A Culture of Tolerance
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Commenting on the controversy over cheerleaders in the Indian Premier League, Peter Foster argues that the Indian society is not ready to for cheerleaders. He further opines that White cheerleaders in skimpy outfits merely reinforces the belief that all white women are easily available.
There are many errors in Foster’s arguments. Sexual harassment in India is hardly restricted to White women; Indian women are as likely to be harassed as anyone else. Foster also displays biases of the worst kind when he argues that White women are considered fair game because they allegedly wear revealing clothes. Ask any Indian women and she will tell you that sexual harassment has nothing to do with the kind of clothes one might wear. In fact, Foster’s argument is not only disappointing but dangerous because it assumes that women can prevent harassment merely by being conservatively dressed. As the unfortunate example of Foster’s own wife shows, conservative clothes are hardly a deterrent to sexual harassment.
Foster then offers a daughter’s test: Would you be comfortable with your daughter cavorting around in Eden Garden with millions of ogling fans?
The concept of ”shame” must always be an individuals’ judgement; when it is defined by the larger society and individuals are expected to adhere to it, then, coercion and conflicts are almost guaranteed. Let the cheerleaders decide if performing before a large crowd is acceptable or not. Why should Mr Foster or for that matter the society make their decision?
More broadly, an individual’s discomfiture over his own daughter’s actions hardly gives him the right to make that decision for every one else. Indeed, a culture of tolerance rests on the bedrock of the acceptance of the unpalatable; the maverick; and the deviant. There are many things individuals may find unsavory, some universally so–drugs, prostitution–but they must be accepted if individual liberty is to be the guiding principle of the Indian society.
India has already seen the farce of competitive intolerance. Every time the state concedes the right of a group to define the limits of acceptability, it encourages other groups to demand the same right over individual choice.
Conceding individual discretion on the other hand respects the right of everyone. Those who like cheerleaders may watch them; the guardians of Indian culture always have the option of watching the cricket. Or not watching it at all. If they are as offended and numerically as strong as Foster believes them to be, then cheerleaders will disappear automatically. Pronto.
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