Living in the urban establishments in the ancient land of India where female deities are worshiped on such a large scale, day-in day-out we come across news pertaining to sexual exploitation of women. The sexual crimes committed against women is definitely worrisome and the actual nature of these crimes absolutely disgusting. This growing concern and the number of these incidents that are happening, growing simultaneously as we move inch-by-inch closer to “modernization” and this raises a very dangerous question – “Do these crimes come as a byproduct or an added drawback of modernization?”. How valid is this question really? The answer as it seems is that it is not valid because the same nature of crimes is committed against women even in the rural areas, which still to this day covers a large part of the country. The point of difference between urban and rural areas is how few of these crimes are actually reported in the two areas and the difference is big! The victim seldom comes forward.
But to this day and age, can it be confidently said that all women are victims and can never be considered as perpetrators? This is even more doubtful. Now let’s see the other side of the coin. Are all the crimes reported by women as victims, true? The answer to this is the data given by Police Department of New Delhi which says that more than 45-50% of cases are found to be fake and untrue where false claims of rape was filed by women in order to either extort money or just to teach their partners a ‘lesson’ which earlier was a consensual relationship. Take a look for yourselves: here
Then where is the equality we have so often heard being demanded? Certainly not in the small cities. The number of cases where women are biased against and more often than not have to lead a subdued life is in the small cities, villages in India. These are the places that actually require women empowerment. Which begs the question – What is women empowerment exactly? Is it what the modern feminists tell us?
The answer to the second question is No. Modern feminists ask us to completely forego any attachment or positive image we have of the men around us. This is preposterous and unfortunately true. The fourth wave feminist movement in the west presents irrefutable evidence of this fact. If you’re unversed with the term, check this out for more information. The internal fight between the third-wave feminists and the fourth wave feminists a an ongoing one where they disagree on the core values of the meaning of feminism. Let me explain it this way – Third wave feminists are fighting for not being discriminated against in the workplace while the fourth wave feminists are fighting for being bumped up to the higher management positions because of their gender. Understand the distinction. While the third wave feminists says that all they want is not to be discriminated against because of their gender and should be taken based on the merit of their work, the fourth wave feminists say they should have the privilege to work less and still be paid more because of their gender. Any sane person will think this is insane!
Modern feminists claim that “masculinity is bad and responsible for all the catastrophic things in the world”. It feels ludicrous writing this statement, I can’t imagine how anyone can believe it in the first place. That is an immature, reckless and idiotic statement to make! Masculinity is a set of attributes, behaviors and roles that form the basis of functioning of males in the society of the two genders (yes there are just 2 genders as per biology and it’s not fluid). Masculinity symbolizes stability, strength, discipline and integrity while femininity symbolizes freedom, color, creativity and emotion. Both are necessary and both are different. They are not equal and they shouldn’t be equal. Both have their strengths and weaknesses. While masculinity is about focus, strength and discipline, too much of it becomes obstinacy, rigidness and autocratic. Similarly, while femininity is about creativity and emotion, too much of it becomes ambiguity, indecisiveness and disparity. Both are necessary and neither are bad. It’s by a combination of both that a perfect society can be formed and not by putting down one side. By destroying any side, society will collapse into chaos.
If these modern/radical feminists complain that the society is patriarchal, completely dominated by men, women are oppressed everywhere and men are and have always been oppressive, well then isn’t this the exact society which is giving them the platform to express and yell these nonsensical things? Doesn’t that become paradoxical? How can their arguments be valid then? It may not be so simple, but you don’t need special skills or high intellect to identify what’s hogwash.
Food for thought.
Literary Expeditions 