Indian Gov't Wants Worldwide Ban On Rape Documentary, Including Online

An anonymous reader writes India's far-right Hindu Nationalist government headed by Narendra Modi has banned telecasting and viewing online of a BBC documentary on the 2012 Delhi rape which shocked the nation. The documentary consists interviews of the rapist Mukesh Singh, his lawyers and the victim's parents seems to expose the male dominant nature of Indian society. Indian government is now attempting to ban the documentary worldwide. Critics of the Indian government's action has accused it of not addressing issues women face and instead trying to hide the dirty secrets of its culture from the world. Some Indian websites have also reported that the views expressed by the rapist are echoed by policemen, lawyers and politicians of the nation. So far the government's attempt to ban the video online is with mixed success.

Comments

Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[jcr]

Someone has to teach Modi what "Streisand Effect" means.

-jcr

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Dutch Gun]

Also, "worldwide ban". Good luck with that. Indian government, the attempt at a ban says much more about you than the documentary itself does.

The fact that this incident sparked mass protests, on the other hand, shows that many people in India are good and decent, and of course abhor things like this. I wish them the best of luck in taking control of their government someday. It's something we're still struggling with ourselves on a regular basis.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[K. S. Kyosuke]

He's technically correct. Anywhere where there are dark skinned people, there's going to be trouble. That's because anywhere where there are people, there's going to be trouble.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Luckyo]

Most of the people in India agree with him, including women. That is the main problem with Indian society in relation to rape. It's not just "policemen, politicians and lawyers" but average people as well. Views like "women are responsible for what (rape) happens to them if they dress in a certain way and go out in the evening alone" are commonplace.
Those opposed are mainly educated people in the cities, and even among them, there's no real consensus. Remember, this is a huge country with a large portion of rural dwellers, caste system that persists in spite of being banned by government and very conservative views on many issues.
It's also a country where most people will rather buy a slightly more expensive phone than replace their outhouse with a running water toilet.

Streisand effect is working in his favour on this one, even though his intentions are obviously impossible to achieve, simply because it shows his constituents that he shares their world view.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Shadow of Eternity]

No, it's not. In fact it's so far in the opposite direction that our top scholars and professors of law are publicly referring to our policies as "madness".

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[jcr]

Well, I'm watching it, and 20 minutes in I want to not only strangle all the perps, but both of their lawyers. Jesus Christ, what a greasy, evil, stupid and vicious pair of shysters.

-jcr

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[BarbaraHudson]

So, rather than admit there's a problem, just sweep it under the rug. Not gonna happen.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[bingoUV]

caste system that persists in spite of being banned by government and very conservative views on many issues.

Caste "system" is not banned and it never was. Even the British loved it as it was a nice way to divide people. Complexity of Indian caste system lends itself to creative uses.

It's also a country where most people will rather buy a slightly more expensive phone than replace their outhouse with a running water toilet.

"Most people" in India don't have an outhouse, most of those who have , don't have any running water to their outhouses.

Those with running water to their outhouses don't have any need to practice economy. So you are wrong in every way.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Nethead]

Yeah, I got about 20 minutes in before I was about to put my fist through the monitor. The main perp said that only 20% of women are decent? I though we had rednecks in the US. Nothing like these total pieces of shit.

Now I see why women avoid IT jobs with all the H1-B dudes roaming the halls.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Anonymous Coward]

Views like "women are responsible for what (rape) happens to them if they dress in a certain way and go out in the evening alone" are commonplace.

It's pretty common here in the States as well...

No, it's not. What is common in the US is the point of view that if you do stupid, reckless things then bad people will take advantage of you. In India, the view is that if a Woman doesn't follow traditional social protocol, then good Upstanding citizens will rape her as punishment.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Fire_Wraith]

Obligatory HHGTTG:

"To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem."

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean the "campus rape crisis" that doesn't actually exist on the campuses where women are actually less likely to be raped than women in the general population? The entire thing is based on poor statistics, something for which the users of those statistics are at least as responsible for as the originators.

Any rape is too much rape, but by creating fairy stories about the prevalence, causes and definition of rape you won't do anything useful to reduce that figure. In fact you'll probably make it worse.

