The previous post was supposed to have been titled, “Why I am not a feminist” – but the title that I used seemed and felt more appropriate and while concluding the previous post I felt there was a lot more I had to say, and so I left it open. I have thought about this much, and more than I have wanted to (and because of the comment in the previous post apart from other writings) because for one thing there could be very many different ways to approach the issue of women. Indeed if one starts with oneself one may find not a few yucky and peculiarly feminine traits in oneself, which makes pondering or contemplating upon the issue not a particularly pleasant prospect. But I'll save all that for another time...
- for now, I'll take a different bull by its horns.
I’ll begin with a question: what do we mean by equality when we talk of men and women (and indeed any social identity)? Here’s a sober and thoughtful post people might like to revisit. Equality of opportunity– the one that interests me here – in its very basic terms means that everybody has the right to participate in whatever arena of life s/he chooses. Entry shall not be barred on the basis of sex. And so (in modern nations), we have universal adult enfranchisement including the right to vote, the right to work, the right to education, and the right over one’s own body (including but not limited to reproductive rights). These are the very basic ones and there can be many more that other people can and will locate.
Even tunnel-visioned academicians realized that gender (the social identity more than a biological identity) does not function in isolation within a society. So what other identities become important? Class and national origin become two factors of importance within a society. Depending upon national origin (and thereby the specific culture) and class – other identities become important in understanding which females have what rights and what obligations but also concomitantly the rarely broached matter these days - which males are burdened with fulfilling their obligations and must not only do their duties but also keep quiet about what females take for granted because such societies are now going through a very strong phase of the female “liberation” movement. Now let’s see – the feminist movement has had a forty year strong history in the US and political rights were established in 1920. I’ll talk more about what I’ve noticed over the last decade or so about equality but before that two tiny anecdotes.
I saw a little news clipping a couple of weeks ago when the summer finals week was on the run. A prominent US university was lauded because it had strong feminist organizations on campus and had activities planned through the week of final exams during summer. One of the activities was about “women’s rights over their bodies and the right to feel good” – guess what had been planned on campus? Females who were stressed over final exams could go and get manicures done and “pamper” themselves.
Almost everybody will remember (better than I do) about the “slutwalk” that was organized first in Canada(because a male police officer said something stupid and just wrong – both morally and factually) and which spread like wildfire in different parts of the world. The cop who said that women get raped or molested because of the way they dress said something utterly stupid and wrong, yes – but how did masses and masses of women respond to one stupid comment? They decided to walk the streets, and in items of clothing that can hardly be called clothing and they called it a "protest movement"? Now of course I do have my own questions: Why do women dress up so much or dress down and spend so much money and time on shopping to look – let’s say the word -“sexy” and preen about in public? But apart from this I still absent-mindedly wonder why masses and masses of women from Canada to India were so keen to dress up in frankly weird ways and take to the streets because one cop in Canada said something utterly daft and wrong? Should so much attention have been given to one daft remark, in this instance? I mean just imagine what would happen if some of the men got together and started paying heed to what the feminists of different hues have been saying for across forty years?
But I’ll return to the above another time for let’s look at the other side of the picture and get a handle on what feminists like to talk about when they talk about “equality”. Let’s take one of the arenas from those rights based equalities: the right to work. Very well and good. White, middle-class women, at least in the US, following the period of WWII when they had gone out to work in factories and elsewhere with the men off at war (and yes, let’s not forget: boys and men are the ones to be conscripted where conscription and drafting exist – not girls and women)realized during the prosperity of the 1950s that they didn’t want to sit at home and just play house. They wanted to go out and work. So one of the legitimate demands that arose and was made into a law through the provisions contained in the Civil Rights Act, 1964 was that no work place with more than 15employees could discriminate against the woman who wanted to work. And yes, there had been legitimate reasons to consider when hiring women before this. Women do go through days of leave during childbirth and right after – and workplaces did not want to hire employees who might take leave. I’ll consider he fairness and unfairness from another perspective. When it came to bodily rights – women wanted the full right to be able to abort a foetus whether the father of the baby wanted the child or not. The right was considered to be absolute. This was the hallmark jurisdiction that came about through the famous Supreme Court case of Roe versus Wade, 1973. As I pause for a moment I can almost hear women standing up wishing to pelt me with words if not stones. They will claim that a majority of the males did not even want the child and that no matter what, females should have supreme control over reproductive rights because this is a matter related to the absolute right over one’s body. That is not my point however, ladies. I am neither arguing against the right nor for the right in this instance.
