Feminism.
A word that stands for unity and equality but is often addressed with
conflict and controversy. I am a Feminist. I believe every human
being should be a feminist. It makes no sense to me why Feminism is
seen as a system of belief that one can choose to either believe in
or not. Feminism is not a belief, it’s a way of life. One needs to
accept it as a basic necessity next to food, water and shelter
because Feminism means Equality.
Equality
is not something that one can just decide not to believe in. Equality
is not like Religion where you can be a Believer or an Atheist,
Equality is the basic right of every human being and no one can take
it away from you. When a person says that they are not a feminist,
this person is implying that “I am a human being who does not
believe in making other human beings feel human”. If that sentence
did not make any sense to you then worry not because such people who
say they are not feminists actually don’t make any sense.
I
don’t intend on attacking any group of the society and their
opinions because I truly believe in respecting every individual and
what they have to say, but it saddens me when I do not get the same
treatment that I offer because my opinions and suggestions are coming
from me, a girl. Despite living in the 21st
century, an era of progressive thinkers and enlightened teenagers who
know what they are doing and don’t need their parents to nag them
all the time, I have felt the deep routed haunting remains of
Patriarchy that once crept in our society. Of course, not in a very
obvious in – your- face manner but rather in such subtlety that
makes it even harder to recognize it. Microaggressions-These are even
more dangerous than upfront misogyny because they hide behind the
apparent humour and jest with which they are vocalised.
Microaggressions are the comments which are spoken with supposed
light hearted intentions but have serious and offensive implications.
Ask any girl in the world if she has faced these and the answer is
unfortunately positive.
I
really don’t have any solutions to this problem. I don’t know
what is it that I can do to stop this. I try to call it out whenever
I see it or experience it but is that enough? Why is it that Feminism
and its objectives are considered only a responsibility of women? Why
is it that it is only the job of women to strengthen our status in
society and ask for all the rights that we already deserve? Why do we
girls constantly have to take the burden of coming up with solutions
to the problem of gender disparity?
Feminism
sure is about uplifting women but I think that lifting something from
top is much easier than pushing something from bottom. Does that make
any sense? What I’m trying to say here is that we seriously cannot
think of coming on par with men unless we involve them or rather
unless they involve themselves in this journey.
I
think that it will be easier to involve men in this journey towards
absolute equality, if we understand that even though they are major
influencers of Patriarchy, they too are victims of it. Toxic
Masculinity. Yes, that’s the unsaid disease that most men are
inflicted with. They are supposed to be bold, domineering, bossy,
self-assured, in control of emotions and women. Why? Because
Patriarchy meant oppression of women and to oppress women, they had
to become the oppressors. Hence, the characteristics of an oppressor
were a necessity for them to feel like a man and be accepted as one
in the society as well.
Sensitivity,
gentleness, sentimentality, delicateness……be honest, didn’t
these words make you think I was going to talk about Femininity?
That’s how stereo typed we have inevitably become. Men who depict
the aforementioned qualities are regarded as girly, weak, not man
enough. Men are not supposed to cry. “Stop crying like a girl” is
what they are told as children when their basic instinct of shedding
a tear makes them look ‘weak’ and ‘frail’.
Well,
this is not the case only with guys. This happens among us girls too.
Putting on makeup, dressing up, doing your hair, painting your nails,
purchasing beauty essentials, wearing pink and so on, makes a girl
‘too girly’. Wearing baggy clothes, having total disregard for
makeup, dejecting the concept of beautifying yourself and pretending
not to care how others perceive you makes a girl a ‘tomboy’.
Tomboys are supposed to have manly traits hence the word ‘boy’.
I’ll be honest, I was a ‘tomboy’ for a brief period in my life.
The period where I rejected to associate myself with anything ‘girly’
and I felt proud in saying that I am a tomboy. I thought that to feel
like an empowered female, I had to behave like a man, sit like a man,
talk like a man. I can’t tell you how ashamed I feel for having
thought that because instead of taking pride in my femininity, I
considered it to be my weakness. I love watching romantic comedies, I
cry at the smallest of things, I am sensitive and emotional but I
tried my level best to hide these traits as I thought I would seem
weak. Somewhere I feel that I associated these traits with girliness
and I associated girliness with weakness.
This
too is an example of sexism. I was sexist. There, I admit it. I am
sorry, well I should be apologizing to myself…. sorry Suhani, for
making you feel that to be a strong girl, you had to be manly. No one
needs to be something they are not. Besides, this categorisation of
both genders on the basis of the degree of femininity is absolutely
absurd.
Being
feminine or girly or simply just being a girl means accepting
yourself and embracing your womanhood. A girl could like wearing
makeup or wearing baggy clothes, she could like playing the cello or
playing soccer, none of this, however, gives anyone the right to
classify her as a girly girl or a manly girl. She is simply, a girl.
Similarly,
a man’s degree of ‘supposed manliness’ does not define his
strength or lack of it thereof. I think it takes great strength to
show your weakness, hence, a man who can cry is probably stronger
than all the muscular gym junkies out there.
Every
individual has a masculine and feminine side to them. When we learn
to accept both and be proud of both, equally, is when we can think of
ending the sexism in our society. Relieving ourselves from the
expectations of fitting the box that is unknowingly created for every
gender is of paramount importance as only then could there exist
absolute
equality.
By-
Suhani.
Points: 1763
Reviews: 60
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