Posting ac because, unfortunately, it's just too dangerous to say things like this in connection with one's IRL identity these days.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[msobkow]

Which is precisely why the world should see this video. Because those "ideals" are far too prevalent in Indian society, and the nation should not be allowed to gloss over just how backwards so many of their people are beneath a veneer of respectability. It wasn't until this case that rape was even really taken seriously by the government itself, and then only because of mass protests.

It's not that all the people support the viewpoint by any means.

But it's important to show the world just how entrenched that viewpoint is in Indian society so that the rest of the world can apply pressure for things to change.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[DNS-and-BIND]

US culture is currently going through a Rape Scare that is very much like the Red Scare of the 50s. Witch hunters are everywhere, and what do you know, they find witches all the time. Just like in the 50s, it's just hysteria that feeds itself. Crime is down to historic lows right now.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Intrepid imaginaut]

Did you know that over 90% of those in prison for violent crimes are men? Men are evil! But wait - 99% of men have never had and will never have a conviction for a violent crime, so saying men are evil is flat out bigotry as bad as any Klanner roaming the backwoods with a length of rope and a shotgun.

When you project the crimes of a miniscule minority onto much larger groups, you're a bigot.

A similar principle applies here. Let's take for example this article which claims a woman is raped in India every 20 minutes. While it goes without saying that any rape is too much rape, this makes it sound like India is the world's rape capital. Once every 20 minutes, my god!

Except the population of India is 1.25 billion, so counting the number of 20 minutes in the year we get around 26297. Divide 1.25 billion into that and look, we get 0.00002, or two per hundred thousand, which is considerably lower than most western countries. A very different picture emerges. Yes, scumbags and psychos exist in India the same as everywhere else. No that's not an indictment of Indian society, and what they're trying to do is protect their national reputation in the same way they're prioritising a space programme over indoor plumbing.

What happens when hysterias like the feminists and other carrion creatures manufacture for fun and billions in profit take hold is people suffer and die, torn to death by mobs without trial or due process. Trying to spin this call for a ban into the government protecting rapists is just more of the same - the government is acting in a confused and not terribly intelligent manner, but it doesn't want the country painted in a bad light.

And that's before we start talking about dowry law abuses, domestic violence law abuses, and maintenance law abuses, of which there are a great many. A quarter of all male suicides in India are directly attributed to family problems.

So, we have well provisioned westerners sitting behind their screens, tut tutting at the dastardly H1-B dudes roaming the halls scaring off all teh wimminz, suckling at the teat of hyped up outrage, squinting myopically through their little electronic rectangles at a world they've never experienced and have little understanding of, proudly touting the merits of skepticism in their signatures while massive human suffering goes unnoticed.

Still, that outrage feels good though eh?

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Luckyo]

1. Discrimination against lower castes is illegal in India under Article 15 of its constitution. It is however still prevalent. Not sure how your example of British rule which ended many decades ago has any more relevance to current situation than, for example, the fact that during the same period rape within marriage was completely legal everywhere Europe.

2. The obvious elephant in the room that you chose to ignore to get to claim that "I'm wrong in every way" on this one is that it's a well known and documented fact that there have been several programmes that allowed almost any Indian person to get a running water toilet for minimal price. It was widely rejected by people who preferred to put money in things like buying slightly more expensive smartphones instead. This was noted all the way up to the prime minister of India.

I'm not sure why you're so hell bent on making the "you're wrong in every way" claim as to ignore things like Indian constitution, well documented charity programmes and even PM statements.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Immerman]

> a strange culture, who would rather put a lot of effort in denial rather than on fixing the problems
What's strange about that? Sounds like pretty much every culture I've ever heard of. Try to get "brogrammers" to admit they have a misogyny problem. Try to get _rabid_ feminists to admit they have a misandry problem. Try to get religious fundamentalists to admit they have a rational plausibility problem. Try to get economists to admit they have a "no actual clue about anything" problem.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Anonymous Coward]

The campus rape cause is one that that's typically been taken up by middle and upper class folks, a number of whom have been raped on campus. This is because this is primarily the demographic that ends up at university in the first place - the lower class are far less likely to end up at university.

The issue is that for that demographic, campus is far and away the most likely place these people will be raped, more so than the middle class neighbours they grew up in, and more so than the middle class neighbours they'll likely live in when they graduate and enter the working population with a graduate salary.

