Shameless objectification of women, says Joseph.
By Sreekanth A. Nair
Merin Joseph, an Indian Police Service (IPS) officer from Kerala, lashed out at the media for objectifying women.
The 25-year-old Assistant Superintendent of Police of Munnar, Kerala took it to Facebook to express her disagreement with a Hindi daily that carried a story titled “The list of top 10 Most Beautiful IAS and IPS Officers In India,” and featured her as one of them.
Joseph’s Facebook post begins with citing the fault of Indian media especially “especially the vernacular press.”
“Shameless objectification of women and propagation of patriarchal structures, reducing a lady’s worth to her face value,” she wrote.
“These are bold and brave officers working in the complex bureaucratic system in India, negotiating their way through the good, bad and ugly of our body politic- and here we have a list of officers whom people can ogle at,” Joseph added.
Condemning the attitude of media, she said it was seriously disgusting, constricting and demeaning to the identities of smart, intelligent and self-made women.
The Facebook post ends with a question: “Have you ever wondered why we never see a list of the most handsome males in the IAS and IPS?” Joseph asked.
The post has gone viral and many people from different walks of life came up to support Merin Joseph.
“Really shameful…but this is what Indian media is all about…they forget that whoever has reached that position has done so on their individual merit and if IAS IPS were interested in exposing themselves they would have selected modeling and not this reputed profession. Woman’s beauty is her intellect, not face value,” read a comment.
Some others criticized Joseph blaming that she posted the article featuring her along with the post to get popularity.
The youngest IPS officer of Kerala cadre had landed in controversy two times earlier. In 2015, she was criticized for making a junior officer hold an umbrella for her. In another incident, she asked an MLA to take a photo of herself with actor Nivin Pauly.