My point is – it doesn’t make sense does it to demand rights in certain places (the right over one’s body, as it is called) and privileges in other places (the right to work with full pay)without consciously making room for the fact that we cannot – I repeat -cannot demand “equality” simply because there are places where establishing “equality” between males and females is impossible and rather stupid. I have heard very modern women saying about a couple who are about to have a baby, “they’re pregnant”. Now having a baby is one thing – couples have a baby (or babies). But excuse me, “They” are not pregnant. The female is – not the male. Biologically speaking – this is the fact. We can’t change this bit no matter how politically correct we try to be. On the other hand, I see no reason to side with bands of juvenile feminists who have decided that women who have babies are extra terrestrial aliens if not nasty and repulsive creatures. I see nothing amusing about their jokes. So let’s consider work rights in connection to the right over one’s body. Society then considers women able even if they do go through childbirth (there are interesting anthropological studies on some societies about cultural practices but I’ll leave these aside for now). The assumption is that this biological difference does not make a difference in one’s ability to work. So far so good, I guess. And so a lot of noise about the right to work and equality in the workplace and the right to education paid a dividend in as ense. Within thirty years of the right to education bill being passed in theUS – there were clear cut rises in the number of females passing out from medical school, law school and also those who received their doctorates. So the law did benefit average middle-class women. But that’s not my point.
Let’s look at the bit about “equality” in the work arenas, and a little more carefully. I’ll pick on one aspect although there are plenty of arenas where I can look at and dispassionately. Construction workers, garbage disposal workers, road builders, movers, bus drivers, policemen, firemen, mechanics, truck drivers (this is how almost all supplies are transported), security men, railway men, soldiers, and even pilots actually….Some of these occupations are still 99.9% male or overwhelmingly filled with men. Feminists may grumble again or may pretend this is not their concern. Most likely because they don’t know where I’m going with my point. Well the world is controlled and dominated by some horrible distant males and androcentric norms and values which “privilege” male attributes, they say? Well what if all these men – and in f act all working men went on a quiet two month strike? What would happen? Could someone then please tell me how “equality” exists within the workplace arena, and in very modern and liberal parts of the world? I know of some of the arguments that have been forwarded by feminists of different hues. Women can perform any of these jobs. They are capable. The other argument is that these jobs are higher paying because they are dominated by men, and so women have been kept out of these jobs while yet another argument is that these jobs shouldn’t pay more than the jobs that are dominated by women (I don’t see any reason why a secretary should be paid more than a construction worker but maybe this is just me?). And yes, sure – the exceptional female can become a fireman. And yes, I’ve seen a few women driving buses here and I’ve known one gutsy little woman in ten years who worked as a truck driver, and I’ve seen a few policewomen, and there have been a few women who have been tom-tommed post Iraq(when women entered the US army at higher numbers – but anybody can check the numbers through a basic google check; and considering the low numbers of females as compared to the males, let's not forget that when Abu Ghraib happened, which involved both the military and PMFs - women were immediately involved n the same...so really, how can feminists say that war and violence and brutality exist only because men are around or that we should sympathize with the women because they were/are simply “caught” in the traps of the androcentric norms of war and had to participate in cruelty…? – about war some other day).
I sometimes wonder about different scenarios, for instance females moving from one city to another - because most 'moving' would come to a semi-halt if the males disappeared. Male friends or professional movers would no longer help them carry out and carry in heavy furniture when they are about to move, for free or for a fee. And kind boyfriends would not be around to bring in grocery bags and this while the lovely females walk into their houses with their little handbags, and there would be no men friends nor mechanics to change the tyres on the cars, and how or why would a majority of women and girls dress down and preen in public…?