From their perspective therefore it is a big problem, it is the place where most rapes happen to people from their background, but the reason it doesn't look such a relative problem compared to overall rape statistics is because most rapes occur in lower class neighbourhoods, and with relatively disturbing regularity.

So you're right that rapes off campus are far more likely, but not for the people who typically attend university - if a university goer gets raped in their lifetime it's far and away more likely to occur whilst they're at university. The problem is that where the general statistics show higher levels of rape outside of university it's a result of a broader problem - the higher levels of crime that occur in lower class neighbourhoods in general.

Of course, these aren't the only two walks of life where there's a distinct rape problem- the military has a rape problem, and prisons have a rape problem.

So whilst you're right, that there is more rape outside of campus than on campus, I'd warn against using that very generalised overall rape statistic of on campus vs. off campus as a justification to ignore the problem of rape on campus. The fact is that rape occurs in these different walks of life for different reasons. Changing the culture of the military so that staff can report rapes without fear of killing their career will do nothing to lower levels of rape in poor areas where social cohesion and respect for the law has been completely lost, just as dealing with rape in prisons will do nothing to stop the preppy jock who after a few beers and a life of entitlement believes he can just take whatever woman he wants knowing they're away from home and their family support network and more vulnerable.

These are all distinct problems, and simply pretending rape has one single cause, and one single solution such that single trait campus like university rape can be ignored is counter-productive. All rape must be stopped, but there's no one single solution to do so - rape on campus isn't a fairy story for the demographic whom it's most likely to effect, it's a real problem, just like rape in the military, rape in prison and so forth also are.

The only thing that shouldn't be surprising is that the rape on campus problem has come to the fore because it's a problem that affects the demographic of society with the most money and the greatest ability to be heard - poor people, soldiers, and prisoners don't much get listened to when they have problems. Is it unfair that those folk can raise the issue more easily? yes absolutely. But it doesn't mean there isn't still a problem to be solved there.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[LifesABeach]

Oh India, whose culture peaked 3,600 years ago. We know you want to be all grown up; it's a process.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[ggrocca]

I think OP refers to policies against sexual violence that have been enacted of late in many USA universities, based on things like "if you wake up and don't remember the night before than it was rape". Several young males have been thrown out of school and tainted for life without any kind of due process - just badly handled internal procedures carried out inside their academic institution.

There's also the other face of the coin that rapes, especially when undergrads are involved, seems to be a real problem that universities and local police forces seem to be very ill-equipped to address. It's just that handling it exercising draconian justice without presumption of innocence, as far as the school is concerned, while doing nothing outside school in normal courts at the same time, does not seem to offer real justice to either victims or accused.

Especially considering that rape cases are very, very difficult cases. They are terrible tragedies for the sufferer of the crime, which is horrible for them when it happens on one hand, and real nightmares for people who is falsely accused of being a perpetrator. More often than not, they end up in being "my-word-against-yours" cases, where the police and the courts end up making accusations and judgments based on the "character" of the people involved. Quite a mess.

There has been an ongoing debate about this for at least a year in all major media (the NYT had several pieces, both investigative and opinion), and journalistic scandals with sources and false reporting were conveniently thrown in the mix as well (was it Rolling Stone? I'm too lazy to check). Google away to your pleasure!

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Baloroth]

The fact the you just blamed the victim by saying it's their fault shows that it is common in the States. Most rapes are about control, so the messed up people who are rapists think that have to put women (and men) in their place. It's not the victim's actions but how people react to them that is the problem-worldwide.

No, he didn't "blame the victim by saying it's their fault", and the fact you claimed he did means you are part of the problem. Look at it this way: if I drive a Porsche into a bad neighborhood, leave it unlocked with the keys inside, and it gets stolen, are you going to say I didn't mess up? No, of course I messed up, because failing to lock the doors on your car is stupid. That doesn't mean I'd bear the responsibility for the car being stolen, but it does mean what I did was stupid, and I would partially bear responsibility for a chain of action that lead to the car being stolen, and I could maybe have prevented the car being stolen. Since I cannot control the actions of other people, only my own, what I can do to prevent my car from being stolen is to take the proper precautions: lock the doors, don't park in bad neighborhoods, install a tracking system, etc.

