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[2018] 7.2 NULJ 65
Sexual Morality and Lajja: A Gendered Code
SEXUAL MORALITY AND LAJJA: A GENDERED CODE
by
Aishwarya Singh Kashyap*
ABSTRACT
Morality is an amorphous concept yet it continues to be the yardstick that gauges
our personal actions and intentions. While this is a difficult road to tread, the journey
becomes particularly precarious when it is appended to sexuality and sexual
expression, especially in terms of social control of women to create and commit to
gender hierarchy. Sexual morality propagates prejudiced standards of behavior that
adopt and inform patterns of normativity complied by a system of societal ‘rewards’
and ‘punishments’. I argue that this structure is detrimental to our holistic growth,
both personal and collective, for it represses curiosity and sexual liberation. It also
induces catatonic preoccupation with female sexuality, chastity or lajja grounded in
synthetic importance attributed towards purity and control wherein women become
symbolic of the honor assumed by their association to family, group or community.
Herein lies the basis that informs and perpetuates gender hierarchization and
subordination that begets our wanting laws.
Keywords: Sexuality, Sexual Morality, Gendered Codes, Bigotry, Social Control,
Gender Hierarchy
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INTRODUCTION
Sexuality is universally repressed and morality is ubiquitously celebrated.
Furthermore, morality is an elusive concept that gets diffused in the subjective nature
of its time and geography; it is a slippery slope. Yet, the impossibility of the conflation
of ‘sexuality’ and ‘morality’ has been negated by many on different accounts, whether
in the form of conservatism, traditionalism or cultural relativism.1 Therefore,
regionalists assert that any call for claiming stake in sexual freedom is an evident
influence of westernization. While the aftermath has been disastrous for all, it has a
particularly perilous effect on women. Globally, sexual scripts have reinforced the
gender inequities by carving discriminatory rules-one that gives men impunity and
another, which puts the entire onus of conformity upon women. Therefore, morality is
surreptitiously used to perpetuate patriarchy and control women in the name of
‘preservation of the moral code’ although this code forever remains nebulous.
The binary of ‘goddess’ and ‘prostitute’ is created; a ‘good’ woman shall forever
strive to conform to the attributes of the former and any aberration automatically puts
her closer to an assumed nexus to the latter.2 Deconstruction of this pattern reveals
the modus of patriarchy-control of women and their sexuality by appending value to
their innate ‘goodness’ or ‘lajja’.3 Herein, female sexual expression is legitimized
within the cornerstones of matrimony alone whereas a similar mandate is ostensibly
absent for male sexual conduct. Therefore, in order to ‘preserve’ such goodness, her
entire life is bound by rules that must be strictly conformed to for ensuring societal
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acceptance. Simone De Beauvoir explained this acceptance as a compromise by
women, sold to one man as marriage, and to
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many as prostitution.4 In either case, dependence on men for survival became
inevitable, thus propagating systemic reification of ‘Gender Hierarchy’ as explained by
Catharine MacKinnon.5 Hence, it becomes imperative to trace the role of morality in
continued women subordination.
BIGOTRY OF STANDARDS
Human progress is hinged on setting standards along with the aspiration to surpass
them. However, emphasis on achieving traditional attribute goals is atypical in that it
fails to establish its relation with personal growth. Socially, hetero-normativity was
scribed as the rule for all.6 Within this framework, the limit of female sexuality was
defined by synonymizing gender with feminine and masculine qualifications.
Instinctively, the former was designed to ‘nurture’ and ‘care’ for others; be the
proverbial ‘glue’ that binds society together thereby, controlling direct and indirect
circumstances of her agency, whether of traverse, self-sufficiency, reproductive
choices and sexuality.7 On the other hand, dominance and aggression came to be
associated with masculinity. Therefore, loss of dominance over ‘their’ women meant
loss of ‘maleness’ itself.8 Consequently, gender was bound within social expectations
of what gender ought to be; standards were allotted on a hierarchical basis-one, to
control and the other to be controlled.
