I mute the audio before replaying it frame by frame – in dread, in desperation. I watch the video four times. It is not me. It is my fucking face. Amrita Chaturvedi goes by Amy. Amy identifies as a communist on Twitter her bio omits a cameo on reality TV and millionaire daddy who runs the show at Delhi High Court). When a deepfake porno of her ‘forwarded many times’ by WhatsApp aunties goes viral, the truth finally catches up. On her birthday, Amy is battling a stoning in the digital town square that could cancel even Kim Kardashian. Her executioners? An unhinged cartel of virgins styling themselves after V for Vendetta, except these keyboard warriors are on a merciless crusade to eradicate desi jezebels and Make India Hindu Again. A muscular work where the online turns offline turns bloody, this is not a novel you read but a novel that reads you. Fieldwork as a Sex Object asks every one of us how much we’re prepared to risk for our principles.
