[Reader-list] 4th Posting - Lesbians & Media

[Sappho for Equality]

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DOCUMENTATION OF NEWS PAPER/MAGAZINE ARTICLES AND LETTERS THAT WERE PUBLISHED IN REACTION 	

It has already mentioned and discussed that Sappho was almost a loner in her maiden voyage towards creating a safe, sensitive and supportive environment for the women with same sex preference since her inception. In no time Sappho did embrace activism and started claimimg political space. Nevertheless, it took the shape of a much awaited and long deserved social movement.

It goes beyond questioning the role of media behind any social movement specially from or for the minorities. For the last two centuries Indian  media, with all of its form,  opted to be ignorant,  non-conversant, numb and silent about issues of homosexuality specially with women. Thanks to “Fire”, the silence was ultimately broken. The conversation on homosexuality (particularly lesbianism),  about homophobia, was on the move and took up its pace as “Fire” was banned  and faced a series of frenzied assualt on the screening by Shiv Shainiks. 

All over India in most of the leading national and regional news paper editorials, special features, interviews, letters to the editor ushered in like tides. On the the first hand it was agianst the ban, against the violation of fundamental rights  of  freedom of  speech and expression. But  it was not confined to debates around artistic freedom or democratic rights only.  ”Fire” actualy paved the way for the Indian women with same sex preference to come out of the closet and speak up. 

Bengal shared almost the same lot, although the uninterupted and regular screening of ‘Fire’  was itself a srikingly different event. The cause behind was much more political than social and should never be confused about the existense of  homophobia preveiling in the society at large.  However, media, mainly the  newspapers and magazines,  were  prompt enough to take up the issue, though the prime intention was profit-making, yet it served a major role in opening up the issue of lesbianism within the common mass.
 
The chilled foggy mornings of December ’98 witnessed a series of hot and warm editorials and articles vehemently protesting  against  the massacre at Mumbai and Delhi.  Besides these protests, two major articles in  leading vernacular newspapers not only challenged  the 
right-winged campaign of labelling Lesbianism as a  foreign import and  criminal offence but also supported same sex relation between women and celebrated the rich heritage of  parallel sexuality in ancient India.  Another contemporary praise-worthy article in ABP (Ananda Bazar Patrika, a leading bengali newspaper)  by Jaya Mitra, a noted author and  former radical-left  activist,  condemned the underneath partiarchal  pressure in homophobia . She questioned the self-imposed moral dictatorship of Shiv Shenas and interpreted the vandalism and terrorism of the Shiv Shaink’s and other right-winged political parties as  a way to distract people from the major socio-political shortfall of the ruling party.  In a quite interesting way Rupali Ghosh presented a study in a Sunday Telegraph (13.12.98) which tried to assess the locus standi and repurcassions of the lesbians in Delhi and Mumbai, who were already visible and backtracked the lesbian heritage in  ancient Indian literature, paintings and scuptures through breif and definite examples. Other than these articles  some interviews of renowned personalities from all the fields came up in another regional newspaper (Aajkal) which unanimously and uncompromisingly  opposed the dictatorship over all kind of emotional bonding irrsepective of sexual preference and practice.  Almost all these articles, editorials and interviews, mostly supportive,  were very clear definite and assertive about their opinion in regard to homosexuality, primarily in women, but few psychiatrists created  quite a lot of confusions by their double standard about homosexuality. (Ref. ABP, 23.01.99 and Manorama, March, 1999). In the first  context homosexuality was labelled as disease and preventive measures were discussed with due concern, and surprisingly , in the second context this stand was not repeated and the uselessness of its treatment and cure were mentioned duely.  However, critics didn’t spare the interview published in ABP.  Within a week a  series of four important letters in protest were published in ABP which  post-mortemed the interview and all the discrepencies and unscientific comments were criticised vociferously.  All these discusssions about  media-reaction will remain incomplete without mentioning a very sensitive and bold article in ABP, 03.04.99 (Fire Beneath The Ashes) .  For the first time in Kolkata and Bengal,  people could hear about a lesbian couple (incidentally both of them were in  the founder team of Sappho and are also the most dedicated and spirited activist  of the group) and about all the contentment  and pleasure that was the gift of their conjugation and all the pains and depressions that was a result of a partnership which was taken as illegitimate, immoral and perversion acording to the law of the land.    Besides having this passionate touch this article published an address for correspondence, and amazingly a good number of letters from women with same sex preference from all over Bengal jam-packed the postbox and ultimately acted as the main inspiration  behind the formation of Sappho.
>From inception till date Sappho received coverage, though not adequate,  from printed media mainly as reports of various mass awareness programmes held by Sappho either independently or jointly. One such example was the coverage (ABP, 20.07.2000) of a mass awarenes programme, titled as Breaking The Silence  held by Sappho and British Council, Kolkata jointly.   Saswati Ghosh, a reputed columnist and activist prepared the article with much care and conviction and  logically argued for lesbianism both from social and legal aspect  and tried to inform about the contemporary and ongoing  events associated with the movement for decriminalisation of homosexuality. All the leading newspapers, both in English and Bengali (The Statesman,  23.06.2000, The Asian Age, 20.06.2000) not only covered the programme but also justified homosexuality and  criticised  the prevaiing disapproval and discrimination against women with same sex orientation.
Other than these reports quite a few number of full page articles came, though not in a regular manner, more or less in  all the English and Bengali  dailies through out the last five years. (Nothing Less Than Gay, The  Asian Age, 3.8.1999 by Priyanka Dasgupta and Amrita Mukherjee, Glad to be Gay, The Telegraph, 29.9.2001, by Shniibali Mitra Saigal,  Narir Khonje Nari, Sambad Pratidin, by Ushashi Chakroborty) . The articles were based on interviews with the members of Sappho and other arguments from eminent personalities that  catered a good lot of information about homosexuality and against homophobia. The last two articles had an added quality, the Helpline Number of Sappho which started on 15.01.2001  came up in these two articles and acted as advertisemnets of the helpline service which the News papers (all of them , till date) rejected to publish inspite of  all these coverages.

Besides print media, Sappho got a good coverage in the programme “Satyer Arale” (Behind the Truth), in February , 2001 produced by Tara Bangla, a regional television channel . On public demand it was retelecasted after two or three months back.

In a nut shell the media reaction to the emergance of Sappho and related matters did act as a positive intervention into otherwise stigmatised and looked down issues and tried to sensitize people, at least, to break the silence.