Popular TV actress Shweta Tiwari has gone to great lengths to call out the online abuse against women, stressing the need to respect women, emphasizing how degrading and abusing a woman online has been normalized, calling out how even educated people do this.
Sharing her disgusted experience from her Instagram live, Shweta said, “Just yesterday I started an Instagram Live with contestants from The Traitors. I was watching the comments and saw so many people casually calling us ‘randi.’ I genuinely don’t understand how this has become normal. Sometimes, people even talk about me and my eight-year-old son and my daughter in a very, very disturbing way. And when I open their profiles, I see pictures of their wives, daughters, and families. They clearly have women in their lives whose dignity they would never tolerate someone else attacking. So what makes it acceptable to disrespect another woman who has absolutely nothing to do with you?”
In a series of Instagram stories, Shweta expressed her anger and disappointment saying, “Today, I want to talk about something that is both deeply concerning and, unfortunately, very common on social media: calling a woman “randi.” Any woman. Of any age. From any profession. Any man, from any background, can come online and call a woman “randi.” And what shocks me is that these men are not necessarily uneducated or from troubled backgrounds.”
She emphasized, “Many of them are educated, come from seemingly respectable families, have wives, daughters, mothers and sisters… and yet feel completely comfortable using the most degrading word they can think of for another woman.”
Sharing a screenshot of one such user who abused the actress, Shweta wrote, “I opened one of the profiles. The man is a doctor. His profile has beautiful pictures of his wife and child.”
Expressing her disbelief and shock, Shweta shared how the user is also a supporter of politician Raj Thackeray and said, “And I thought, how do you go home to that family after speaking to another woman like this? Apparently, he is also a supporter of Raj Thackeray or his party. And that brings me to something very personal.” I have lived in Maharashtra all my life. My father was brought up in Mumbai. I was born and brought up in Mumbai. All my life, I have grown up seeing the pride and dignity attached to being a Marathi manus. मी मराठी आहे माझी मुंबई माझी आई माझी ताई I have heard Marathi women proudly say, “Mi Marathi mulgi.” I grew up believing that Marathi culture respected women, their strength and their dignity.”
Questioning Raj Thackeray, the actress said, “So when I see people who proudly identify themselves as Marathi manus coming into women’s DMs and calling them ‘randi,’ I genuinely have to ask: Is this what being a Marathi manus has come to mean? Raj Thackeray, if people like this are your supporters, then I would genuinely like to know..do you believe this is acceptable behaviour? Because speaking Marathi, calling yourself a Marathi manus, or claiming to love Maharashtra is not enough.”
Speaking up for women’s respect, Shweta wrote, “Respecting women is also part of that identity. And if you can proudly display the women in your own family while degrading another woman online, then perhaps it is time to ask yourself one very simple question: Would you be okay with someone speaking to the women in your family the way you speak to women on the internet?”
And lastly, she concluded sarcastically, calling out the abusers and asking to respect women, “Because a woman doesn’t lose her dignity just because you don’t know her. And she certainly doesn’t deserve to be called ‘randi’ simply because you disagree with her, dislike her, or feel entitled to abuse her. Respect women, not only the women you love, but women. Period.”
