Kiss of love does not mean sex on the streets
The first time I saw two people kissing in public was when I walked into a bar in Brooklyn many moons ago. One woman was sitting on the lap of another and both were making out in wild abandon. No, my world didn't come crashing down when I saw them. Neither did it arouse me nor did it disturb or destroy me. I just instinctively looked away because it seemed impolite to stare. My friend, an Indian, who had been living in New York City for almost eight years then, was amused when she saw me look away.
People kiss. Let's not deny it. If you are reading this and you have for some reason been denied this exalted experience, it is like drinking a glass of wine or reading poetry, much like being in love. Except the experience is free, full of promise and you can't force it.
Sure, people happen to kiss more freely and incandescently in America, even if they happen to be two women. If you haven't travelled in the West, rest assured, kissing in the open doesn't encourage or bewitch or licence people into slipping into orgies in the middle of the street, as people tend to believe. No one is okay with that kind of behaviour. If and when people do kiss, they often do as if it is the most natural and wonderful thing in the world, a celebration of love if you may. Perhaps this token of affection is to share, for prying eyes or not, this veritable happiness, cushioned by the utmost sense of freedom and independence that they feel in the warmth of the company of the other.
We, Indians, though, prefer to be intimate behind closed doors, which is alright too. We are a shy and "cultured" lot, with good moral values, or so we would like to believe. We hate to come across as inappropriate despite our best efforts. We hate to make out in the open, but we sometimes end up doing so, in some cases with biting guilt and fear. But by and large we all suffer from a sense of anguish for what boils within us when we get no outlet - if that weren't the case Chetan Bhagat books wouldn't sell - and tend to break into fits of seething rage when we see others getting away with it. ("How dare you make out? It is against our Hindu culture." You can go to jail for it. Don't they know it is only an archaic British law which we're going against?)
Lately, in our country living space is increasingly shrinking at a time when the population of the youth is peaking. It is but natural that you will find people wanting to express and experiment with their sexuality spilling out in the open. If we don't broaden our mindsets to accept this, we are likely to be enraged and outraged, and perhaps contribute to the high number of cardiac-related deaths anyway in our country.
What irks me the most is how intolerant we are of love and so acquiescent about rape and violence in this country. Why does it bother us to see people kiss in the same open space where road rage, crime, misogyny, corruption, sadness, squalor and depravation is seen and felt and almost allowed to flourish almost on a day-to-day basis? Why has our society grown so comfortable breeding morality in this quagmire of duplicity?
I raise these issues because a protest called Kiss of Love, sparked in Kochi about ten days ago, has travelled across the country, and reached New Delhi. People have come out on the streets and found a release in kissing, or at least showing that they can lock their lips with another and need not be scared because they aren't committing a crime. People are doing this to send out an important message: our Indian culture is also of what we make of it. To force a way of Hindu life down our throats will only end in a pool of regurgitations of hate and anger. Our government, our supreme leader and the ultimate custodians of Hindu faith must realise that mere development, moral policing, rise in chest-beating nationalism and communal flare-ups will not refurbish our society, it may alienate us further. The country must be able to express love with acceptance, respect, independence and freedom for it to rise above the dark clouded skies of unreason.