How do you react to the word PORN? 

Jharna Choudhury

Porn. Yes, the word, the industry, the reaction it generates, is interesting. It is up to you, how you react to this discussion. You can flip over the page right now... you want to do it, don't you? And convince yourself that the word porn is non-existing. You are free to pretend that your young son, your teen daughter, your husband is not interested in porn at all. You will say, they are "good" people, they have a good "character". Perhaps justify yourself unnecessarily. Go on and on. Covering it up again. That you and your family stay away from a taboo like porn.

Last week, you were dusting the house. Do you remember? You found a magazine, carefully hidden behind the stack of books on the study table of your young son. You picked it up. The cover page said it all. The nudity was so disgusting to you that you didn't talk to your son for the entire day. Instead of speaking to him about the body of a woman and the sensuality, sexuality and mysticism involved in a man-woman relationship, you chose to be a silent mother who lets her son know things the way it came to him. You didn't care about the source. You just said let him be. No doubt you took offence for a day. Mothers don't talk about the woman's body to their sons. They don't talk about porn. Good bad porn. Then who does? There is nobody waiting outside your house to explain him, how he should handle the cascade of images and information he finds in the internet on this topic. He has no idea of a woman. He is still in his growing stage. He imagines it himself. And this later complicates his perception of who a woman is, how she behaves and how is she to be treated. You dumped the magazine in a dustbin that day. And talked nothing about it. Indian mothers don't discuss porn in her house, you conclude.

Last month when your husband expressed dissatisfaction about your body, when he asked you to squeeze your belly inside, act petite, submissive and experimental all of a sudden, you laughed and didn't ask him why? You didn't realise that he had an idea of perfection in his mind that he wanted to mould you into. You thought it is his preference. But this preference started to bog you down. It made you insecure about your body. It made you doubtful, ugly in your mind. That day, you said yes to your husband.You felt like a stranger in bed. Oh sorry, you said no, didn't you? He turned his back on you in bed. A week later, you felt that you are drifting apart from him. Then you started the blame game. You blamed your motherhood, the marriage institution, your husband, his imagined mistress, on and on. You hesitated to reflect. Like always. You did not think why he asked you to change into one particular body type? Is he blindly following a trending body type? Is his preference in some way associated to the word porn?

You beautiful lady, yes you, your son, daughter, husband, lover, is coinciding you with a visual, digital representation/misrepresentation, an exaggerated image of a woman, who is not you. They are making a jargon of you.

Reflect. Speak out loud. And talk about a taboo like porn with the people close to you. Here is the solution to multiple problems you are facing these days. It includes your insecurities about yourself. Be your own woman. Not an image of some imagined concept of an ideal goddess sitting afar, or not existing at all. If you think, porn is not affecting your life then I guess you are still not accepting that it is. Handle the sensitive issue and its consequences carefully. Who will, if you don't act responsibly?Pornography has its positives and negatives. All you need is a healthy talk with different age groups!

Be you own inspiration, ladies!