More than 850 porn websites being banned by Internet Service Providers (ISPs) is becoming the talk of the town. The government has ordered the ISPs to block these sites over the weekend. Whenever you try to open a webpage of the sort, either it’s a blank page or showing the message “The site has been blocked as per the instructions of Competent Authority”. It is said that watching these movies results in the increment of activities like rapes, harassments and molestations. The authorities are facing much flak from the public regarding this ban though it’s not much out in the open but is being talked about at every nook and corner. So how does this kind of ban affect our “Right to personal liberty”? Should the government be imposing these sorts of bans or they should be more of a personal choice? What this ban will actually mean? Let’s find out.
The Positives
#Human Trafficking: No one as a child dreams of becoming a porn ‘star’. Most of these film actors do so because of their deprived financial status or they are trafficked or kidnapped to be part or such ventures. None among them wilfully joins in and hence it is very crucial to stop this horrendous flow of human resource.
#Violence: Many of these movies have people doing shenanigans which no one usually does on a regular basis. The kind of objects they use and also the positions which are displayed, they are not really that appealing to the eyes or the soul. These sort of activities affects our psychology and there is a massive expansion in our thought process which in turn results in taking sexual violence to a whole different level.
#Objectification: Many of these films exhibit females as objects of sexual satisfaction. Also the love making is not at all pleasurable. It looks more of a job rather than relaxation activity. These visuals pose a great impact in our heads and many people tend to look down upon women as a medium to let out their sexual frustration. It does however result in cases of rapes and harassments.
The Negatives
We have four porn sites with respect to every legitimate website. A ban like this would obviously affect the viewership as India is one among the world leaders as far as population is concerned. Not much of a negative but it raises a bigger question here, what else is next? According to Chief Justice HL Dattu, this is a violation of Article 21 (Right to Personal Liberty).
#Democratic enough? : Being the biggest democracy in the world is it appropriate to inflict these bans? It is not illegal to watch porn if we are doing it inside our houses and the kind of taboo sex is in our nation, most of the sex education a person receives are from these movies only. So in a way if we are supporting it we are handing over our liberty to government authorities and are left at their will as to what they want to make us watch, read or believe.
The Conclusion
With proxy servers and torrent downloads available people are still going to watch it but what does this ban actually signifies? Does it show that we aren’t decisive enough to choose what is right for us and what’s not? Or it is the first step of government to make us think the way they want to by limiting our resources? Hiding behind the veil of culture doesn’t always works the same way. Is this a democracy only for the namesake or for real? Cutting the outer stems is temporary measure; the problem should be solved form the root. This is just a minute step towards a gigantic problem standing in front of us of rapes, women security and not objectifying women, it should be implemented but the way its foundation is being laid down is in no way acceptable.
[author image=”http://www.aapkatimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Sameer-Khan.jpg” ]I am Sameer Khan,an IT engineer by graduation. Pursuing MA Convergent Journalism from Jamia Millia Islamia. Bollywood reviewer and technology researcher.[/author]