Mansplaining makes headlines almost every year at JLF? In a new incident feminist publication Zubaan Books accused journalist Vir Sanghvi of “shutting a woman down for calling him out on his sexist behaviour.” Sanghvi was moderating a panel with three women, Kota Neelima, Sarah Raven and Lathika George, on Glimpses from ‘Food for Thought’. You can watch the video of the session here.
Urvashi Butalia run, Zubaan Books posted a thread of tweets. In one of the tweets it asked JLF, “Is this festival just another venue for men to dismiss and discriminate against women?”
This is not the first time that a speaker manterrupted his women speaker. Last year at JLF, Suhel Seth was in a panel on manelists, misogyny and mansplaining with Bee Rowlatt, Amrita Tripathi, Anuradha Beniwal, Ruchira Gupta etc. Ironically, in the panel largely steered by women had a man who picked up what Rowlatt had said and mansplained it in his terms. The session that revolved around women’s issues with misogyny had practising mansplainer. Not just this, Seth even did not spare Comic Mallika Dua in another session as he went on to throw half baked question half mocking Dua on the panel.
Zubaan Books went on to tweet, “Throughout the session, Sanghvi interrupted the women speakers (unless they were white), mansplained his way through concepts they had WRITTEN BOOKS ON, refuted their professional knowledge repeatedly. THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE.”
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"Throughout the session, Sanghvi interrupted the women speakers (unless they were white), mansplained his way through concepts they had WRITTEN BOOKS ON"
It then found it too difficult to sit through the panel and decided to walk away.
This is largely becoming a trend at JLF much less at any other conference of panels with men and women around the globe. If personalities like the President of Norway Erna Solberg can talk about the instance of mansplaining at the World Economic Forum then it is a problem for sure. And the fact that such ceremonies are becoming conversation points for issues like mansplaining then we know how we have ingrained and normalized it in gender relationship.
The good thing however is that we have started talking about it and one must call it out as and when it happens.
We reached out to Sanghvi and this is what he had to say:
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