The substance of this control is sustained by coding the rules of the most basic
bodily urge-sex. Men are placed, as the active role players-the pursuers and women
ought to be the passive recipients. The oddity of this scheme is manifold but the
foremost lies in its hetero-normative assumption. The other, in that it assumes women
do not (and should not) initiate sex. This is in direct contradiction to the rhetoric of
female sexuality and its
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innate insatiability. ‘Sex’ became the male prerogative whereas ‘sexuality’ is governed
by femininity. The outlandishness of this position further developed the dichotomy of
female attributes-the desirability of a virgin mate and the seduction of the wily
temptress. Ironically, it is the former that is tagged morbidly boring and the latter, as
desirable.9
While calls were made to broaden the stage for women and their sexuality, the male
liberal agenda pushed promiscuity. Ellin Willis has argued that the feminist backlash
often reduced the struggle to demonizing ‘men’ in general; male dissociation was
encouraged either via celibacy or lesbianism.10 Women found themselves between the
Scylla of ‘gender normativity’, marriage and virginity, and the Charybdis of ‘casual sex’
against the odds of non-access to abortion, ensuing lack of reproductive agency and
freeing men off the responsibility arising out of their sexcapades. Thus, women have
been ‘infantilized’ by different segments of the social movement, which exhibits the
pitfalls of bigoted standards created by the society that is inherently male.11
Willis also highlights the problematic labor segregation within the institution of
marriage, the pivot of learnt gendered construct.12 Children are informed of gender
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values by observing their parents; the mother is the primary homemaker and
caregiver, and the father is the breadwinner and ultimate authority. She draws
attention to the Freudian explanation of ‘sexual repression’ during childhood, which
identifies it as ‘destructive’ and furthers its repression in adulthood as well.13 This
circular proposition is regressive for reasons apparent on its own however, in
particular, the worst hit segment are women that are burdened with dogmatic
standards within this repressed sexual framework. Their sexuality, undoubtedly,
becomes a tool of
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negotiation in social settings, to either earn their grace via marriage and motherhood
or curse via rebellious deviance. In both cases, they gain the shorter end of the stick,
with their agency pre-designed to be contingent on factors beyond their control.
‘Phallocentrism’ becomes germane to the present issue-the perception, creation,
and sustenance of social standards is a canvas that is wholly the vision of a male lens.
Further, this masculine lens renders our laws deficient in their operation. If we are
circumspect of our surroundings, little is found to be gender neutral; law, language,
actions and adjectives, all are intensely infused with gender specific constructs. This
problem is further exacerbated by the present education system and professional
market wherein gender roles are concretized for patriarchal proliferation. This
stratification can further become regressive based on social class or caste background
of any given community. This is evident by the disproportionate presence of female
workforce in fields considered a masculine forte-the fields of policing, scientific
discovery, engineering, industrial application and so forth. Their absence further
perpetuates the subordination of women in spheres of political, economic and social
participation.
Women are further catapulted with the perception of ‘being a burden’ by their
systemic exclusion from the work force and consequent economic elimination. This
belief furthers the desire for sons as against daughters, justifying female infanticide
and feticide reflected in our debilitating sex ratio.14 In the process to churn out sons,
women are likened to a commodity-the phenomenon of bride price and polyandry
shows a low supply against high demand whereas hypergamy and dowry exhibit the
opposite. Education and economic self-reliance affect the trends of their exchange thus
discouraging societies from attempting to change the status quo and ensuring the
persistence of the present gender roles’ model. When efforts are made to gain access
to quality education and entry in the workforce, caveats are made to adhere to the
stipulated roles that assign importance to
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motherhood (the ultimate goal of femininity) over all else. This idea is reflected in our
‘family laws’- a woman can still not be the ‘karta’ in a Hindu family;15 unwed women
are not expressly covered under the abortion laws;16 a mother is not the equal natural
guardian of her children as against the father,17 however she is entitled to the
‘custody’ (care) of her children until the age of 5 years; only a mother can avail ‘child
care leave’18 and there is considerable difference between the duration of the
maternity and paternity leaves. In order to overcome this vicious cycle, it is necessary
to scrutinize the origin of this construct followed by a careful deconstruction of its
prejudiced values.
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SOCIAL CONTROL
The sustenance of gender hierarchy lies in creating inequitable codes of standards,
especially governing sexual behaviour among genders, and establishing the
touchstone of conservative (sexual) morality for women thereby, creating the
unquestionable armour of ‘social control’. Analysis of the gendered code of sexual
morality and social control lies in a two-pronged approach-first, the anthropological
creation and development of the said code, and second, control by means of normative
restrictions.
