Yessir, ji madam.

What does it mean to respect somebody? Is personal expression integral to respect, or must it be enacted in socially acceptable terms to be meaningful? Is it possible, within an institutional setting, to eschew existing socially acceptable expressions of respect and create another vocabulary; what sort of consequences would such an experiment entail?

I ask these questions in the context of a seemingly innocuous conflict I am faced up with: the use of first names while addressing those senior to me. The terms ma'am and sir make me uncomfortable, as do, indeed, all terms that require me to address persons as positions. The fact that ma'am and sir have such evidently classist roots does nothing to endear them to me. But they are seemingly ubiquitous. When I began referring to a university professor by her name to my parents, my mother (a teacher, herself) chided me several times about being disrespectful. My mother, however, was also the person who would come back fuming from work, disgruntled by the superficial ways in which students sometimes ritually enact respect <cue: "good morrrning ma'am"> but do not mean it in any kind of depth. Whenever I've conversed with anybody about the rationale behind sticking with terms like ma'am and sir instead of simply calling people by their names, respect has been central. I thought, therefore, that it would likely be useful to unpack the idea of respect, a little bit, to make sense of the confusion in my head. As always, the confusion is deeply personal and to do with a month of intense agonising about the ways in which I wish to negotiate working within institutions. This question of names, positions and respect speaks to, in many ways, the bigger questions one is always faced up with, while trying to, simultaneously, work within a system created by others and remain one's own person.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines respect in two ways that are relevant to this post:

1. A feeling of deep admiration for someone or something elicited by their abilities, qualities, or achievements
2. Due regard for the feelings, wishes, or rights of others

The second, I think, we owe to all human beings. Some would say all creatures, but being non-vegetarian I am a little unsure of my footing on that debate: can you respectfully kill? But if we view ourselves as engaged in the messy business of living, then is killing for food part of healthy (and essential) competition; in which case, is respectful competition, enough? I'm not sure. Anyhow, for the mean time, we'll run with it being essential that we be considerate towards the feelings, wishes and rights of all persons. I do not think position or seniority has anything to do with this understanding of respect. Should someone higher up in terms of educational qualification, seniority, age, status deserve more consideration by virtue of their position, than a person say at the foot of the same ladder? I should think not. In fact, we call that expectation of greater consideration, which folk who're at the top of the ladder tend to have, 'entitlement' and we tend to wrinkle up our noses at it. This cannot, then, be the respect that is spoken of, when we think about why we use ma'am/sir.

The first definition is evidently more complex. A feeling of admiration is something that is deeply personal; for instance, I do not admire all my professors, even if they've all got the same educational qualifications or are at the same position in my university. This reminds me of something rather cliched that my parents often said to me: respect is commanded, not demanded. If I am told to refer to a person as ma'am or sir as a symbol of respect for their position or seniority, it sounds to me like a demand, though a fairly hollow one. I can address a whole horde of people as ma'am or sir, but respect (as in, admire) maybe two of them. What value should one attach to that symbol then?

If I were to decide to address somebody as ma'am/sir, perhaps I would be enacting a well-worn socially acceptable ritual of respect. But I think something else is at play when institutions make it mandatory that persons in particular positions be addressed in particular ways. In those settings, I think the use of ma'am and sir is used to reinforce authority and create a sort of distance between the two persons involved in an interaction. It serves as a means to constantly remind one of the power imbalance that exists, and to reify it. It is of little wonder, then, that the military is one context within which the practice is most rigorously observed.

Does that make the requirement unequivocally problematic, I don't know. I can see why it is important for certain sorts of identities, especially, to set up that distance and to assert authority. A brahmin man can afford to be pally and on first-name basis with his junior colleagues yet be able to assert authority when required. The same behaviour from a woman in the same position would likely result in a certain familiarity on the part of the junior colleague, and could well lead to the woman's authority being undermined. The examples of differential readings of and responses to similar behaviour can be multiplied. The point is that this overt assertion of a difference in positions can sometimes be a person's only tool towards being taken seriously in that position. What does one do, then?

