That safety playbook

It’s another day, another incident of violence against a woman, and another return to the same old playbook.

This is how the playbook goes: whenever a woman is molested, raped, or assaulted in a public space, the immediate response is that she should have stayed indoors. Or that other women should now stay indoors. This, authorities will argue, is protection.

Ever opened a newspaper and read about a man being assaulted and a college responding by declaring that all men should stay at home and attend online classes? Or of men being told to travel only in groups because public spaces are no longer safe for them? This is what happened last week after a young woman was gang-raped near Lady Shri Ram (LSR) College in Delhi. The college promptly suspended physical classes and moved them online.