Trust yoga and sexual assault: We got called by the police

On the 25th of Nov, I was having dinner with my hubby when suddenly he received a call. We weren't in the mood to pick up calls, but it wasn't that unusual- could have been student enquiries, or the clinic that changed his general screening date. He put the call on speaker, it was the police. The lady officer said someone had lodged a complaint against my hubby for making her feel uncomfortable during yoga class, and asked if my hubby could go down at 1030am the next day to record his statement. The rest of the night was wrecked. We had planned to set up one of our apps but I knew that wasn't going to happen that night. I had to go back to work after dinner for a few more hours, but I was too angry to actually concentrate. I just spewed vulgarities for the first time on social media to release some of the steam. I was also worried for my hubby because he started getting stressed and upset. I kept telling him don't worry nothing will happen, before I left for work. I knew he wouldn't be able to sleep that night.

My hubby remembered on the 23rd of Nov that one of the three girls (I won't be revealing any names) had acted weirdly in his backbend class. That girl had taken my mum's Yoga basic class that was just before my hubby's, and could still smile and receive adjustments like a normal person would. However during my hubby's class, my hubby was explaining how to do camel pose, and even demonstrating how to do the pose, yet she still wasn't able to do the pose, despite saying that she had learnt yoga for a year. The other two students in the class had said they were beginners, and could easily do the pose, but this woman said she wasn't really a beginner, and yet she couldn't do the pose. So as would any responsible teacher, my hubby went to adjust her in the posture. At this point, she didn't yet show any sign of discomfort. 

Class went on, and it was the three-legged downward dog pose. Her alignment was wrong again and my hubby came to adjust her in the pose. She came back from the pose quickly. So my hubby said, are you okay? She said something along the lines of "I'm correcting my pose". Again downward dog and the same thing happened. ''Come on your knees'', my hubby said to everyone, ''please let me know if you are ok with adjustments or not''. No answer. My hubby was already irritated because he was asking yet not getting any reply. The rest of the class went on without anymore adjustments- body language is also a form of communication, and it was obvious that student wasn't comfortable with adjustments. So in order to be safe my hubby just didn't adjust any of the other students as well.

You might think, hey if my hubby didn't do anything wrong, there was nothing to be afraid of. Logically speaking, yes, but my hubby is a foreigner, the student is local. My hubby is Indian, the student is Chinese. Humans are humans, biases exist. We had been spot-checked at Sg-Malaysia customs. (I had been walking a few meters in front of them because they were helping me with my baggage, I suspect if I had walked with them we wouldn't have been stopped.) And on another occasion, my hubby had been brought to the immigrations office when he was entering Sg for the first time. They made me wait more than an hour. Imagine, the first time coming to see me in my home country, no sim card and he wasn't able to connect to the Airport wifi. I waited like an idiot till he finally showed up and told me what happened. And recently there had been a few high profile sexual assault cases in the fitness industry, which had blown up because of social media. And my mum was also involved in one of the cases. Refer to this article for the case:

https://mothership.sg/2020/08/trust-yoga-update/

https://coconuts.co/singapore/news/yoga-instructor-investigated-for-sexual-misconduct-trust-yoga/

https://www.asiaone.com/singapore/i-cannot-stay-silent-student-alleges-trust-yoga-instructor-molested-her-during-session

According to my mum, till now, the police still hasn't interviewed the 2nd witness for this case (She was the 1st witness). It has been a few months already. Who on earth still remembers? So all of us suspect they are waiting for things to cool off, or for the yoga teacher's employment pass/contract to expire so that he will go back to India and the case can grow cold.

Right now from what I heard, the yoga instructor is not getting any pay from the yoga studio, and his housemates are helping him pay for his rent. So glad that at least he still has some support here in a foreign country. He had asked the studio if he could help to clean the studio and get some money from it, but the studio said they didn't want students to catch him in the studio. He told them he would come early before studio opens or late at night after closing. The studio refused. 

I had been extremely pissed about this case because I knew the other side of the story. Everyone on social media had supported the alleged victim because there were so many other similar accounts. And she was female. In conservative societies, men are supposed to 'keep it in their pants' because 'men can't be trusted'. However I have seen my fair share of hungry women. Personally, I'm not restricted by this sort of gender bias, and in a yoga class that is taught by a foreigner, I don't see how the instructor has that much power over the local students. Any wrong move can mean a loss of income and a ticket back to homeland. Yes there can be cultural differences, leading to miscommunication and conflicts, but using the excuse of the teacher having authority in this case just doesn't seem logical. You are no longer in primary or secondary school. You are an adult fully capable of consent. You are an adult fully capable of drawing your boundaries. 

