Rage Against The Machine

When stoked and stirred, women’s anger has always proved a powerful catalyst for change. And they pay an inordinate emotional and creative price for it.

- Meena Kandasamy

Where do I look for an early example of what a woman’s anger can do? Being Tamil, Kannagi comes to mind—angered that her husband had been unjustly executed by the king—she burns down Madurai. The epic Silappatikaram speaks of how she plucked and flung her left breast, cursing that the city be reduced to ashes. To me, this is a woman’s rage born out of her body. Her body becomes a bomb, rage becomes a quest for justice that smashes an oppressive, unjust structure.

Long before we started calling it #MeToo, women under military occupation were tapping into this collective rage to organise themselves. The mothers of Manipur marched naked to protest atrocity—with the banner ‘Indian Army Rape Us’, they are the earliest Kannagis in our midst. In cultures used to collective shaming, women becoming warriors is a historical inevitability. Tamil women of Eelam subjected to rape by Indian peacekeeping forces ended up weaponising their woes, as do Adivasi women hunted down by paramilitary in India’s infamous Red Corridor. The Western-adjacency of our societies means that we do not recognise history until she makes an appearance wrapped up in hallowed hashtags.