is tough. But sometimes to learn new things, to grow, means to first un-learn the old. And that takes great courage. I get that.
Jibran Nasir – lawyer and activist
“Dear PM Imran Khan, stop humanising the rapists, abusers and harassers and stop objectifying the victims,” wrote the activist.
“You may not realise it but when you repeatedly stress upon the clothes of a woman as a cause for temptation leading to sexual violence you do exactly that.”
Usman Mukhtar – actor
“Rape is rape! There is no justification for it. No! It does not happen because a woman is wearing short clothes. It happens because the person who is committing this heinous, inhumane act is a criminal and the scum of the earth. It’s an act of abuse of power! It’s an act of a deranged mind, not of non robots lured by women!” the actor and director said via his Instagram Story.
“It’s like saying that if a person had a gun in the house they would want to commit murder. And it’s justified because the gun was lying around so of course this had to happen,” he reasoned.
“Mr PM, please stop blaming the victim. It’s time for action. Time to punish such filth of the earth to a point no one dares to commit such an act.”