Ortner gave an emphatic elucidation of the anthropological view of the present
focus on female sexuality, especially, chastity. She described ‘social coherence’,
‘economic viability’ and ‘community reputation’ as some of the driving factors behind
the obsession towards female sexuality.19 It was considered the only means of
ensuring ‘pure lineage’ by the members of the early societies. Promiscuity of men
could be cleansed by performance of rituals however nonconformity by women was
considered to have an indelible stain on ‘descent’. Herein, there's a significant relation
between control of women and their sexuality and the development of the ‘State’.
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According to Ortner, pre-State societies considered women ‘dangerous’ thus
inducing fear of their sexuality at minimal, and enforcing their segregation in extreme
circumstances. While they were idealized for domestic upkeep, they had considerable
presence in production and their sexuality wasn't caged. However, with the
development of State, in conjunction with the structured formation of religion, focus
shifted from ‘women are dangerous’ to ‘women are in danger’ and demands were
made for their ‘protection’.20 Control of their sexuality meant a direct control of their
movement by proscribing their erstwhile (relatively) free status along with the
‘domestication of men’ i.e., creation of the patriarch.21 Men were laden with the control
of the women in their house and in their community, thereby engaging them in larger
family roles than they desired to be part of, resulting in a conflict that left both
struggling. She also traces the focus on hypergamy and dowry to these social
transformations in the patterns of State formation, religious development, demand for
sexual purity, change in family structures and marriage.22
The other important facet of social control is the endemic nature of its construction
i.e. social conditioning or internalization. Whilst ‘protection’ and ‘confinement’ require
external agents for compliance, ‘normative restrictions’ are ensured by the process of
learnt behaviours presented with the system of ‘rewards’ and ‘punishments’.23 For
women, ‘modesty’, ‘chastity’ and ‘niceness’ or ‘goodness’ become both a standard of
behaviour and a goal to be achieved.24 Curiously, these concepts are magnified with
the passage of time and the yardstick becomes more complex.
Since ‘niceness’ is an ascribed status, it has the illusion of being deserved and
coveted. Falling short on the yardstick in terms of social acceptance is met with severe
punishments, for instance, sustenance of ‘rape myths’ contingent
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on the previous sexual history and general moral character of the woman. The
custody of children will depend on the established ‘goodness’ of the mother-ambition
must not overtake matrimonial obligations, motherhood and other gendered
characteristics of womanhood. This view is traced in the precedents set by the
Supreme Court of India in a litany of matrimonial cases like Suman Kapur v. Sudhir
Kapur25 ; Narendra v. K. Meena26 ; Samar Ghosh v. Jaya Ghosh27 and so forth.
Therefore, the judiciary in addition to the legislature are found burdened and biased by
the social constructs of gender roles.
Additionally, Fox reminds that ‘niceness’ is appended to ‘behaviour’, not an
individual, thereby making ‘social control’ a life-long process where women have to
prove their moral worth in each social interaction till the time they are rid of their
sexuality and sexual viability. Therefore, older women are given wider latitudes and
freedom than their younger counterparts. Social control also enables conformists to
‘chastise’ others with the perceived aid of their moral superiority thus ensuring
‘behavioural goals’ turn women into the biggest impediment in their own deliverance.
SEXUAL MORALITY AND SEXUAL PLEASURE
Morality of sexual expression has direct nexus with sexual pleasure. Ironically, the
ideology of self-restraint negates the latter, irrespective of bodily necessities.
Therefore, most structured faiths and cultural relativists espouse the significance of
‘pro-creational sex’ whereas locus on ‘sexual pleasure’ is considered misplaced and
unnecessarily ‘glorified’.28 This is also assumed to be the underlying rationale behind
‘sex’ and the ‘ordinary course of nature’ whilst it maintains silence with regard to
deviant sexual expressions like lesbianism and extra vagino-penal expression between
heterosexual couples. This is further fortified by penal distinctions of sexual
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behaviour especially in terms of protection extended towards marital rape exemption
and acceptance of adultery with the ‘consent’ or ‘connivance’ of the husband.29 This
idea begets the notion that women and their sexual agency is inconspicuously absent,
such agency is limited to the sexual pleasure of the man and that women either do not
enjoy sex or ought not to enjoy sex.
