The question at hand is simple: how immaculate is the modern gaze?
Recently, a controversy flared up and as usual, it was brought under legal scrutiny, followed up with a magazine cover released by a vernacular magazine published in Kerala. The act intended to bring public attention to the topic of breastfeeding and to break the taboo surrounding it. The public response was as expected – mixed, with a certain percentage of the ‘stakeholders’ dragging the magazine and its model to the court for circulating indecent content.
When fickle morality meets progressive maturity, sparks are sure to fly.
The Controversy
It all started with a simple magazine cover. In our country, where numerous magazines and countless other stuff on printed media is released on a daily basis, this particular Malayalam magazine’s cover immediately caught the attention of many. The cover carried the picture of a model breastfeeding a baby with a tagline that abstractly translates to “Do not stare. We need to breastfeed in peace”.
There was nothing titillating about the concept. It wanted to covey a concept, but instead of the desired effect, the magazine and the model involved was dragged into a controversy which was beneath the standard of a forward-thinking community.
The Blame
The picture was ridiculed for being obscene, and the model was questioned on her morality for being ‘too exposing’ and for not being an actual mother. A certain percentage of the overly-zealous vigilantes blamed it as the magazine’s tactic to sell more copies by catering to a perverted percentage of the readership.
The social media campaign gained momentum as it acted as a new platform for the vigilantes of the internet to strike gold. This was further aggravated when two separate court cases were filed at Kollam, CJM Court and with the State Child Rights Commission respectively, stating immodest and unethical reasons, and further bashing the magazine and the model.
The Act Of The Male Gaze
The main accusation against the issue featuring this cover page was centred around ‘obscenity’. The case registered against the model accused her of an indecent portrayal of motherhood, and a majority of the online and offline comments blamed the picture for exposing the female body. Nobody bothered to see the concept which was underlined along with the picture or the social stigma it was trying to break.
This was not because the state with the highest number of literate people forgot to read. It was because the attempt to break the mould got drowned in the depths of social stigma which further aggravated the social patriarchy at hand.
The intensity of the male gaze is something like a gauge which determines the degree of obscenity and morality in our society – and if we feel intimidated by a picture of a woman breastfeeding a baby, then our society has become critically susceptible to something as natural as motherhood.
Addressing The Question
The question that sticks out here like a sore thumb is how and why this picture offended the viewer or its reader to such a degree? There have been controversial pictures and photos that have created much debate over its relevance, but a picture which was aimed at challenging the taboo surrounding something as natural as breastfeeding got frowned upon and bashed for its portrayal.
The answer to the earlier questions of why and how is latent with how we have created a moral code that vehemently opposes questions. This moral code clamps down on questions regarding the social construct of gender, sexuality and about our own bodies. This archaic construct hardly gives answers – and to cover up for the lack of substance, the upholders of this construct bashfully criticise the one who raises these questions.
Another angle to look at this is with regard to the ‘sheep mentality’ which is predominantly exhibited by many especially in the age of social media. A similar incident was seen in Kerala where an actress was thrashed brutally in social media because she criticised a famous Malayalam movie star for his movie where women were objectified. In relation to that incident, it can be seen that the so-called social media vigilantes are following the wind and can rarely understand the cause or effect of their behaviour and actions.
Conclusion
The postmodern thought about gender and sexuality establishes that these are constructs of division established by the society, and are operated to bring about efficiency and control. In our present day and age, there is social division and a code of morality that we follow in despite realising how gender roles are used to control and subdue people.
In the case of this cover page, all it took was a confident gaze from a breastfeeding woman – and the drapes of morality came falling down. The chaos that followed has surely exposed the strange resemblance in the cacophony that prevails among the naysayers. In spite of this unholy nexus, the ethos that develops from modern-day visual and print media tells us that there will be a struggle against this nexus – and once the dust settles, there will be the brilliance of egalitarianism.