In 2009, Rihanna's bruised, bleeding face shocked fans all around the world. The singer had been assaulted by her then-boyfriend Chris Brown who later admitted to the violence and was sentenced to serve five years probation and 1400 hours of 'labour-oriented' service. The pictures are back in circulation today, and not because anything has happened between Rihanna and Chris Brown recently.
The pictures are being shared and tweeted by Indian right wing handles, hailing Chris Brown for beating up Rihanna back in 2009. The reason? On Tuesday, Rihanna tweeted about the internet shutdowns around Delhi due to the farmers' protests, bringing international attention to the issue. From turning the domestic abuse into a joke to wishing Chris Brown had been more violent towards her back in the day, and even asking him to step in now to shut her up, the tweets are stomach-churning to say the least.
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There are several racist tweets on Rihanna's skin colour, her choice of words in older posts, her clothes...but the celebration of Chris Brown's violence towards her is a new low. It goes beyond branding her for her political views ['anti-national' can't exactly be applied here, can it?] with a convenient label. This is about taking a moment of personal trauma, an instance of gender-based violence, a crime, and using that to invalidate her view. Surely, nothing can be wrong in glorifying a man who committed a crime as long as it is in 'nationalistic' interests? The misogyny can't be more apparent — what better way to shut an outspoken woman up than a man who can show her her place? Bharath mata ki jai.
It is, of course, not a new strategy. Discrediting any anti-establishment view by targeting and labeling the dissenting individual/group instead of engaging with their opinion/argument has been the go-to method for several governments across the world, including in India. Convenient labels like 'Maoist' and 'anti-social elements' have been used by the Congress government too in the past to justify the killings of adivasis, and the harassment of activists supporting marginalised groups that challenge the government. Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, like Indira Gandhi before him, turned to the 'foreign hand' narrative to explain away the people's protest against the Kudankulam nuclear plant in Tamil Nadu. Left leaders in West Bengal claimed that the CIA was behind the Nandigram violence in 2007.
The BJP, with its agenda to present itself as the only party with 'nationalistic' interests, has furthered and strengthened this strategy manifold with a flurry of labels like 'anti-national', 'urban naxal', 'terrorist', 'Pakistani', 'Khalistani' and so on. These labels are thrown around liberally by its supporters, including celebrities and pliable news anchors, every time someone raises their voice against the government's policies.
Needless to say, if the dissenting voices are female, they are subjected to vicious slandering of another kind. Sometimes, the harassment even shocks the women supporters of such groups. From rape threats to moral policing them for their clothes or lifestyle, the abuse exposes the ugly misogyny that pervades our society. Lebanese-American media personality Mia Khalifa, who is a former porn actor, has also tweeted on the farmers' protest following Rihanna's tweet. Predictably, right wing supporters have been tweeting her earlier photographs with sexually coloured remarks to discredit her political views.
Following Rihanna's tweet, several other prominent voices have followed suit, and the displeased Ministry of External Affairs has released a press statement about 'vested interest groups' trying to mobilise 'international support against India'. They're fooling nobody. For those outside India who wish to understand what's happening here, the corrosive language and violent reactions of those supporting the government is enough to know, they're all under the same umbrella-ella-ella.
Views expressed are author's own.
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