Female Genital Mutilation or female circumcision presents itself as one of the most
gruesome evidences of the aforementioned ideas. Other than the morose appeal of its
‘aesthetic value’, female circumcision is performed to ensure that women do not
achieve the gratification sex was inherently intended to produce. As Nussbaum puts it,
“sex becomes a vehicle for one sided male pleasure rather than for mutuality of
pleasure.”30 Notwithstanding the presence of clear medical perils of female genital
mutilation owing to persistent infections, haemorrhage, abscess, issues of infertility,
complications in childbirth etc., ethnocentric proponents continue to fight for its
retention in the name of ‘moral’ and ‘cultural code’. Therefore, we become privy to
‘codes of bigoted conduct’ subsuming all reason, in the present example-at the cost of
permanent impairment of sexual health of women, and universally, at the cost of
health, happiness and hope.
CONCLUSION
The essence of the present discourse lies in understanding ‘gender’; it is not
something you are but it is something you do. Therefore, our experience of gender
construction is not only learnt but also artificial. It is possible that a different social
progression of civilization may have resulted in a role reversal of gender paradigms
and its ensuing values. However, that model would have been equally susceptible to
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being tarnished by the bigotry of gender codes under the unnecessary creation of
gender hierarchy. This informs us of our priorities; it is not desirable to turn gender
hierarchy on its head, it is imperative that we eliminate hierarchy from the equation
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altogether. Equity, not equality, should be the motto. This discourse becomes
inevitable in the wake of our laws being torn asunder against the backdrop of socio-
cultural resistance. Efforts must concentrate on diminishing constructs of gender that
defeat our holistic growth, for subscription to the contemporary prejudiced standards
will confirm our moral catastrophe.
———
* PhD Scholar (Indian Law Institute, Delhi), LL.M (The London School of Economics and Political Science), B.A.LLB
(Hons) GGSIPU. The author can be reached at [email protected].
1Celestine I. Nyamu, How Should Human Rights and Development Respond to Cultural Legitimization of Gender
Hierarchy in Developing Countries, 41 Harv. Int'L L.J. 381, 387- 88 (2000).
2Rituparna Bhattacharyya, Understanding the spatialities of sexual assault against Indian Women in India, 22
Gender, Place & Culture 1340, 1341-1345 (2015).
3 Jacques et al., Chastity, the Guardian Virtue of the Family, Marriage & the Family 20, 21-24 (1949).
4 Simone De Beauvoir, the Second Sex, 415, (2nd ed. 1953).
5 Catharine A. MacKinnon, Gender — The Future: Catharine MacKinnon, 17 Constellations 504, 505 (2010).
6 Jean Carabine, ‘Constructing Women’: women's sexuality and policy, 12 Critical Soc. Pol'y 23, 26-27 (1992).
7 Id. at 28.
8 Ellen Willis, Toward a Feminist Sexual Revolution, 6 SOC. TEXT 3, 11 (1982).
9
Id. at 4.
10 Id. at 5-6.
11Keith Thomas, The Double Standard, 20 J. of the History of Ideas 195, 197-98 (1959); Catharine A.
MacKinnon, Not a Moral Issue, 2 Yale L. & Pol'y Rev. 321, 324-25 (1983).
12
WILLIS, supra note 10.
13 Sigmund Freud, the Interpretation of Dreams 86, (3rd ed.1899).
14 Government of India, Census, (2011), Gender Composition, (Jan 14, 2018),
http://censusindia.gov.in/Census_Data_2001/India_at_glance/fsex.aspx.
15 The Hindu Succession Act, 1956.
16 § 4, The Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act, 1971.
17 §6, The Hindu Minority and Guardianship Act, 1856.
18 §4, The Maternity Benefit Act, 1961.
19
Sherry Ortner, The Virgin and the State, 4 Feminist Stud. 19, 20-25 (1978).
20 Id. at 24-26.
21 Id. at 30.
22 Id. at 23.
23 Greer Litton Fox, “Nice Girl”: Social Control of Women through a Value Construct, 2 Signs 805, 807-810
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(1977).
24 Id. at 811-12.
25 (2009) 1 SCC 422.
26 (2016) SCC Online SC 1114.
27 (2007) 4 SCC 511.
28 Martha C. Nussbaum, Sex and Social Justice 135, (Oxford University Press 1999).
29 §376 proviso; §497, The Penal Code, 1860.
30
Nussbaum, supra note 28.
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