Feminism for men

Are our laws unfair to men and husbands? Can essentialising any gender or sex category as “weak”, “strong”, “oppressor” or “oppressed,” given the varying contexts in which these dynamics unfold, be avoided under law, wonders Kanav Narayan Sahgal.

The year 2024 ended on a tragic note with the country reeling from the suicide of a 34-year-old Bengaluru-based tech professional, Atul Subhash on December 9, 2024. His 90-minute-long video and 24-page suicide letter provided a detailed account of the harassment he allegedly endured from his wife and in-laws, and simultaneously opened the floodgates to a wider conversation about men’s rights, men’s mental health, and the state of the Indian legal system, which, according to Subhash, was purportedly biased against men’s interests in marital disputes.

Almost three decades earlier, renowned lawyer and academic, Nancy Levit published an article in the UCLA Law Review, titled ‘Feminism for Men’ (1995) that made a compelling argument for including men’s experiences in feminist legal theory and practice. With close to 200 academic citations and a reprint in a gender law textbook years later, the article has remained influential. 

She stated there, “in several important respects, apart from the crucial role of the culprit, men have been largely omitted from feminism. Feminist legal theorists have paid mild attention to whether men could embrace feminist objectives in the “Can men be feminists?” question. This issue is treated as a relatively unimportant one.” Although she primarily discusses feminism in a Western context, her observations are important for those of us in India as well.

As sociologists Romit Chowdhury and Zaid Al Baset remind us, “gender” is a relational concept. Therefore, no feminist interrogation of women’s experiences (even in India) can be complete without juxtaposing them with men’s understanding of women’s lives, and vice versa. This dialectical approach is essential for developing an appropriate response to male grievances within and against feminist articulations of justice.

It’s important to remember that while Subhash’s specific claims have yet to be proven by a court of law, the mental harassment he experienced is evident. Therefore, it would be incorrect and improper to dismiss all his claims outright. In his suicide letter, he expressly outlined his intent to kill himself, saying in part “This suicide is going to stop the supply of money to my enemies and corrupt legal system. It will also stop the taxes I pay which is going to be utilised to pass more laws against more fathers, men and their families.”

But are our laws unfair to men and husbands? This question must be placed in a historical context. As far as Hindu personal law is concerned (Subhash alludes to the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 in his letter), Flavia Agnes reminds us that codified Hindu family law is gendered precisely because the discrimination women experienced for decades was also gendered. As for criminal law, the Justice Verma Committee Report, in response to the 2012 Delhi gang rape incident, found that gender bias in society was still deeply embedded at a systemic level. This bias manifests in various institutions, including the family, police, judiciary, and public administration. Therefore, the Committee proposed a wide range of reforms aimed at strengthening, rather than weakening, women’s protections under the law. Therefore, on the issue of gender neutrality, Agnes notes, “Equality can only be between equals. If the norm of equality is applied between unequals, it will lead to greater disparity.” And while I agree with her reasoning in principle, I also hold that laws must keep evolving with changing times to respond to new social realities, whenever relevant. For instance, up until 2005, Hindu daughters did not have the same rights as sons in coparcenary property.

As of this writing, queer women, including lesbian and transgender women, still face various forms of marginalisation that have yet to be addressed by the law. And marital rape largely remains a non-offence in India, with the law recognising “domestic violence” and “cruelty” as offences but not rape by a husband upon his wife, who is older than 18 years of age. Therefore, Indian law needs to account for these changes.

Similarly, two major contemporary developments that have purportedly placed the feminist movement at odds with each other must also be addressed by feminist groups. These developments are important and intricately connected to the legal and social dimensions of Subhash’s case. The first is the demand for gender neutrality in our existing family law regime (specifically, the Special Marriage Act of 1954) by some members of the queer community; and the second is a demand for stricter and swifter punishments for those filing false and frivolous cases in matrimonial disputes. Both of these issues require careful deliberation and debate to determine how best to balance the protection of women’s individual rights with the need for legal reforms that are fair and just to all parties involved — which must include queer, trans, and cis men, who may find themselves disadvantaged by the law for a variety of reasons, in different circumstances.

Put it another way, feminists must consider the following three things: (1) how the law can be constructed and administered to uphold principles of equity, fairness, and non-discrimination for all parties in our changing socio-cultural realities; (2) how the law should account for intersecting oppressions, including those that don’t fit conventional markers of vulnerability; (3) and how the law can best avoid essentialising any gender or sex category as “weak”, “strong”, “oppressor” or “oppressed,” given the varying contexts in which these dynamics unfold. “Isolating gender for analytic purposes may be a less than fruitful endeavour because gender has no single meaning. Just as feminist theory runs the risk of essentialising women, so does any analysis of male disempowerment risk essentialising men,” says Levit.

That being said, proposals from those on the ostensible right wing to scrap legal protections for women altogether must be rejected. It is a well-established legal principle that the possibility of abuse of a provision of law does not, per se, justify the invalidation of the law. This principle applies to existing laws on dowry prohibition, cruelty, domestic violence, “unnatural sex”, and rape, among others, that were enacted to protect women from harm and have been in place for decades. Furthermore, official reports consistently show that crimes against women are still on the rise. Therefore, these legal protections for women must be retained. However, the Supreme Court of India has also stated (in the context of a legal challenge to the validity of Section 498A of the Indian Penal Code in 2005) that “merely because the provision is constitutional and intra vires does not give a licence to unscrupulous persons to wreck personal vendetta or unleash harassment. It may, therefore, become necessary for the legislature to find ways in which the makers of frivolous complaints or allegations can be appropriately dealt with.”

This position was reiterated again by the Supreme Court in a different and more recent case involving dowry harassment before the Telangana High Court. It is these constructive calls to action that feminists must pay serious heed to.

Subhash’s anguish over being alienated from his son for three years is a central theme in his suicide note, as is his frustration regarding his inability to provide financial support for his wife and child due to his limited economic resources. Such issues demand careful exploration with empathy and concern, as should every case involving violence against women. These two concerns should not be viewed as mutually exclusive; rather, they should be seen as interrelated, mutually reinforcing the goal of fostering healthier gender relations between men, women, and others.

(The author is a communications manager at Nyaaya, the Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy and can be reached at [e-mail])