“So Sir, do you think you are responsible for the growing lesbianism?”

“What do you say, madam!! I have very strong Indian values and ethics. How can you blame me for something so dirty? You know, madam, I think I agree with our great leader Balasaheb Thackeray that ‘lesbianism is just a perverse influence of the West’”.

Curb your thoughts, you pathetically ignorant egomaniac.

Lesbianism is a state of mind. There are a few who ‘adopt’ homosexuality out of preference. But many ‘resort’ to it, or rather, to bisexuality - driven because a woman is not to refuse her male the release of his holy, white, viscous fluid. Her services are needed; she has to assist him in reaching his nirvana.

Illustration by Siddhartha Mitra

What else do you expect when the Indian male is the most unimaginative, non-gratifying aberration of nature? The woman wants fun, foreplay, stimulation, caresses, licking, slurping, teasing, and biting - being only imaginatively possible with the male, it is made literally possible with a female who longs for the same.

Yes, there are those who would like to take her to the peak of ecstasy. But they are horrifying, almost blasphemous: that wink, that tobacco-stained yellow grin, that nod, and that leer collectively do the trick - you would rather ‘do it’ with a non-rational species.

The woman gets bored stiff, perched on a double-bed, waiting for her apathetic man to return. He comes home - to his free attendant -- but starts snoring within five minutes of gorging on a meal fit for a pachyderm.

Alibi: Exhausted after work.
Verdict: Lying. Has already released the elixir from the fountain elsewhere.

She no longer wants to be the attendant. She wants to be a pouty, gratified nymph, smouldering with sexuality, imagining that she is God’s gift to earth. It doesn’t stop at physical gratification; mental fulfillment is equally imperative.

So what does she do? Call a sex-chat line? Sorry, Sushma Swaraj banned them - anyway, there was not much for women to choose from, with men trying to turn you on with their monotonous dribble. Go to a strip bar? There are none she knows of. Pay for the service of a gigolo? Difficult to find one - also, too risky with STDs and AIDS in the air. Indulge in a wet, ‘reciprocating’, wild action game with that friend? Enjoyed it last time - so, this is the most exciting, satiating option. Ergo, she is a lesbian.

Do you blame her -- the less-gifted sex? Aw, come on! The answer should be unequivocal and unanimous. Uh-oh! I get it! The Indian male hypocrite and his ubiquitous ego!

Can’t you see? It’s your insipid, morose, somnambulant attitude that is driving women to look for greener pastures.

Maybe it’s time women performed a coup d’etat and told the subcontinent who is boss. Educate them on how, where, when, and what ought to be done.

Or should we just resort to what the female ‘Viagra Rape Squad’ did in London? You know, force-feed viagra, chain him to the bed, tape his mouth, and ‘do it’.

Cherry Malik is a post-graduate Philosophy student at Delhi University.

Illustration by Siddhartha Mitra

“Where have all the interesting men gone?” Anjani (March 16, 1995).

This is a familiar lament, sighed by an increasing number of women. It isn’t, as chauvinists of my species are wont to argue, because women have straitjacketed ideas about the male oomph, but -- as Darwin himself would have retorted -- because the emancipated female, in a sudden evolutionary overdrive, inspired by cultural imports from the West, has outmatched the Indian male in the art of love, courtship and seduction. She’s more imaginative, cleverer and bolder while he is lazier, dafter and risk-averse. Colossal ennui rather than sexual frisson is what he inspires in her.

“My most gratifying fantasy is consorting with a voluptuous woman.” Vandana (June 20, 1996).

Ennui, as you know, is the great muse of radical ideas. So it’s nothing to gawk at if a number of women are confessing to similar, sapphic desire. In fact, it follows logically. The ire over Fire is not about freedom of expression or unnatural proclivities but about the paranoia of the Indian male about his inevitable obsolescence.

Of course, women couple not just out of curiosity, ennui, loneliness, or even kinkiness. What constitutes ying and yang is a complex conundrum. Although it’s fashionable today to “blame” it on the genes, most analysts agree that we may never succeed in deciphering the sexual hieroglyphics. Whatever the first principle, however, the truth is that in the evolutionary game of sex, man is fast losing out to the “other” woman. If you read the newspapers you would realise how unviable has the modern Indian male become.

He’s a congenital risk: More often born with inherited diseases like haemophilia, also more likely to be autistic, dyslexic and hyperactive. A medical disaster: Twice a likely to die from heart disease than women, more likely to suffer strokes and liver failure, more cancer prone. Intellectually challenged: Dumber at school with more failures and dropouts than girls. Increasingly being superceded by women in many walks of life. An AIDS risk: Strays more, doesn’t believe in safe sex, a threat to humanity.

Sexually challenged: Dropping sperm counts, increasing erectile dysfunctionality, reckon the rising Viagra sales, much less satisfying in bed. Psychologically challenged: More violent, molests and rapes more, drinks and dopes more, more crime-prone, more depressed, more confused.

Now who in her right mind would want to ally with such a monumental risk? It’s a classic case of diminishing return. And by inference a strong incentive for a woman to express solidarity, emotional as well as sexual, with another of her kind. In all probability a world with men reduced to supernumeraries would be a much happier, safer place.

After all dandelions do it, whip-tailed lizards do it, snails do it, so why can’t women? Sans the male that is.

Rakesh Kalshian is the Science Correspondent for Outlook magazine

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