Sex, abortions, divorces: Why do we love judging other people’s lives?

Chandrima BanerjeeTIMESOFINDIA.COM
Mar 12, 2026 | 18:24 IST
Image: AI

A Pew survey found that Indians are increasingly seeing contraception, abortion, and divorce as “morally unacceptable”. What happened?

The uncle who lives in the house across the street should have a say in whether you use a condom during sex, whether you decide to keep the baby if you don’t end up using one, and whether you decide to keep the man who helped make said baby.

If that were not true, far more Indians would have said that the use of contraceptives, abortion, and divorce are not moral issues. But when Pew conducted a survey in 2025 across 25 countries, including India, nearly half or much more than half the people surveyed in India said use of contraceptives, abortion and divorce were “morally unacceptable” behaviours.
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