Hindu Men and Patriarchy
Originally published Oct 3 2018 on my Facebook post. Republished here with edits.
This is the type of tone policing I have to deal with from Indian and Hindu men and other men of color everyday.
Notice how convinced he is that he's right. Notice his internalized oppression and respectability politics. Notice his fragility. Notice his condescension and patriarchal superiority complex.
In the absence of Hindu men who are too cowardly to take action, I have to deal with this myself, every single day.
Where are all the Hindu men? Are there any left? All I can see are brown men stuffed with white supremacist capitalist patriarchy, covered in a veneer of shallow "spirituality." These are not spiritual warriors. They're too busy making money to pay attention to what needs to be done. They are never going to protect me or any other Hindu woman.
I wish they would wake up. But they are not going to without help. So I have to make noise. I have to SMASH. Their walls are not going to come down any other way.
Jan 2022 Update:
As you can see, I wrote the above post in 2018. I have since been glad to meet a few Hindu men who do support my work and agree with my critique of patriarchy, and are willing to learn what they don’t know without endless fragility and denial. There’s still a long way to go but it’s been healing for me to get to know these Hindu men who are doing the work, especially when our ancient Hindu values are actually all about smashing the patriarchy.
Resources
National Sexual Assault Hotline: 1–800–656–HOPE (4673)
National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1–800–799-SAFE (7233)
National LGBT Hotline: 1–888–843–4564
Hotline for 2SLGBTQIA+: 1–519–752-HELP (4357)