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Love does not abuse. Love heals. What Kabir Singh feels and expresses is not love; please don't be swayed by it, people. It's abuse. Recognise it for what it is.
Love does not abuse. Love heals. What Kabir Singh feels and expresses is not love; please don’t be swayed by it, people. It’s abuse. Recognise it for what it is.
I want to talk about stalking, abuse and love today. Last summer, I was in a listening circle. Everyone shared their stories about love, abuse, and harassment.
There is one story that stayed with me. An 18-year-old boy talked about his mother.
She was from North India. A brilliant girl who loved physics and maths. In her leisure time, she spent hours solving Maths. She wanted to study space science.
Every day she had to walk two hours to and from college. A guy fell in love with her. He would follow her, and bully her every day. She protested. Then ignored him.
One day he held her hand. She pushed him away and ran. The whole town came to know about it. Her brothers did not allow her to go to college anymore. She was married off in three months. Now at 37, with an 18-year-old son, she teaches Maths and Physics to school kids, because though she could never continue her studies, her love for knowledge remains. The son exclaimed, “Maa is still so good with Maths, she solves my sums. I am an engineering student now.”
I have a male friend who was in a relationship for 4 years with a woman. She would always tell him that she was going to cut her wrists every time he would try to break up. In the end, the police had to be involved. She left. Married someone else. My friend was in therapy for a year.
I asked my friend how it all escalated. He told me that the first time she abused him verbally he thought that it was because she was madly in love and came from a broken family, she did what she did. And I have heard this story from innumerable women when the coin was flipped.
In both the above cases, it is the abuser who went scot free.
Yesterday, Kabir Singh was released. A broken man, who hounds a girl and slaps her later. The glorification of the abuser is so much that the abused seems guilty.
In Pyaar Tune Kya Kiya, Urmila falls for Fardeen who is a married man and makes his life miserable. The movie ends with her in the asylum. We all know who had the audience’s heart.
In Darr, when Shahrukh first stalks Juhi, the first reaction was to marry her off to Sunny Deol. But nowhere have we talked about the journey the abused goes through.
Can we first get it? Any form of abuse, be it mental, physical or emotional is not okay. Repeat after me, “Love does not abuse. It makes you feel good.” If your boyfriend hits you in a fit of rage, run. If your girlfriend writes abusive mails to your family, run. Somewhere we are taught that if someone loves you, violence is okay. It is not. It never is.
Take it from me, abuse changes the wiring of the brain and takes years to heal. It’s time we show what the abused go through. The journey to healing is tough. If your partner abuses you, he/she needs help. If you let the broken break you, you let the cycle of abuse continue.
The system is already broken, don’t add to it. Run, get your family involved, get the police if needed. Or a restraining order from the court. Your future self will thank you. You are your first love.
One more time, repeat with me: Love does not abuse. Repeat it till the system where abusers are glorified breaks down, and a new world dawn in.
I have lived and experienced enough to know, love does not abuse.
Proud Indian. Senior Writer at Women's Web. Columnist. Book Reviewer. Street Theatre - Aatish. Dreamer. Workaholic. read more...
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Neena was the sole caregiver of Amma and though one would think that Amma was dependent on her, Neena felt otherwise.
Neena inhaled the aroma that emanated from the pan and took a deep breath. The aroma of cumin interspersed with butter transported her back to the modest kitchen in her native village. She could picture her father standing in the kitchen wearing his white crisp kurta as he made delectable concoctions for his only daughter.
Neena grew up in a home where both her parents worked together in tandem to keep the house up and running. She had a blissful childhood in her modest two-room house. The house was small but every nook and cranny gave her memories of a lifetime. Neena’s young heart imagined that her life would follow the same cheerful course. But how wrong she was!
When she was sixteen, the catastrophic clutches of destiny snatched away her parents. They passed away in a road accident and Neena was devastated. Relatives thronged her now gloomy house and soon it was decided that she should be married off.
Women today don’t want to be in a partnership that complicates their lives further. They need an equal partner with whom they can figure out life as a team, playing by each other’s strengths.
We all are familiar with that one annoying aunty who is more interested in our marital status than in the dessert counter at a wedding. But these aunties have somehow become obsolete now. Now they are replaced by men we have in our lives. Friends, family, and even work colleagues. It’s the men who are worried about why we are not saying yes to one among their clans. What is wrong with us? Aren’t we scared of dying alone? Like them?
A recent interaction with a guy friend of mine turned sour when he lectured me about how I would regret not getting married at the right time. He lectured that every event in our lives needs to be completed within a certain timeframe set by society else we are doomed. I wasn’t angry. I was just disappointed to realize that annoying aunties are rapidly doubling in our society. And they don’t just appear at weddings or family functions anymore. They are everywhere. They are the real pandemic.
Let’s examine this a little closer.
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