The trouble with demanding the use of sir or ma'am, though, is that I feel it reduces two people to two positions. There is something impersonal about the use of these terms that pushes aside the softer, caring parts of me. In essence, I feel that with me, personally, to insist that I address somebody as sir/ma'am is to ask that I enact respect and recognise authority, while reducing my ability to actually be considerate and compassionate. I have found, interestingly, that each time I have connected with somebody senior to me, I've found a way by which to refer to them by their names or by nicknames that they accept, and worked around the sir/ma'am conundrum. But that is not always going to work; there are some people and some organisations that treat their norms for addressing people as non-negotiables. Being faced up with one such situation, I have been wondering about what I should do, and how I should process this.

I've come to realise two sets of things: first, that not every disagreement between my personal preferences and an organisation's norms, irreconcilable as it might be, threatens my fundamental values and second, that while standing dramatically firm and true to oneself is often valorised, most meaningful engagement happens in the grey area of give and take. I would be taking myself a little too seriously, if I raised every conflict situation to the level of a moral dilemma. In this particular case, then, if somebody insists that I refer to them as ma'am/sir, I'd do it, to the extent that the insistence does not in any which way quell democratic speech within the institution. Perhaps I will learn, with time, to use the terms shorn of the negative connotations they carry for me, and perhaps then I will find it easier to see the person, despite the stress on the position. Or perhaps those who insist on creating that distance will just have to live with the fact that while they gain something in doing so, they also lose out on a range of possibilities in the process, if that means anything to them in the first place.

If I ever have somebody junior to me working with me, though, I know I would be happy to have them refer to me by name. And, knowing my proclivity towards bluntness, I would probably also not hesitate in giving anybody who took that as license to be disrespectful, a piece of my mind. I am also sure that if I ever run an organisation, it would not welcome essentially gendered terms like ma'am and sir. But these are castles in the air. Right now, I've got to go back to figuring out whether, when you want to say belonging to ma'am, you can say ma'am's or you must use madam's. All help on this front would be welcome. :) 

full disclosure

I had a friend. Whom I loved very much, perhaps a little blindly. Many things should have told me that it's foolhardy to trust someone that implicitly, but I soldiered on, regardless. This friend meant a lot to me, sometimes she gave me the courage to be myself, sometimes she stood up for me when nobody else did, and sometimes she didn't. She's in many way the anti-thesis of me: gorgeous, smart, articulate, and an immense amount of fun to be around. I think we had fun together, though I do not know what her take on that is (I can be a dreadful bore). But, hidden amongst all the being-tight-buddies-ness were these sudden moments when she wielded the power to make me feel like as small as humanly possible. I didn't have the language to describe what I felt, until I read this article, recently. She, it turns out, was incredibly adept at 'jellyfishing', a concept described thus:

"The thing about Rebecca is, she's a jellyfisher. You have a conversation with her that seems all nice and friendly, then you suddenly feel like you've been stung and you don't know where it came from. You'll be talking about jeans and she'll say "Yes, well, if you've got cellulite jodhpurs, you're best in something really well-cut like Dolce and Gabbana"- she herself having thighs like a baby giraffe—then smoothly move on to DKNY chinos as if nothing had happened."

Each time I brought it up, I felt silly and a little stuffy, because I was taking offence at what was ostensibly a joke, or a lighthearted statement. I guess jellyfishing hurts you when you're insecure about yourself, and she seemed to have the unnerving knack of picking at my deepest insecurities. I do not know whether she did it deliberately or she didn't even realise what she was saying. What I do know is that it hurt, and despite my raising it as a concern several times, it didn't stop. It was something I could deal with alright, when I was happy and engaging with the world around me. But this one time, when I was low, working on depressing material (district court rape judgements), and feeling entirely alone in the world, I think it broke me. And I always thought that was an incredibly dramatic phrase, until I literally felt something inside me snap and understood what it meant. I figured I needed to get away, and I did; you know, for all the hungama people make about break-ups, the whole losing a friend, one who has possibly seen you through several break-ups, thing cuts just as deep, if not deeper. I didn't just lose one, I lost three (and I don't even know why). At one shot. And it felt like my world was collapsing around me.

