The verdict in Priya Ramani versus MJ Akbar represents both a closure and a new opportunity. The cathartic moment of 2018, which was shared by women who told their stories and those who believed them, has long been replaced by the unsurprising realisation that the world has, by and large, returned to normal. While most of the men accused have been rehabilitated, the immediate consequences for women who shared their stories have been negative for the most part. For women at large, the consequences are more indirect with employers, globally, expressing an unwillingness to hire more women. The case, perhaps, most clearly represented the harsh consequences women must face in a world that is all too forgiving of respectable men with a history of sexual misconduct. The respectability of privileged men has been the bedrock of patriarchal societies and is used as a justification for everything, from sexual misconduct to honour crimes. It is a form of power that revels in delegitimising consensual relationships women forge and refuses to acknowledge the lack of consent in coercive situations. It also allows for unlikely allies across the political spectrum, united in their faith that civil society will collapse if men, despite their disreputable actions, are not allowed to continue with their reputations intact. Since last year, we have seen a renewed campaign to restrict consensual Hindu-Muslim marriages, where local leaders of Hindutva outfits have openly declared that consent of women is a non-issue. In 2017, one Mahmood Farooqui was acquitted of rape by the Delhi High Court on the grounds that a feeble no could be overlooked. Others accused of sexual misconduct, including filmmakers Vikas Bahl and Subhash Kapoor, are back at their trade, collecting laurels even as feminists assess their options in a political landscape marked by a blatant disregard for individual liberty.