A digital magazine on sexuality, based in the Global South: We are working towards cultivating safe, inclusive, and self-affirming spaces in which all individuals can express themselves without fear, judgement or shame
I am not pleased about everything that happened, but I accept that these are my experiences. I accept that I have grown through them, built more invisible muscle. Most of all I accept that it is with the help and support of a diverse array of souls, relationships, and ordinary chuff-chuffing that I can do and be many of the things my spirit is; my life is more than the parts that panicked, and I accept and look after those bits too.
Kakar talks about the divide between Ayurveda and modern medicine, Freudian psychoanalysis and Indian metaphysics, and the fault lines between colonialism, religion and sexuality.
On a cold winter evening, watching a tense India vs England cricket match when your about-to-be teenager asks you these questions, you want go deep under cover inside that blanket and never come out. Not possible, of course. I see myself as the quintessential modern day mom, pal to her kids, cool, unflappable.
Being a man isn’t about domination, and it definitely isn’t about subjugation of feminine people. We need to find a way to re-frame masculinity so that it isn’t diametrically opposed to respectful and equal gender relations.
All these stories are examples of courage and hold great significance in the development of the Urdu story and for bringing to our notice the misery of the average Indian woman. A new era of Urdu stories has taken birth that not only acknowledges the issues of women inside and outside of house, but also openly deals with ‘immodest’ and ‘indecent’ themes such as sexuality.
Raising your head shyly, you stumble over your words as you ask if you can marry a woman instead. Instantly, your lungs seem to fill with a tsunami of panic, as you witness his usually warm eyes crackle – the first grey clouds of a storm saturating the brown hue of his eyeballs.
The bill exhibits a lack of understanding of agency which ought to be given to a woman; that a woman should be able to make decisions when the question is with regard to her body. There is no need for the State to be the Big Brother.