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The next time you rejoice and celebrate women empowerment , take a moment and think about the fact that the next time you get your henna done for Eid , some 12 year old is getting hers done for her marriage. While you are contemplating college majors , 276 Nigerian schoolgirls were kidnapped by extremist militants for having the audacity to attend school.
Beyonce thinks that girls run the world but is that really the case ?
Perhaps she needs to take off her rose tinted glasses and step into the real world where the majority of poor people are composed of females. Women own 1% of the world’s land , earn only 10% of the world’s income , 87.5 % of them are illiterate and one dies every two minutes during childbirth.
Yes , we earned the right to vote and own property but what gave men the right to decide what we can and cannot do. How can we celebrate our freedom when rape is still attributed to everything from women’s clothing to her choice of food , everything except the disgusting perversions of men. And those who dare to bring the gender backed injustices to light are branded as men haters or feminazis. Because wanting women to be treated as human beings is just like invading Poland.
Why do we need to remind men that they have a sister/mother at home ? Why can’t they treat another human being with a modicum of respect without being reminded of her similarities to his family.
Why can’t a women be just a women without being reduced to labels attached to how they relate to men.
And it’s not just men who are trying to stomp down our rights and silence us , it’s other women too.
What are mothers teaching little boys about girls if it destroys a little boy to be called as a girl. The violence that boys are taught in order to be men is the same thing that keeps us up at night worrying about our daughters. From a young age , girls are groomed and tailored to meet the expectations of a pretentious groom who looks like Danny DeVito but expects his wife to look like Scarlet Johansson.
It’s our mothers who drill into her heads that our worth is decided by how fair our skin is . Why can’t we be lovely without being fair.
It doesn’t matter if you have a Phd or a successful job as long as you are fair and why does society get to decide what a real man or women is ?
A man who cries and wears pink is still a man and a women who cusses is still a woman.
Why can’t a women do what she wants to do without being judged by the society. A society which cannot make up its mind . A veiled women is being oppressed while a women who wears the clothing of her choice is called names. Why don’t men go on and solve more important issues instead of dictating the size of a women’s skirt. And even when women wear men-approved clothes they get assaulted and molested because no matter what they wear , “ they are asking for it” . It’s a man’s world because while sons are told to have fun , daughters are told to stay safe. We promote a culture where if a man says no , it’s the end of the discussion while a women’s no is the start of a negotiation and that too in the best case scenarios because rest of the time it doesn’t matter if a women says yes or no , men will do what they want to do.
When it’s not the society , it’s the media bringing women down and objectifying them. Everywhere we look the woman is portrayed as the damsel in distress while the man comes to save her so how about portraying reality for once where women prove every day that you don’t have to be a knight in shining armor in order to save a life.
So Stomp down on the culture that tells you to act like a lady , that makes you apologize for not being able to cook and where “choorian pehan lo” still continues to be an insult. Men wish they could wear our bangles and be as fierce as us. Get rid of the culture that lets Tv characters like Khirad set unfair , demeaning standards for women , where characters like Bella Swan set out to wipe years of feminist movements with their clingy codependency on their boyfriends and instead promote characters like Hermoine Granger , who makes sure that Harry Potter continues to be the boy who lived , Christina Yang who doesn’t let any man come between her and her job.Teach little girls to idolize the Amal Clooneys of the world instead of the Marilyn Monroes.
We have suffered immensely , indescribably and constantly at the hands of patriarchy and shouldn’t have to do anymore We don’t demand for a world run by women , we just want men and women to stand side by side , we want girls to have a chance to be born , we want them to grow up in a world where they don’t have to constantly fear for their safety. We look forward to a world where we are more than a Mrs. Someone and no one asks what the victim was wearing.. Its 2015 and I still feel the need to write such an article. Why? My sister Suffragettes didn’t struggle and win my right to vote and own property just so millions of girls were killed , abused , harassed and victimized every day and yet here I am I am not equal to a man. I am not represented Fairly. I don’t believe in sexism or gender superiority .I just want a world where women feel free to be women without being ostracized.
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