Another reason I went bonkers about the case was because people kept saying we have to believe all victims. There were two main types of victims, those who said they had been assaulted (one said she had been grabbed and almost kissed), and those who said they were unsure but later became sure when others came forward. It is an obvious case of eating the forbidden apple, where those who hadn't thought much or were unclear about their experience suddenly learnt from others that it was a case of sexual assault. As an adult, if you are unclear about such things, it just means your principles are grey. You don't know where your boundaries lie. It's not your fault, and we all learn along the way, and you might need therapy, but the law tends to be more black and white. A lot of the girls who reported to the police were the ones who had been unable to get their refunds back, so they resorted to calling the police. Isn't it an obvious case of revenge? As for the grabbing and kissing, it was one of the staff who told the alleged victim that he had seen it happen. That staff no longer works at Trust. No one thought he could say all this, but this consultant would disrupt class just to show a potential client the PT room, and before he left he came so close to my mum as if wanting to physically assault her (because my mum refused to shake his hand- hello COVID leh). He told my mum that she was interfering too much in the case. To me he is Satan's child. 

One thing the alleged victim did was to post pictures of the alleged yoga instructor adjusting students in their poses. There was one photo where she circled the instructor's private area, and said that he was having a boner. Anatomically, it wasn't even a boner, but she insisted it was. And don't you find it weird that she looks at men's private areas? That in itself is such an invasion of space. And also shows how dirty minded she is. She also posted photos of other Indian yoga teachers making adjustments that seemed really intimate. Local and international teachers, dead and alive. There were two types. One was photos that seemed to be intimate or inappropriate, but was actually not, just that the angle made it seem so. The other type was of older and dead instructors who had been accused of sexual assault. And perculiarly, those assaults happened in broad daylight, because the students had become so brainwashed by yoga that they couldn't even set a proper boundary for themselves. I'm not supportive of this type of instructor, and in the moment people can truly be unaware, but if you allowed it to happen, you allowed it to happen. Both are in the wrong. Baseline, you are an adult, you were not held at gunpoint. Why do conservative cultures emphasize modesty so much? Maybe this is the reason. You might never be aware when you are so in love with someone or something, and might bend your principles a little too much. Worse so if you have unclear or no principles in this aspect. 

The alleged victim also posted another video of a Caucasian male yoga teacher supporting her in a yoga pose. She said it was the proper way of adjustment/assisting. Yet the video showed him running his hand across her entire thigh. Are you racist? Indian teacher cannot touch, Caucasian teacher ohhh please touch me so much. 

Back to my hubby's case now. On the day of giving the statement, the police officer was late. 1030am was the appointment, but by 1115am she was still not at the station. So I called her. I was irritated because I needed to pee and I was really hungry as well because the both of us only had a small glass of banana shake in the morning; partially because my hubby had no appetite because of the call from the police. I said to her, where are you, why are you not here yet. She was confused, I hadn't introduced myself. I said I was my hubby's wife. Then she said, oh why are you here? You know you can't go in with your hubby to record his statement? I said I am his wife, why can't I accompany him. English is not his mother tongue.

The next reply kind of amused me. 

She said, oh my colleague can speak tamil. My hubby doesn't speak tamil, I said. Then she said she has another colleague who could speak Hindi.

I had my arms crossed and put on a black face when she finally arrived, but she apologised and said it was last minute that she had to drop some things off at court. I forgave her. Then she brought us into the interview cubicle and let my hubby tell his side of the story. She then apologized to me again and explained that unfortunately the canteen was closed today, and that her colleague was also sick, but if needed, she could get an interpreter if we were willing to wait. I told her if she could understand my hubby then we wouldn't need one, so the both of them went into the office to record the official statement. My hubby showed the yoga poses that had been involved, and even adjusted the police officer in the poses. Haha.

When they came out, the officer asked me if we had the contacts of the other two student witnesses. That was when we checked in classpass and realised the student who reported my hubby actually indicated that she had missed class. For those who don't know, classpass gives out free trial classes (15 credits) for a week, but if you indicate that you missed class, you would have to pay some fees. 

So now that's over, my hubby's right arm also stopped shaking. It had been shaking ever since he got the call from the police. What is there to be afraid of if you didn't do anything wrong? Easy for a local to say, but my hubby is a foreigner. And a minority. My hubby told me if he had to go back to India, it would be of his own accord and not because Sg sent him back. I told him I would go with him and give up everything I had here if Sg would do anything to him. Sg has nothing. It only has people. If the people can't even have the most basic moral standards, then what is the use of staying here? (I knew Sg wasn't gonna send him back though.) 