For women (or men: rape works in both directions, though it's generally a vastly worse problem for women, especially attractive ones), that means not wearing revealing clothing while drunk at 3AM in a bad alley, watching their drinks closely, only hanging out with groups of people they trust and know well, etc. None of that means they're the ones responsible for the rape if they do get raped: but it does mean they can lower the probability of rape happening by being smart, and since the goal is to stop rapes from happening, we should encourage them to be smart, and discourage them from being stupid.

In other words: we can't blame the women for being raped, but we certainly can blame them for being stupid. Yes, everyone should be able to be as stupid as they want with no fear of other people doing bad things to them, but so long as we live in the real world, that will never happen (though we can still strive towards it, of course), so we should tell people to stop being stupid, because that means bad things are less likely to happen to them.

Re:Well, I guess I've got to watch it now.

[Luckyo]

The main advantage is hygiene. That is less diseases spread by parasites in the faeces and no need to empty out the outhouse getting people into direct contact with faeces.

It takes having lived a really comfortable life to not understand this basic issue with hygiene.

Re:Bittorrent

[Ultra64]

magnet:?xt=urn:btih:0EC1B682EFE55269F319620CAFEA9031320EA4E5&dn=bbc+documentary+delhi+rape+case+hd+720p&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Fopen.demonii.com%3A1337%2Fannounce

Only cowards censor

[UnknownSoldier]

Hey India: "Sticking your head in the sand ignoring the issue doesn't make it go away!"

Deal with it.

Re:Only cowards censor

[Black Parrot]

Hey India: "Sticking your head in the sand ignoring the issue doesn't make it go away!"

I suspect you could say that to all governments, on lots of issues.

Tech Support

[Anonymous Coward]

How can a country that hosts so many of the world's call centers still have no idea how the internet works?

Re:Tech Support

[ColdWetDog]

How can a country that hosts so many of the world's call centers still have no idea how the internet works?

Well, if their understanding of Microsoft Windows support is any guide ...

Re:Bittorrent

[roc97007]

So what's the bittorrent name for the file? I've got to grab it just in case the Hindu fanatics win.

This is the internet. The fastest way to make anything ubiquitous that can be electronically transferred, is to attempt to ban it.

I would expect bittorrent links pretty much everywhere by right about.... now.

Yeah, That's Not Going To Work, India

[Greyfox]

Hopefully you have a "Plan B." One would think, ideally, one of your plans would be to not rape people. I mean, just throwing that out there. After, I dunno, the third or forth news story I was all like "Wow, they're really raping a lot of people in India all of a sudden. Did one of our fraternities start outsourcing or something?" And you guys do know that raping people is bad, right? I mean, based on your reaction to this movie, it does seem like you're aware of that. So maybe try not raping people for a while, see how that goes for you.

It's on youtube

[walterbyrd]

Here is the link.

BBC Full Documentary- 'India's Daughter' on Nirbhaya Delhi Gang Rap | Jyoti singh | HD | Banned

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxkMzBqjgw8

Will watch

[moondo]

An issue that I never cared about suddenly became interesting. Thanks Indian government for stimulating my interest.
And thank you to the people who posted links here.

Re:Who would have guessed male dominance?

[rubycodez]

uh, your information is dated, they don't do the fling-yourself-on-the-pyre thing any more. It was outlawed in 19th century in India, and in 1920 in Nepal.

"Be it so. This burning of widows is your custom; prepare the funeral pile. But my nation has also a custom. When men burn women alive we hang them, and confiscate all their property. My carpenters shall therefore erect gibbets on which to hang all concerned when the widow is consumed. Let us all act according to national customs." -- Commander in Chief in India, to Hindu priests complaining that they couldn't do the Sati thing any more.

Sometimes it takes embarrasement to effect change

[JoeyRox]

The rapist's comments in the documentary are pretty shocking - he blames the victim for the rape, for being out at 9PM rather than at home doing house chores. I suspect this perspective isn't unique to this one man and thus the government considers it an embarrassing reflection on the nation as a whole. Maybe that's a good thing.

Pot vs Kettle

[dbIII]

It was illegal to do that in India a few year before it was illegal for you guys to keep slaves - you should have thought about that before you played the "backwards savages" card.
The current situation is based on current problems that can exist in places other than India (or toga parties in the USA).