For a year, I refused to acknowledge the existence of any problem. I laughed with other friends and acquaintances about how lazy I am, and how hard it is to get me out of my bed. But I could not express to them the absolute torture of lying in bed, listening to an alarm ring endlessly on, but not be able to will myself to get up and turn it off. I withdrew from friends, because I felt drab, and boring, and whiny, and being around people just seemed like too much effort. Nothing excited me: not the papers I was writing, not the events happening on campus, nothing. But I went through the motions of daily living, because my ego could not come to terms with admitting to feeling so hollow and fragile. I had been hurting myself since I was around thirteen, and just when I thought I'd finally got out of that phase, it all began again. I never cut myself; prolonged, invisible pain was more my forte; I'd bludgeon myself with something neither too blunt nor too sharp, until I bruised, or sustained a surface cut. Sometimes I'd sit in class, squirming in pain and discomfort, and those would be the only things I'd feel; every other emotion and sensation was a strange haze. Sometimes days would go by, without me getting out of my room (except to go to the toilet) or meeting anyone. And the more I pushed people away, the more they, well, allowed themselves to be pushed away, I guess.

Is it depression, if you've steadfastly refused to go to a psychologist and the only word you have for what's in your head, is your own? Maybe it isn't. But this one day, as I sat somewhat talli in my room, idly contemplating suicide and thinking that jumping off the hostel roof is kind of daft, 'cause one would only break bones, not die, I realised I had a problem at hand. I didn't feel like I deserved to live, or that there was any need for me to. I'd lost count of the number of nights I'd fallen asleep sobbing for no reason whatsoever, and woken up with sticky eyes and a blocked nose. And I decided to damn my ego, and talk about it to people who mattered to me.

That sounds a whole lot easier than it really is. How do you explain things to people when you don't understand them yourself? If you're even remotely aware of society around you, how do you justify your completely irrational, and self-absorbed, anguish in the face of the relative comfort and privilege of your life? How much can you whine about how tatti you feel, without boring the person before you to tears? I've never really talked about my emotions and insecurities with many people before, and now that I'd begun, I felt like a dam had burst and I simply could not stop. At around the same time, a friend and colleague got drunk and asked me why I pretend to be super-human all the time; why can't I be vulnerable. Does somebody have to 'show' vulnerability to be granted the right to be perceived as a human being? Aren't we all vulnerable, by default? But the deal with feeling as fragile as I did, then, is that pretending to be super-human is no longer an option. Somebody I am working with made a passing (and lighthearted) remark about the demons inside my head being a cherished addiction. And, to my intense surprise, I found myself furious and hurt at the same time, railing against him in a reaction that was grossly disproportionate to the remark. For days after that, I dreamt of hurting myself and they were pleasurable dreams, you know, the sort that said, "Go on, Ninni, do it; you need to feel the pain; you deserve the pain." in the most lulling sort of tone. Once, I woke up and did just as the dream suggested. I hated the effect that one little statement could have on me. I talked about my reaction to it, with a trusted friend and my parents, who unanimously called me a drama-queen. I sort of agreed with them, and felt sheepish. When you think about it, though, it puts you in quite a bind, doesn't it? If you don't express vulnerabilities, you're pretending to be super-human; if you do crack when you're feeling vulnerable, then you're a drama-queen. Ab karey bhi toh kya karey?

But people can be so immensely beautiful. Sometimes, support comes from the most unexpected sources, and in such doses that you wonder what you've done to deserve it. People who wake you up in the morning and wait outside your room until you pick up your lota and go to the loo. People who're willing to work with you despite knowing that you're as whiny and prickly as humanly possible, and little bit clingy. Old friends who tell you you're not alone, and they've been in your place too, and that things get better. And as I talk to people and am honest about how I feel, I realise that there are just so many others who've lived through this in the time that I've known them, but we'd never really have spoken about it until I brought it up expressly. Having refused to talk about it for a whole year, myself, I can totally see why. Describing things in your head can be a very risky venture: people have the annoying tendency to tell you to 'stop being lazy', 'get a grip on yourself', and that it's 'all in your head' (well, duh). Perhaps some part of this is because we do not talk about things in our head the way we talk about fevers and loosies, and more conversation will dispel myths regurgitated by people who mean well. And for those who resist your gentle nudges towards sensitivity, send 'em a copy of 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows' with “of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real,” highlighted in neon pink.

---

Was that an abrupt ending? Well, sorry, I ran out of things to say and the energy to attempt to say 'em well. Maybe I'll revisit this post later and end with a flourish. Maybe I won't. Meh.

