Criminalizing marital rape would be “excessively harsh,” the Indian government has said, in a blow to campaigners ahead of a long-awaited Supreme Court decision that will affect hundreds of millions of people in India for generations.
In India, it is not considered rape if a man forces sex or sexual acts on his wife, as long as she is over 18, due to an exception in a British colonial-era law.
Most Western and common law jurisdictions have long since rectified this – Britain outlawed marital rape in 1991, for example, and it is illegal in all 50 US states.
But across the world, about 40 countries do not have legislation that addresses the issue of marital rape – and among those that do, the penalties for non-consensual sex within marriage are “significantly lower” than other rape cases, according to the United Nations Population Fund’s 2021 State of World Population review.
I fucking hate this so much. For context, I’m an Indian, living in India. I can’t believe people here value these archaic “customs” so much that they can go on record downplaying rape to protect the “institution of marriage”.
Fuck all of em and fuck their customs. Worst part is that I found out about this because of western media. Maybe the local media did cover it, I should start reading more…
The best thing we can do is cover each other’s back by holding each other responsible✊
By calling out (reporting) the attrocities in all nations (instances) it’s easier to isolate bad actors and clean up our environment🌻