Before We Reclaim A Slur, We Need To Ask Who Pays the Price

"I'm a proud r***i," exclaimed popular Indian content creator and therapist Divija Bhasin, in a video that now has spread like wildfire. It is a slur used to describe sex workers, and Bhasin, like many other women, is constantly attacked with it online for being vocal about her political views. However, is calling herself a 'proud r***i' really an act of reclamation or yet another incident of privilege and ignorance?

According to reports, many underage girls started adding '#ProudR***i' in their Instagram bios in a bid to join Bhasin's movement. The creator was slapped with numerous FIRs and a complaint under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, accusing her of “influencing minors to use inappropriate slurs."

The bigger problem

The issue isn’t only about one person or one video. It’s about the kind of language we are slowly normalis

"I'm a proud r***i," exclaimed popular Indian content creator and therapist Divija Bhasin, in a video that now has spread like wildfire. It is a slur used to describe sex workers, and Bhasin, like many other women, is constantly attacked with it online for being vocal about her political views. However, is calling herself a 'proud r***i' really an act of reclamation or yet another incident of privilege and ignorance?

According to reports, many underage girls started adding '#ProudR***i' in their Instagram bios in a bid to join Bhasin's movement. The creator was slapped with numerous FIRs and a complaint under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, accusing her of “influencing minors to use inappropriate slurs."

The bigger problem

The issue isn’t only about one person or one video. It’s about the kind of language we are slowly normalising, the way certain words carry caste and class histories, and how different groups of people can get away with using the same word in very different ways. 

And when this keeps happening, the meaning of the word slowly shifts, even if the harm behind it doesn’t. The stigma still falls heaviest on sex workers and other women with fewer social protections. That’s why thinking about how we use these words matters more than any single controversy.

The R-Word’s Caste and Class Luggage We Can’t Ignore

The R-word is not new. It has been used for decades to shame and silence women, especially women from working-class backgrounds, Dalit women, and women who do not have social protection or privilege.

For many of them, this word has real consequences, humiliation, judgment, and even violence. It is not only slang. It comes from a place of policing women’s bodies and behaviours.

How Men Escape Accountability

People rarely talk about how easily men use this word. In daily conversations, in WhatsApp chats, or in random fights, men say it without even thinking. Most of the time, no one stops them. Their friends laugh, the moment passes, and the insult starts to feel normal.

This lack of responsibility is a big part of the problem. When men use such words, people make excuses for them. But when women react to it or question it, suddenly it becomes an issue, a debate, a controversy, a lesson in morals. This difference shows us which voices get ignored and which ones are constantly watched and judged.

When Privilege Tries to Reclaim a Word It Never Suffered From

The attempt to “reclaim” the r-word also comes with complications. Reclaiming a slur can be empowering, but only when it is done by the people who have actually been harmed by that slur. Words carry different meanings depending on who uses them.

So when an upper-class or upper caste woman, someone with online influence and social privilege, uses the r-word casually or jokingly, it does not land the same way. She may intend empowerment, irony, or humour, but she is not the one who has historically been suppressed by the word.

Because of this, reclaiming becomes difficult. What feels like confidence to someone with more privilege can feel like being ignored to people who have suffered the word’s worst effects.

If the women most hurt by the word have not taken it back for themselves, then someone doing it from a safer position can accidentally dismiss their real experiences. It can turn a hurtful word into a style, a trend, or a personality, without recognising the heavy pain the word still holds for many.

Language is always changing. Younger women online often play with words, using irony and humour. Some truly feel more powerful when they take an insult and use it on their own terms.

That feeling is real and shouldn’t be ignored. But we also need to be honest about who can use these words without getting attacked for it and who cannot.

What Do We Choose to Normalise Next?

This debate is not about cancelling one creator. It’s about recognising that certain words in our society are not neutral. They come from histories of caste, class, and gendered control. When we normalise them without thinking, we may accidentally reinforce the same structures we claim to be challenging.

The outrage around this incident will fade, but the bigger question will stay: What kind of language do we want to make normal, and who will be hurt if we choose the wrong words?

Views expressed by the author are their own.