Entertainment industry is safe or unsafe for women?
Like various other unsafe workspaces for women in our society, I think the entertainment industry is largely unsafe for women. In fact, it is unsafe mostly for new people to the industry, also called beginners or struggling actors. Like we all know, a number of cases are reported every day of women being raped, abducted, molested, etc. in their workplaces. We also know how some people in workplaces trade promotion or better job opportunities with women for their bodies. The same way, a number of cases have also reportedly been filed, stating women in the entertainment industry been misbehaved with, or molested, or raped along with advertisement or movie offers in exchange of access to their bodies. It is absolutely unethical and wrong to think that one has entitlement to any random woman’s body if one is giving her a job offer in return. This movement called Me Too Movement began in 2017 with a number of women opening about their experiences of molestation, abuse or rapes and shared their stories online with the hashtag #MeToo along with the names of the men who had sexually abused them and belonged to the entertainment industry. This movement rose to the peak in 2018 in India, when the Bollywood actress Tanushree Dutta spoke up against Nana Patekar for abusing her sexually in the past. A number of perpetrators were identified through this movement as more and more famous personalities or celebrities starting being a part of it. A lot of stars like Tanushree Dutta, Amyra Dastur, Kubbra Sait, Aahana Kumra, Kangana Ranaut, Jasmin Bhasin, etc. opened up about their past experiences. Nana Patekar, Alok Nath, Kailash Kher, Anu Malik, Sajid Khan with others were the ones that were exposed in this movement. It is a clear from the evidences including this movement how unsafe it actually is for women in our industry. I believe there must be a number of other women who did not open up about their incidents in order to save their image or career, because it is a very insecure career for women as they lose it any moment without even knowing. We must cleanse all such areas of our society and make it a safe place for women otherwise we will all reach our doom with this parasite of perversion in people’s minds.
A woman myself,
Shubhangini Shaktawat