Why you should oppose 377 even if you are a heterosexual and no, it is not what you think.

Why you should oppose 377 even if you are a heterosexual and no,  it is not what you think.

There is very little left to be said about this issue. Yet, enough cannot be said about why this is so wrong for everybody, and it is not just because you could be arrested for having oral sex with your consenting adult partner in your bedroom.

Let us just step back form this issue a little. What exactly has been criminalized?

‘Whoever voluntarily has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal, shall be punished with imprisonment for life, or with imprisonment of either description for term which may extend to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine.

Explanation: Penetration is sufficient to constitute the carnal intercourse necessary to the offense described in this section.

The ambit of Section 377, which was devised to criminalize and prevent homosexual sex^[ extends to any sexual union involving penile insertion. Thus, even consensual heterosexual acts such as fellatio and anal penetration may be punishable under this law.’

Different people had different, very interesting reasons to support this. Homosexuality is against nature. By now, enough examples of homosexuality in the animal world has been cited by enough experts. Here’s what caught my eye. Scientific studies have discovered that animals show heterosexual, homosexual and bisexual activities. This has been recorded in sexual activity, courtship, affection, pair-bonding and for parenting. Nearly 1500 species from worms to primates have exhibited activities. The studies throw up some complicated findings with many caveat but most of them seem to agree that all species exhibit homosexual behavior. That should answer the ‘against nature question.’

Then there is this handy phrase ‘homosexuality is against our culture.’ Scholars and other experts have already spoken about Ayyapa being born of two male gods, Hari and Hara; of Bhagirath born of two vulvae, of Shikandi of uncategorised sexuality, of Arjuna becoming an eunuch for a year and of Krishna too becoming a woman to marry Aravan to fulfill his last wish to have a wedding night before he is sacrificed to appease the gods, to ensure the Pandava’s victory in the Mahabarata War. The story goes that through the night Aravan stays in confusion as to whether he is with a man or a woman. There is in fact, a temple in Koovagam , the Koothandavar temple and Aravan or Koothandavar as he is referred to here is the patron deity of eunuchs.

But beyond the question of whether it is against Hindu culture or not is the question – why should it matter? Article 377 is again something bigger that religion, culture and established norms- it is against human rights. That is why, irrespective of your religion, caste, orientation, gender you should be worried if it up held.

Because this could be just the beginning. Now something as private and personal as what happens in the privacy of the bedroom of two consenting adults has become the business of the government, of the law. They have given themselves the power to look in through your windows into your most personal space and decide if you are a criminal or not .There is a loss of dignity here, a loss of a birthright. It may not affect you now, because of the choice you have made. But even the loss of dignity of one person is the loss of a nation’s dignity. It is a loss of democracy. It is the loss of freedom, of liberty, of the right to choose. So some people have lost the right to choose whom they can love. If you heterosexuals reading this think that it is not your loss, think again. If today somebody has lost the right to choose whom they can love and we don’t fight with them to retrieve that right for them, then dogma wins, totalitarianism wins. Tomorrow the same people will decide that some kind of writing is a crime, then the day after that kinds of movies are against the law and the after than it may well be art or even scientific research.

This law has to go mainly because if you have the right to choose whom you love, so should every body else. It should also go if we want to keep our basic human rights