Our “Sisters”

This morning I watched this video. And then I ate breakfast. And then I took a shower. But the haunting imagery in this video followed me around as I moved through my apartment, so I had to write about it. In this 12 minute and 18 second documentary a world of “undesirables” is uncovered. The opening scene is a few quick images flashed on screen and then Dr. Mitu Khurana, a central character in the film, begins talking. What struck me about the opening was how emotionless and flat her voice sounded in contrast to the heavy topic she was discussing: her husband thinks she is useless and wants to leave her because she didn’t bear him sons.

By the end of the 12 minutes I came to realize that her voice wasn’t flat at all, it was just stripped of raw emotion because that is her reality. What would make me break down in rivers of tears are just average events in Mitu’s life. Toward the end of her explanation about her husband’s disgust with her, the camera zooms in on her eyes. They are striated and complex. At first she looks lifeless, or jaded even, but then underneath all that there is a fire, a passion for her twins girls and for all their human rights.

This woman and the others who stand up to the atrocities being committed against their gender are true revolutionaries. I’d love to say that I am just as brave and courageous and would do the same thing in their places, but the fact of the matter is I’ve never had to fear for my life–I don’t know what that’s like. There are 7,000 abortions of girls per day in India, according to the film. 7,000 potentials unrealized. Or, is it that 7,000 girls are saved from a lifetime of violence and unwarranted hatred?

Crimes against humanity are a curious thing. So many people in this world could never imagine committing such atrocities as burning your wife alive because she can’t give you a son. But then why does it still happen in the year 2011? Do these heinous acts stem from fear, cultural tradition, innate evil? It’s so easy to look away and not see what’s happening. ‘Ignorance is bliss’ may be a cliche, but it’s pretty spot on. But once you are exposed to something like the women in this film, how can you look away? There is no bliss in that.