The police officer told us not to worry, but suggested we install a cctv camera to protect ourselves. I've decided not to, because 1. Trust yoga had cctv footage that proved not to be incriminating, but the issue still blew up because of social media and the number of people who shared similar accounts of being sexually assaulted; 2. my dad has been operating his own studio without any cctv for more than 20 years. This suggestion kind of also reminded me of the time when I was studying in Beijing and police officers suddenly told us that we should install CCTV cameras in our living room (apparently for our safety because all of us were females). In the end we didn't because there wasn't any law stating that it was compulsory, and I think we kinda also forgot about it because the police didn't come back after that visit. 

Social media was bombarded with the many personal accounts, yet one Instagram account that supported the alleged victim got reported and was banned from replying to comments. I had commented on the video that was posted, telling her not to spread false news especially if she didn't know what had happened that day. But I didn't report her. Even when I was slammed like crazy by others who had supported her, I didn't even consider hitting the report button. There was one woman who went crazy and said I was ignorant and knew nothing about sexual assault, and continued to insult me without providing any educational material... Whatever, but it kinda worried me that she was one of the speakers in the women's circle, and she had the credentials. Gosh what a scary place. (These materials don't exist anymore because the ig account has since been privated, and the woman who insulted me also blocked me.) 

What they advocated was to 1. believe ALL survivors, and 2. punish ALL the accused (whether wrongfully or rightfully), because they feel there are too many sexual assaulters at large due to the lack of reporting. Another perspective was that because social media is not court, we should be providing support to victims/survivors, instead of assuming innocence until proven guilty. 

I'm fully supportive of believing survivors, but I really don't like when people lump rapists, molestors and those who fall in the grey area all together. There were many reasons as to why I didn't speak directly to the alleged victim. One of them was because I know it was inappropriate. 

In the case of a grey area, she might have felt assaulted, but at the same time the instructor might not have thought he did anything inappropriate. Especially when the victim didn't say anything or act like anything was wrong. If you don't communicate, not everyone is that sensitive to know how you are feeling. I can believe that you felt assaulted, but I can also believe that the instructor didn't think he did anything inappropriate. Because it was a grey area as to what is socially accepted. However I didn't believe he touched her crotch though, because the CCTV didn't show that.

Innocence till proven guilty. It can be very dangerous for society if it were the other way round, especially for smaller cases that don't cause death. Because being good becomes valueless if we falsely punish someone. It means as long as we have money and connections, we can do anything we want, since we will be able to get out unscathed. Or worse, people won't feel the need to stick to the law, because it becomes too easy to be accused. They must as well commit crime instead of be wrongfully accused. And in this case, it is a bias towards women and against men. Meaning it further accentuates the gender divide.

To further validate that what the instructor did lies in the grey area, many of those who came forward to share their experience at Trust said that they didn't know at first what the instructor did to them was inappropriate (e.g slapping their butt cheeks. lol it sounds so bad in words but I can imagine how it isn't in reality.) Some said they thought it was an accident. Personally I don't think it will feel like an accident if it was done on purpose, especially when many of his students came repeatedly for class. Accidents don't happen more than 2 times, unless you let it.  The alleged victim said she had a 200h yttc (which has 0% failure rate), and has been practising yoga for some time, so she claims to know what proper adjustments and assists looked like. The simple answer is, no, she doesn't know. The fact is, one yttc and a year or two of yoga practice is not enough to let you know. Imagine if I only learnt chinese medicine for 2 years, and I come out to teach it. Without knowing there are many schools of thought for Chinese medicine, I can easily misguide anyone.  

This article is proof that these so called YTTC teachers have skewed knowledge in the world of yoga. 

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/in-focus-sexual-misconduct-sports-industry-yoga-13471424

Posted in a major news channel. That is how lacking in standard these news channels are. If it were to be posted in Today, I'd be like aiya whatever. But CNA. *Shake head roll eyes*. 

Extracted from the above article: “I realised how many of these things were so common, and the way it was done is very consistent,” said the 29-year-old.  “I would say that’s the main catalyst. Because before that... I had no idea what I went through was assault because you can be assaulted without even realising.”

It was so similar to how in the Bible, Satan convinced Adam and Even that God was hiding knowledge from them, and once they ate the forbidden apple, suddenly they realized they had been sexually assaulted all this while (since they were naked all this while). Fine it wasn't written like that, but similar. Baseline: it is a grey area. Either step out of the grey area and never encounter all this, or step in and acknowledge the risks.

“We assume that … nobody wants to be touched, because it is their body, number one,” she explained.