Of 'the common man' who refuses to shake hands with me. :(

Yesterday, I started bleeding, as women of a certain age are wont to do every month. I groaned inwardly, because, well, menstrual cramps are a bummer, but also because the next day I was to go for a public meeting about a problematic land regularisation scheme relaunched by the Telangana government and then catch a train to Bangalore after that. My immediate reaction was to think, for a tiny little while, whether I could somehow wriggle out of the meeting, postpone the trip back home and just snuggle into bed with my fluffy blanket for a couple of days.
With that came a flash of anger at myself. 'Menstruation is normal,' I thought, 'it's not a bloomin' illness! You can't simply renege on all your commitments once a month for the next two decades! What kind of feminist are you! What kind of work ethic is that!' So I squared my shoulders <ow, cramp> and thought about what I'd need to take to be completely prepared for the obstacle course more commonly described as a woman's search for a toilet in a public space. Sanitary napkins: check. Toilet paper: check. Bag with a roomy external pocket in case there is no dustbin: check. Newspaper: check. I booked an OLA cab ('cause while exercising this option is evidence enough of privilege, OLA is the only one I could possibly afford) and spent a restless night in my local guardian's house, too afraid of staining her sheets to be able to sleep peacefully.

I went for the meeting with a male colleague. I was the outsider in every sense of the term: language, expertise, the works. What I didn't expect was that I'd be one amongst five women in a gathering of, at least, two hundred and fifty people. So when the president of the organisation that was conducting the meeting shook hands with only my male colleague (we both met the president for the first time, together) and discussed the woes of the 'common man', he meant it literally. The dais had eleven chairs, all for men. Not one woman spoke.
At some point in the meeting, I realised I needed to go to the loo. Trying to be considerate, I went around all the seats instead of cutting across someone's line of vision. I needn't have bothered. Eyes followed me through my entire journey. To be intensely scrutinised as you trot towards a toilet is an incredibly discomfitting experience. I kid you not. But in the embarrassment of the moment, I had failed to focus on something more central to the entire woman seeking toilet experience: the toilet door. It was locked. Ladies: locked. 'Maybe they just lock their loos by default,' I thought, hopefully. Men: open (and in use). They had two toilets for men, both open. Perhaps they got it opened when they went to use it? So I went to a woman who was working in the kitchens adjoining that area and asked about the ladies' toilet. She shook her head emphatically and asked me to use another toilet that didn't have any gendered labels attached and was, presumably, for the staff. Or perhaps it was Ladies' toilet No.2, minus the label? Either way, I entered and shut the door, only to be subsumed within an all enveloping darkness. So I opened the door again, looking around, bewildered, to find no sign of any switch, or even a bulb for that matter. There was no cistern, forget a flush. No lota or any sign of flowing water. No hook, and most definitely no dustbin. I stuck my phone between my teeth, with its flashlight on and pointing downward, tied my bag to the door handle, fished out the toilet roll and stuck it under one arm, and changed a sanitary napkin with the other hand, trying hard to drop nothing and keep my salwar from turning the same shade of brown as the floor I was standing gingerly on. I rolled up the used napkin, covered it in plastic and paper, and stuck it in the outside pocket of my bag, because where else? I left that loo feeling like I'd accomplished a major acrobatic feat, and wondering at women who deal with this, and worse, every day, for all of their lives. This is by no means a new or startling experience; it's normal for any woman who treads paths outside the mall-restaurant-theatre-club-home circuit, but I think it hit me harder because it happened at a 'public meeting' about a seemingly progressive concern that affects, in the view of the organisers, 'the common man.'

The meeting raised several interesting legal and social concerns, but when someone asked me what it was like, it took me a while to be able to articulate any of it because the overwhelming sensation it left me with was that I wasn't part of the public for whom the meeting was called. I was an aberration, that people did not know how to deal with. Ladies weren't expected there; neither were women who lay no claim to being ladies. And oddly enough, common though such exclusions are, it hurt. One wonders, is it because women don't occupy such spaces that men do not know how to behave in their presence, or is their discomfort/hostility the reason why women do not show up for such events? Obviously, the answers are far more complex (and it's evident that both these processes feed into each other), but I do wish that just once in a while, a man would stick his hand out towards me and introduce himself; and that the Ladies' toilet would be unlocked for 'public meetings'.