Air India Urinating Case: A Story Of Men And Their Many Entitlements

Inebriated women till date are considered fallen women. She is referred to as the one without a moral compass. Someone who can’t be trusted to raise a family, be a mother, a wife or a girlfriend. Yet the very men who judge her, never have to suffer such indignity, even if he is an ill-mannered tippler. Men can be found planning to do “the boy thing” of getting drunk and making merry, unlike women who don’t really have a girl thing beyond retail therapy, that’s permissible. They also run off being labelled as a “basic bitch”, if she dares to enjoy things that are not viewed as serious and important.

Uncontrolled alcohol consumption, we all know, is not a virtue, for any gender, however much the West sells us the idea of a glass of red every day with our meals. Medically alcohol consumption is harmful to the body, also it offers no cardiovascular protection for Indians.

Air India Urinating Case

In a recent airline incident in India, an overly drunk man, on free alcohol on a business class flight, mistook a woman for the flight commode and peed on her. The woman was furious and did the exact right thing by taking it up with the higher authorities. When the drunk passenger realised it was a mistake, he offered her money to not register a complaint. But the woman wasn’t the one to take this down easily and rightfully so. No woman in her sane mind would be okay or so forgiving to overlook a stranger’s piss all over herself. It is a thought unbearably difficult to digest.

So now Mr Drunk has got the appropriate punishment. He has lost his employment, reputation and is currently undergoing a trial for abusing a woman’s modesty inflight.

If we are to scrutinise the many entitlements that men enjoy, this incident brings to the fore, two points - the fact that how men are comfortable pulling off the zip, and dropping their pants, without blinking an eyelid in public.

The second is that the judgement that they are spared because of their gender for obnoxious drunken behaviour. Men getting out of control, being drunk, getting abusive and conducting themselves inappropriately without the fear of consequences is a known fact. Society never pulls out its harsh magnifying glasses to look into such conduct for a man. With this incident, one is forced to think if we have ever heard of a woman being so drunk, that she has been caught peeing on a man, known or unknown.

This isn’t about equal rights to inebriation for women. It is about responsible conduct in public and private spaces.

It is also about the innumerable men who haven’t given much thought to drinking behavioural attitudes.

According to a survey conducted between 2019 and 2021 in India, alcohol consumption was significantly higher among men than women. About 30% of men aged 35 to 49 reported having consumed alcohol compared to over 1% of women in the same age group.

In conversation with a Bengaluru teacher Shanta, “this airlines incident is disgusting, to say the least. I know married friends of mine and some of their husbands narrate crazy stories of being drunk. One friend’s husband was so drunk that he passed out and peed in his pants. I often think if this would be okay if their wives did the same. But most of us laugh at these stories as it’s viewed as being silly and not abusive.”

Mohua Chinappa is an author and a podcaster of a show called The Mohua Show.

Suggested Reading: Airline Crew-Passenger Spat: Why Is Cabin Crew Always Looked Down Upon?

Views expressed by the author are their own