Debatable

“You can tell the success of a nation by looking at the status of its women.” – Jawaharlal Nehru

Based on what Nehru has said, how successful is the world as a whole? Debatable.

The world over, we have women involved in every field. They have the freedom to voice out their opinions, their agreement, and their protests. Powerful names thrive in every aspect of society. In politics, we have strong names like Hilary Clinton, Sonia Gandhi, Angela Merkel and Michelle Obama, among others. The business world, in addition to the male pillars, is also supported by women like Sheryl Sandberg, Indira Nooyi, Virginia Rometty and Ursula Burns. The world of sports, thought to be one of the most male oriented fields until a time well within our recent memory, now boasts the names of several women athletes such as Serena Williams, Danica Patrick, Ronda Rousey and Jackie Joyner-Kersee.  We applaud and enjoy the strong performances of female entertainers like Julie Andrews, Audrey Hepburn, Sandra Bullock and Emma Watson alongside their male counterparts. Delving deeper into the history of the world will give you names like Mary Magdalene, Cleopatra, Boudicca, Queen Elizabeth I, Mirabai, St, Teresa of Avila, Rosa Parks, Mary Wollstonecraft, Florence Nightingale, Marie Curie, Eleanor Roosevelt, Mother Teresa, Marilyn Monroe and Anne Frank; these are just a tiny portion of the women who have changed the world and have helped make it what it is today.

These are the names everyone knows, that everyone respects and the names that little girls everywhere aspire to live up to. But, what about Daya? The woman who’s day begins at four in the morning and ends late into the night. The woman who prepares breakfast, lunch and dinner and packs food for her family. The woman who breaks her back every day cleaning her house and doing the family’s laundry. The woman who ends up taking care of every pet her children ever fancied. The woman, who after doing all the work she does, is introduced as “just a housewife”. The woman who her husband turns to in the middle of the night to satisfy his lust, but who just cannot “disturb” her husband with needs of her own. What about Daya and the millions of women like her? We have women present in every field possible, with rights beyond comprehension and yet there are twice those amounts of women who are confined within the four walls of their home, subjected to their ‘traditional duties as a woman’. Women empowerment, the term in vogue these days, refers to the creation of an environment for women where they are given the freedom to take decisions for themselves as well as for the benefit of the society. In the light of this definition, is Daya empowered? Are women in her position, where the man of the house runs the show, empowered? Debatable.

According to Hindu mythology, Adi Parasakthi (etymologically Eternal Limitless Power) – the Goddess or Devi – is considered the Supreme Being. Their sacred texts suggest that She is the ultimate Creator, Observer and Destroyer of the whole Universe. Considering Christianity, complementarians of the modern world argue that the Genesis 1:26-28 and Galatians 3:28 establish the full equality of males and females in terms of status, worth and dignity. Islam women, especially in the Middle East, are said to lead a life of ‘dire oppression’. However, nowhere in the Qur’an is it stated that women are to be trampled under the feet of man. In fact, the Holy Qur’an even provides certain exemptions and rights specifically to women considering their physical and mental situations. So where did this notion of women being inferior to men come up in some point of history, irrespective of caste and creed? Debatable.

A recent issue that had gained a lot of international attention is that of Rupi Kaur, Canadian based writer and photographer, and a photograph she posted on Instagram. The writer posted a photograph on the social networking site, showing herself with blood on her bed and trousers, as part of her menstruation – themed photo series aimed at challenging the myths and taboos revolving around menstruation. The image, which showed Kaur lying in her bed, fully clothed with two spots of blood on her clothes and the sheet was removed from the site twice as it violated the “community guidelines” of the site. The drama that ensued brought Kaur face to face with reactions ranging from appreciation to threats. What strikes one as odd is the fact that pictures of women portrayed half-nude, in which they are projected in lust inducing settings as objects of pleasure thrive and spread on social media, while this image of a woman, fully clothed and depicting a situation which is completely natural and normal, violated the “community guidelines” of the social networking site. This leads us to ask: what sort of a community do we live in? Why has nudity and pornography become acceptable, while a natural human body activity has become sinful, shameful and offensive? Debatable.

Countries like Afghanistan, Congo, Pakistan, India and Somalia are considered the most dangerous for women. However, this statistic does not put a halt on the eve-teasing, rapes and offences against women happening in the remaining 191 countries of the world. Modern society is considered to have progressed to an extent where women revealing their ankle is no longer taboo, as was the case several centuries back. In fact women today have the freedom to dress however they want – in shorts, dresses, bikinis, etc. because it is guaranteed that the world society and its mentality is developed enough to not be driven into a carnal frenzy at the sight of a woman’s skin. A conversation between two young men when a woman clad from head to toe in a burkha passed by, revealed the sorrow of one of them of never having “slept with a burkha clad woman”. Progressed, indeed. This is the ‘modern’ society, which gives the utmost freedom to women in their dressing, which ensures the safety of every individual, male or female. How far exactly has this world society of ours developed? Debatable.

The world as of now has developed beyond belief. Technological advances, the medical discoveries, scientific inventions, international business relations – everything that happens every second of every day has propelled us to where we are today. But where are we? We live in a world where social media is helping people in India connect to their family in Australia or Germany. We live in a world where the youngest of rape victims was a six week old Northern Cape infant, and where, statistically, one woman is raped every 107 seconds. We live in a world where stem cell research has the capacity to cure cancer. We live in world where women are catcalled and groped on public transport. We live in a world where our technology has the capacity to send humans into outer space for research. We live in a word where a 15 year old Pakistani girl was shot in the head because she advocated the right to education for all girls. This is our world.

This is not aimed at shaming anyone – the men of the world or women anywhere. This is just a solidification and expression of a few questions and concerns millions of people share. How progressed is the global community, where technology and fields of science are more developed than the moral radar of its people? Is this the right global mentality to expose our younger generations to? Debatable.

First Step

“I get sad every time I hear a person say ‘I don’t read’. It’s like saying ‘I don’t learn’ or ‘I don’t laugh’ or ‘I don’t live’.” ~ Anonymous 

Every time I read this quote, it strikes home. The power of the written word is immense. To be able to come across a piece of work that inspires you, captures you and takes you to a world of its own is a blessing. My first memory of a book is a giant kid’s atlas I had when I was three or four years old. It was much bigger than I was at the time. I could not understand a word of it – the names of the countries, its features, the tiny compass at the corner indicating directions. I understood nothing.

Yet, I used to spend hours on end lying on top of that book, poring over each page over and over again as a scientist would go over theories for his research. Around the same time, my mother introduced me to the world of literature through the tiny Ladybird story collections.

The world of Thumbelina, Cinderella, Pinocchio and The Three Little Pigs became part of my reality. I fell in love with words, with the magic of it and the fantasy. And then there came a point when I wanted to tell stories of my own instead of just living a fantasy through someone else’s words. So I started writing. And now here I am, nearly 16 years later, still as much and even more in love with words and their world as I was all those years back.

They say the first step is always the hardest. But taking that first step into the world of books and writing has been the easiest step for me. It was a small step, as simple as opening a book and breathing in the scent of words, of a world within and yet transcending our own. But sometimes, the smallest step in the right direction ends up being the biggest step of your life. 

Wouldn’t you agree?