This survey perhaps is only a pre-cap of the things to come in the run-up to the 2019 Indian general elections.
Perceptions can be dangerous. Because perception, unlike facts, is more often than not, based on stereotypes and biases. In a recent survey, Thomson Reuters Foundation survey ranked India as the most unsafe country for women. Was the survey based on existing data published by the government? If this was a qualitative survey, who was surveyed? Just Indians? Or the whole world? Do you see the problem now? The Indian women in need of protection from the Indian man through the efforts made by Westerners, of course, the age-old narrative. You wouldn’t be totally off the mark if you had expected so-called Indian feminists to ask these questions.
It is easy to say India is the most unsafe for women according to “perceptions” and wait for “Westerners” to dissuade women from visiting India
Was this a qualitative survey replete with in-depth interviews with Indians? Were these the perceptions of Indian women and men? Of the 548 experts on gender, only 41 experts were Indian, and even if all 41 listed India as the most unsafe on all 6 parameters, it is still only 7.5%, so the other countries scored less than 7.5% on the whole? Or did other experts also rank India as the most unsafe according to their perception? If so, have they lived in India or are they going by hearsay, because really the survey only wants perceptions (not backed by facts)? Who was surveyed? Who were these experts? What was the representational ratio? Why were “experts” outside of India asked about their “perception”? Is it right to pander to the biases these “experts” hold against the countries listed in this survey? Some countries were not even ranked on some parameters like human trafficking, sexual violence, healthcare at all, which is strange, to say the least. Left-liberals who pride themselves in being supposedly literate and qualified to conduct surveys, must ask these important questions about the methodology used—where are your questions about rigor and validity? Or do those questions not matter in your esteemed echo chambers?
It is easy to say India is the most unsafe for women according to “perceptions” and wait for “Westerners” to dissuade women from visiting India and further perpetuate the stereotype that India is the most patriarchal, and “Western women” must feel thankful that their countries are “less patriarchal”. The orientalist narrative of “others” as being culturally inferior, that these libtards speak of, will simply cement these “perceptions”. How can a question like, “name the five most dangerous countries” based on mere perception even be asked? Imagine if one were to conduct “which religion is the most violent according to you” poll, and be vague about who was asked and why they were chosen? Liberals would lose their sleepover asking ‘suggestive’ questions to experts who are outsiders and don’t understand the everyday reality of the followers of the religion and accuse everyone of being “bhakts”, “troll”, “hyper-nationalist” and trash the poll for lacking transparency and pandering to the populist imagination.
If this is the cue for what is going to come as things get more heated up, I shudder to think what else the Congress will support to malign India both domestically and internationally.
But why was Rahul Gandhi so quick to retweet this? Is he so eager for tourism to go down? Does he want the whole world to mark India as unsafe and stop visiting the country? What does he stand to gain politically, is anyone’s guess. His supporters (journalists, left-leaning academia, liberals) took this over from him to further malign India’s image.
How many of these 41 (and/or 548) so-called experts are ideologically compromised? This survey perhaps is only a pre-cap of the things to come in the run-up to the 2019 Indian general elections. If this is the cue for what is going to come as things get more heated up, I shudder to think what else the Congress will support to malign India both domestically and internationally. One would do well to remember the age-old nexus between sold-out media houses, journalists, left-wing intelligentsia, CONgress, and be conscious of the broader international politics for such a flawed survey to have taken place and gained validation from CONgress and Indian Media (notwithstanding the parentage and percentage of foreign funds). This is a great example of how a section of media backed by CONgress has been trying to set the agenda of maligning India, right since Narendra Modi took over the Prime Ministership in 2014. The CONgress and its propaganda machinery are deliberately creating an atmosphere of paranoia through the use of dubious international ‘surveys’ such as this to validate their claims and build a ‘perception’ (there you go, that word again) and singular narrative of danger.
Note:
1. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent or reflect the views of PGurus.
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- Of Perception polls and building dangerously false narratives - July 5, 2018
My perception about Safety of Indian Women : The World record for the fastest rate of career growth and longest tenure in the highest post for any Woman in the entire world belongs to India. It is held by none other than the former President of the Indian National Congress, Smt Sonia Gandhi. She joined INC as a primary member in 1997 and became it’s President in 1998 within 62 days. She continued to serve as President of INC before retiring in 2017 – the longest in the history of INC which was established in 1885. This itself is a great testimony for the safety of the women living in India.