<p>Since everyone is into kitchen tips, here’s an old Indian specialty. Nobody cooks a woman’s goose like Indian men. Over the years, they have added barbaric tweaks, because anyone can robotically follow a formula, but it’s in the personal touch that you really express yourself. Its name is euphemistic, since few Indians like to call a spade a spade (see ‘eve-teasing’ and ‘outraging a woman’s modesty’).</p>.<p>This recipe is so popular that you can be sure that on average 90 times every day—that we know of—some Indian man, somewhere, is cooking a woman’s goose. The basic dish is simple: Take a woman against her will, dominate her, and pierce her flesh with whatever is at hand—a penis is a convenient favourite, but it could be anything, really. She will release a mix of fear, pain, misery, humiliation, rage, and grief. Check your humanity thermometer—when it hits zero, she’s done. Cover up the whole thing and let the heat subside, and serve up to your friends, or show it off on social media.</p>.<p>It is a household staple in Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, but a favourite all over India. Ingredients are commonplace and usable at any stage of development. A sexually mature woman is fine, but almost a third of men use children (some as young as a few weeks old); and a woman in her 90s has served equally well (Delhi, September 2020). About 94% of men know their ingredient personally, so Babu’s your uncle! Often literally.</p>.<p>There is a preparation for every occasion. Woman’s goose is cooked as a complement to communal killings, like in Noakhali in 1946, or Gujarat in 2002. It is a favourite of hostile army personnel, as it was in the Kunan Poshpora (Kashmir) in 1991. It can be a midnight snack, or a post-drink nightcap, like in Delhi in 2012. Woman’s goose is cooked as vengeance, like Bhanwari Devi’s in Rajasthan in 1992, after she opposed a child marriage, or the eight-year-old in Kathua. It is cooked to commemorate spurned love, though acid is a popular alternative. It can be cooked because you’re mad at a man or, like smoking, it can just kill time. It is 100% cooked to establish that men can cook it, and women shouldn’t forget it.</p>.<p>Penises are a favourite prop, friends’ and families’ welcome. But men have also used a dog chain to choke the victim (Aruna Shaunbag remained in a vegetative state for 42 years) or an iron rod (which eviscerated Nirbhaya). People have presented their work variously: hung two teenage rape victims from the trees in Badaun in 2014; chopped a 19-year-old daughter into two in Gorakhpur, 2019, for resisting her rapist father who (get this) doubted her character; shot Thangjam Manorama in the genitals, post-rape and torture, in Manipur, 2004; stabbed and burnt alive the Unnao victim in 2019.</p>.<p>Most men who cook a woman’s goose just get on with their lives. Women who object usually have to appeal to other men, most of whom don’t see what the fuss is about. But these days, women are getting louder, so now the police just burn the body along with due process on the same pyre, ignited with petrol, in a field, in the middle of the night, while the family is threatened and locked up, the press barricaded with their phones tapped, and opposition leaders manhandled and arrested; then they deny rape, via a public relations firm. All to protect the upper caste cooks of a Dalit woman’s goose (Hathras, 2020).</p>.<p>Those who call this barbaric, revolting, heinous—you don’t understand the power of tradition, or the traditions of power. Just stick to pasta.</p>
<p>Since everyone is into kitchen tips, here’s an old Indian specialty. Nobody cooks a woman’s goose like Indian men. Over the years, they have added barbaric tweaks, because anyone can robotically follow a formula, but it’s in the personal touch that you really express yourself. Its name is euphemistic, since few Indians like to call a spade a spade (see ‘eve-teasing’ and ‘outraging a woman’s modesty’).</p>.<p>This recipe is so popular that you can be sure that on average 90 times every day—that we know of—some Indian man, somewhere, is cooking a woman’s goose. The basic dish is simple: Take a woman against her will, dominate her, and pierce her flesh with whatever is at hand—a penis is a convenient favourite, but it could be anything, really. She will release a mix of fear, pain, misery, humiliation, rage, and grief. Check your humanity thermometer—when it hits zero, she’s done. Cover up the whole thing and let the heat subside, and serve up to your friends, or show it off on social media.</p>.<p>It is a household staple in Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, but a favourite all over India. Ingredients are commonplace and usable at any stage of development. A sexually mature woman is fine, but almost a third of men use children (some as young as a few weeks old); and a woman in her 90s has served equally well (Delhi, September 2020). About 94% of men know their ingredient personally, so Babu’s your uncle! Often literally.</p>.<p>There is a preparation for every occasion. Woman’s goose is cooked as a complement to communal killings, like in Noakhali in 1946, or Gujarat in 2002. It is a favourite of hostile army personnel, as it was in the Kunan Poshpora (Kashmir) in 1991. It can be a midnight snack, or a post-drink nightcap, like in Delhi in 2012. Woman’s goose is cooked as vengeance, like Bhanwari Devi’s in Rajasthan in 1992, after she opposed a child marriage, or the eight-year-old in Kathua. It is cooked to commemorate spurned love, though acid is a popular alternative. It can be cooked because you’re mad at a man or, like smoking, it can just kill time. It is 100% cooked to establish that men can cook it, and women shouldn’t forget it.</p>.<p>Penises are a favourite prop, friends’ and families’ welcome. But men have also used a dog chain to choke the victim (Aruna Shaunbag remained in a vegetative state for 42 years) or an iron rod (which eviscerated Nirbhaya). People have presented their work variously: hung two teenage rape victims from the trees in Badaun in 2014; chopped a 19-year-old daughter into two in Gorakhpur, 2019, for resisting her rapist father who (get this) doubted her character; shot Thangjam Manorama in the genitals, post-rape and torture, in Manipur, 2004; stabbed and burnt alive the Unnao victim in 2019.</p>.<p>Most men who cook a woman’s goose just get on with their lives. Women who object usually have to appeal to other men, most of whom don’t see what the fuss is about. But these days, women are getting louder, so now the police just burn the body along with due process on the same pyre, ignited with petrol, in a field, in the middle of the night, while the family is threatened and locked up, the press barricaded with their phones tapped, and opposition leaders manhandled and arrested; then they deny rape, via a public relations firm. All to protect the upper caste cooks of a Dalit woman’s goose (Hathras, 2020).</p>.<p>Those who call this barbaric, revolting, heinous—you don’t understand the power of tradition, or the traditions of power. Just stick to pasta.</p>