Re:Who would have guessed male dominance?

[jcr]

Sir Charles Napier.

-jcr

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Sometimes it takes embarrasement to effect chan

[grep -v '.*' *]

The rapist's comments in the documentary are pretty shocking... I suspect this perspective isn't unique to this one man and thus the government considers it an embarrassing reflection on the nation as a whole.

I just finished watching it (after DLing in case it disappears.) I find hints of "honor" and what I've heard about the Middle East and about Islam appearing as well.

a) woman should always be accompanied by members of their family when outside (in public), and
b) need to cover themselves so that strangers won't lose control of their facilities (presumably by their penis.)

Are men so sexually animistic that they can't control themselves after seeing a boob? In this case it seems like the guys were out for an opportunistic "good time" and wanted to teach her a lesson for resisting.

Maybe the idea is that teenagers might be lacking in self-control and so you need to help them along. Completely blaming women and hiding them away does not solve the problem though. But maybe that is the exact procedure to keep the male leaders (family, town, precinct, area, state) in control.

Perp:
"A decent girl won't roam around at 9 o'clock at night."
"A girl is far more responsible for a rape than a boy."
So: It's not my fault, she made me do it to her.

Lawyers:
"A woman means I immediately put the sex in his eyes."
"A female is just like a flower .. [that] always needs protection."
"In our society, we never allow our girls to come out from the house after 6:30 or 7:30 or 8:30 in the evening with any unknown person" "If very important, she should go outside BUT she should go with a [parental guardian]"
"The women are more precious than ... a diamond. It is up to you how you want to keep that diamond in your hand."
"If my daughter/sister engaged in pre-marital activities, and disgraced herself and allowed herself to lose face and character by doing such things, I would most certainly take this [person] to my farmhouse, and in front of my entire family I would put petrol on her and set her alight."
So: if you let your women out at night unaccompanied, they get what you deserve. And it almost sounds like they're living with wild animals roaming the streets. Well, maybe they (and we) are. Self-control, anyone?

Seems like there's also a hook to "terrorism" and "conforming to society will protect you" here, but I just can't place my finger on it quite yet. "Be somewhat afraid of the general population because they might not be civilized like you are" comes to mind.

India is murder on women

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm of Indian descent. I used to live there, and frequently visit. I speak one of the main languages. I'm well aware of their culture.

India is missing 50,000,000 girls. No typo, that's FIFTY MILLION. If you don't believe misogyny is a fundamental part of the national fabric, why don't you tell me WTF happened to these girls?

Here's another way to look at things:

Chance of being killed in Syrian Civil War: 1 in 300
Chance of dying before five years of age if you're a girl in India: 1 in 20

No opinions, those are numbers. If you doubt them, research the latest Indian census, World Bank data on child mortality, wartime data from the Human Rights Data Analysis Group, among many many others.

Is the picture becoming clearer?

Re:Who would have guessed male dominance?

[Megol]

Yes men are sexually assaulted by men and women. Yes men are raped by men and women. So what?

What this article is about is a culture that accepts rape and even murder for someone that dresses wrong and does the wrong thing. IFF they are women.

Your attempts of misdirection is simply pathetic.

Re:Watch "It's a Girl" documentary

[nedlohs]

Why?

How is that going to change that the under-five mortality rate is India is 1 in 20. And thus if it is 1 in 20 for girls then it must also be 1 in 20 for boys and thus there is no gender component or bias in under-five mortality which is clearly what the post was trying to imply. And no I don't count abortions as murders or put them in mortality rates - but I'm a godless moron headed for hell anyway :)

That it sucks to be a girl in most of the world (by population) is irrelevant to the original claim. Which as far as I can tell was "girl children die at exactly the same rate as boy children in India" - since that's what the cited statistic says.

If girl's do in fact die under age 5 more than boys, then surely there's a better statistic to cite rather than expecting to people to buy and watch a movie.

I also love the "hance of being killed in Syrian Civil War" comparison when numbers for under five mortality in Syria are easily available where the poster for the Indian number from for an actual useful comparison - and yes I realize you are probably not the anonymous coward who was trying to lie about the numbers they knew didn't support their implication.