Thread by @kavita_krishnan

#thread on #gatekeeping on #ManipurViolence
What's your response to
- a 7-year-old boy & his mum burnt alive in an ambulance by a Meitei chauvinist mob?
- a 20-year old Kuki girl being thrashed by a mob while Meitei women shout "Rape her! Torture her! Cut her into pieces!"

If your first response is to scold or lecture me (or "mainland media" for cherry-picking cases & focusing more on Meitei mob massacres than on Kuki militants & Indian Army, you need to stop & take a closer look at yourself.

Instead of asking me why I am blowing these atrocities out of proportion, ask yourself why you are more outraged at some tweet of mine than at chauvinist outfits being able to get people to participate in these horrific crimes?

Why are you more concerned to persuade *us* we're being unjust to your community? Why not instead address members of *your* own community to demand the arrest of these chauvinist militias as a key measure to restore peace in Manipur?

In Manipur (like in Assam during NRC) civil society is gate-keeping - “you aren’t from Assam/Manipur, you don’t understand our exceptional pain, how dare you imply we're chauvinist"?
The purpose of this gate-keeping is to nip discussions of Assamese/Meitei chauvinism in the bud.

The most dangerous political phenomenon in Manipur (& Assam) is majoritarian chauvinism making common cause with the BJP's fascism, to brand vulnerable communities as infiltrators & "illegal immigrants", & seek *legal* measures to identify, surveil, control, & evict them.

"What about Kuki militants"? Well: Kuki militants claim (in theory) that they do not accept the legitimacy of the state, its laws, its politics. In contrast, Meitei chauvinist groups proudly declare that they intend to MAKE laws, SHAPE politics. That's why they're dangerous.

Like the RSS outfits, these Meitei chauvinist groups are reshaping the very landscape of politics in Manipur (& the rest of the country) - by openly building and displaying popular support for a politics of disgust, hatred, and violence towards other communities.

They do this through propaganda that mark minority communities as legitimate targets for violence, because these are "illegals", "infiltrators" as opposed to "indigenous" citizens, & have no place in the embrace of citizenship, of constitution, of humanity.

Now in the case of Manipur (as in the case of Assam NRC) civil society, intellectuals & activists in/from those states' majorities loudly shout down any attempt to talk about latent chauvinism, xenophobia & bigotry being weaponised by the BJP.

But we do acknowledge that the latent chauvinism, xenophobia, casteism & bigotry in Indian society in general is a major resource for the BJP's politics. Why such haste to stop us from doing the same regarding Assam or Manipur?

The gate-keepers insist that their state and society is exceptional and everyone else must just shut up and sit out this ongoing orgy of hate and violence. But such gate-keeping only diverts attention from the fascists within to democratic allies outside the state.

It's still not too late. Instead of vague appeals for peace, Manipur civil society across communities could lead us in campaigning for the arrest of Meitei Leepun & Arambai Tenggol as the essential first step towards peace.

It's really tempting to think our own communities could not be so cruel & bigoted: all that cruelty & bigotry must be an import from outside. But the problem is so grave because there's support inside for bigoted & cruel politics; can't fight this without first facing it.