- Jim Sarbh says comment ‘taken out of context’ as he never condoned sexual violence
Bollywood actor Kangana Ranaut has never shied from sharing her thoughts on controversial topics – be it nepotism or feminism, Ranaut has always been vocal about her opinions, often defying the norm.
However, the actor seems to have embroiled herself in a controversy as a video of her laughing at a rape joke shared by actor Jim Sarbh has emerged on social media.
In the video that appears to be from an after-party at Cannes, surfaced late Thursday, Jim is heard saying, “I’d rather be raped by 12 prostitutes than touch alcohol and the Punjabi says ‘Me too, I didn’t know that was an option.”
As Jim completes his ‘joke’, Kangana is seen cracking up along with the rest of the party. However, in a statement, Jim Sarbh clarified that his comments were “taken out of context” as he was enacting parts of a play which was a “dark satire”. He said that he never “condoned any form of sexual violence”.
The video did not go down with fans, activists and followers and several of them took to Twitter to express their disgust and referred to Kangana as a “hypocrite.”
Kangs is A+ grade hypocrite (nothing new) and this Jim Sarbh turned out to be a piece of shit. Rape jokes are not okay… stfu ..??
— BANNO (@Inception700) May 15, 2018
Dear Jim Sarbh/ Kangana Ranaut
Rape jokes are not funny. Rape is NOT a joke. If you tell or laugh at jokes about rape you are a part of the problem. https://t.co/Pk5bSB9zCr— ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ (@karishmau) May 15, 2018
Jim Sarbh is cancelled.
One. He made a hideous joke and included a vital thing called ‘Rape’
Two. he included ‘prostitute’ in that “I would rather be raped by 12 prostitutes…” are you freaking kidding me ? you just stated that they are as equal as Rapists ?
Go get a life man— Fuddu (@_shruti_singh_) May 15, 2018
So Jim Sarbh made a rape joke at #Cannes2018 and feminist Kangana Ranaut laughed over it. Ofcourse twitter feminists haven’t gone mad at her or Jim the way they did over Salman Khan’s comment.
Who knows Jim anyways. Small Fly. No primetime debate material.
— Deepika Bhardwaj (@DeepikaBhardwaj) May 18, 2018
Meanwhile, Kangana was one of the first actors to condemn Salman Khan’s statement when he compared his physical training for his film, Sultan, to being raped.
During a promotional interview for his film with Anushka Sharma, Sultan, Salman had remarked, “When I used to walk out of the ring, after the shoot, I used to feel like a raped woman. I couldn’t walk straight.”
At that point, Kangana had said, “We all agree that it is a horrible thing to say, it is something which is extremely insensitive. But what I would like to say is let’s not encourage the mentality where we want to point fingers at each other and want to feel greater by just running people down by trolling them.”
Nonetheless, Kangana still laughed at Jim’s jokes and what’s worse is that apart from the hideous use of rape in the ‘joke’, Jim even insults sex workers in his narrative.
Jim rose to fame with his portrayal of a terrorist in Sonam Kapoor’s Neerja and was recently seen alongside Ranveer Singh in Padmaavat.
Jim and Kangana attended the 71st Cannes Film Festival for the same liquor brand. The occasion also marked Kangana’s debut at the esteemed Cannes Festival.