“First, before I even approach that person, I'm asking myself: ‘Does she need the assist - Is she in danger? Is she going to be injured? Will she benefit from that assist?’ … And then after that I approach her, I ask her: ‘Would you like to be assisted? But feel free to say no at any point in time'. You still give client right of refusal.”

Should an assist be required, instructors will also have conversations with clients to explain how they will assist them. These interactions continue throughout the session, said Ms Chen.

“It's a very long conversation but that’s what’s missing … conversations between facilitators and their clients,” she added. 

There were parts in the article that touched on assisting in gym training. I won't be touching on that (lol pun not intended) because the nature is quite different. For the part which I highlighted in a darker shade, I have serious problems with this. You can brand yourself as a no-touch studio, but there are studios that are adjustments based. There are students who expect to be adjusted, and come to such studios. So the fact that this article is so skewed, just shows how low quality it is. We don't come for practice to have long conversations. We come for practice to do practice. Less talk, more practice. That is the difference between professionalism, and acting. (Yes it is an insult.) Conversations are fine, but why do we need LONG conversations? It is just a matter of Yes and No. Do you need convincing? Are you doing negotiations? Learn about the concept of TRUST. These conversations are merely there to protect studios in the eyes of the law. If you trust your instructor, these conversations aren't necessary. Unless you have a hidden injury or whatever, then you should inform your instructor. You are not doing a major surgery. Even in major surgeries, the conversations are there mostly to protect the Dr. Most patients don't even know half of what they are getting into. That is why trust is so important. If you outsource services, you need trust.

After she spread on social media that the adjustments at Trust were dangerous and inappropriate, more and more people started coming forward to share that they had similar experiences. The fact that people didn't know at first, meant that it falls in the grey area. If someone raped you (as an adult), you wouldn't say you didn't know it was inappropriate or an accident right? That's why rape is not the same, and the word sexual predator shouldn't be used as a blanket term. Another reason I could think of is because people didn't really have strict boundaries. It is yoga after all and physical adjustments are sometimes necessary. People allow their thighs to be touched in an adjustment, for the sake of improvement and also safety in their practice. And if they don't set their boundaries straight and tell the instructor that they feel uncomfortable in certain adjustments, then these boundary lines will slowly fade away. 

People say that it is a matter of power play Like the patient and doctor relationship. I can agree on this for technical movements, but for touching areas off limits to others, I think as adults there isn't a power difference. Even as a patient, you can ask for a female Dr if you feel uncomfortable with a male Dr. You can switch Drs if you feel uncomfortable with the current one. We are not kids, we are adults that know what is appropriate FOR OURSELVES. There is no major difference in knowledge level for this because it is YOUR body. If you allow yourself to sleep with an instructor or your boss to get that income raise or improvement in practice, then even if the boss or instructor is morally skewed, you are not any much better. 

Even so, there are still grey areas. Such is the adult world. If you were a minor, things would have been much more straightforward because minors cannot consent. Adulting comes with its own set of risks in decision making. Whether to go for that job, that yoga class, that hdb flat, that business opportunity. A wrong decision results in losses that can only be self-born. In the issue of sexual assault, we want to make society as safe as possible to minimize such risks. Which is why people advocate believing the survivors because it tips the balance against sexual predators. It's an ideal, going back to the garden of Eden where Adam and Eve could walk around naked and nothing would happen. Realistically it's not possible, unless you want a society that has negative birth rate lol. Desire exists. (Tell me about how many ppl can't give up meat even though it's bad for their health, the environment, and a total hell for the animals.) I'm still not saying that the Trust instructor had a desire for students, I believe his was a case of miscommunication, difference in culture and teaching style, I'm just talking about society at large. There is a lot of underground sex going on, which might go against our own moral compasses, but many of those are consensual. Such is the adult world. Consent is everything. We can put in restrictions, but over-restriction builds a black market.

Why I believe the Trust yoga incident was a case of miscommunication is because the instructor has students who hug him and fling themselves at him, yet he has always been very professional. Students with voluptuous curves. Professional or is it that he's just too tired? 60-70 PT in a month and group classes. YOU try it. Even during parties he can't wait to go home to rest. Why work so hard? Because they just need to work a few years in Sg and go back home to live a good life without work. Unless they intend to set up their own studio. 

My hubby doesn't like to keep secrets from his mum, so he told his mum about the police call. His mum couldn't sleep for a few nights. Even after reassuring her that the police told us not to worry. She said in 30 years nothing happened to my hubby in India, yet in 10mths of being in Sg such a thing happened. India was better she said. 

TTFN