How can so many women even afford to neglect or be utterly oblivious to the men who keep so many arenas of work going? I even remember one utterly bizarre case which went to court when a fire department said that there had to be a physical test which stipulated the minimum weight that a person applying for the job would have to be able to lift. Women protested. They filed a case that the fire department was being “sexist”. I don’t want to have to spell out the obvious – but just in case some far out ex-friend is reading this post: who would want a fireman who can’t lift a body if need be?
What makes me wonder is that women who talk so much about equality don’t begin to understand that equality doesn’t work when it comes to men and women. I have heard of the other side of the argument too. Equal but different. And about not being equal at all but being much better. This is not my opinion. The way the feminists have managed to forward their collective points of view is something that sometimes befuddles my brains or makes me go ‘tsk-tsk’. No matter how many “brands” of feminism females come u p with – they share a commonality. It spreads across feminist theory of the environment to feminist theories of science being gendered to feminist theories of war to feminist theories of peaceful societies, democracies and totalitarian regimes to feminist theories of sexuality. How is it possible that feminists attack societies as different as US American society and societies like Afghanistan in the same way as though both were and are equally patriarchal andandrocentric? This is like saying that a democracy and a military state are the same because both have legitimate forms of government. So while talking about “male advantages” why not talk about the advantages enjoyed by females in non-repressive states, the kinds of advantages the sort of women enjoy and also abuse?
No matter whether the feminists themselves keep saying that radical, liberal, Marxist, and post-colonial brands are different – they too share a commonality. What they do is this: when it suits them they talk of the averages and when it suits them they ignore the averages, and they blame whatever is wrong and bad on androcentric values and “men this and men that” or that “men have it better and easier”. An exception is counted in the same way – counted and held up when it bolsters their prejudices, and when the exception demolishes their prejudices they would much rather look away or become abusive or quarrel while parroting matter included in a politically correct soc 101 textbook. I know that gender studies (some schools still call it “women’s studies”) has become a laugh within many schools or just politely accepted for now and in some schools it is still held in high esteem yet who would be willing to bet a hundred grand that none of these schools have a clear and firm section on the man who works tirelessly to make human beings more emancipated? And what about the different kind of men who seek to make women’s lives a little better and men who work to simply get societies to function? And who will tell me that gender studies includes a firm section which talks about how average women themselves engage in cruel practices, silly ones and pass these on to their children (both daughters and sons) and take advantage of how they view and treat males, and not because they are oppressed under the shackles of patriarchy (as if this explains anything!)? And who will tell me that gender studies includes a firm and concrete section on the problems faced by men and boys?…and if aggressiveness and unhealthy competition are apparently masculine traits, who’s going to tell me that spitefulness and malice and deviousness and an overwhelming obsession to “look good” aren’t feminine traits?
The one thing I have to give to the big band of feminists is that they’ve got all their grounds covered. They’ll always tell you, “I’m not that kind of a feminist…it’s the other ones who say that stuff…” – but they’ll rarely if ever critique “that stuff” nor say that it needs critiquing nor say that middle-class women need to get off their butts and start whining less.
As for the “right over bodies” and the “right to express one’s sexuality” – this is the one that makes me laugh unless I’ve got steam jets coming out from my ears. This could do with a post of its own. Sexuality now means that females want the right to dress as they please in public and bat their eyelids and curry favours (mostly of material types – expensive dinner dates and gifts) from the males or simply dress to flirt and string the males along for bits of time or it’s meant to make other females jealous. Sexuality does not mean exploring sexual relationships in healthy ways– it simply means the right to dress up and dare to bare what they please and to flirt in preposterous ways in public places. And yes, there are the other feminists who say that they don’t need the males because sexuality can now be expressed through same-sex relations. Males are not necessary since they are only interested in “penetration”. These females are even more ridiculous. I read on Wikipedia that one of the ways feminists could support the inexplicable rush of female readers for “Fifty shades of Grey” is by saying that the book is a moment of liberation because women now don’t need men to experience romance and experience arousal….
I’m wont to say that feminism needs to be done away with and all brands of feminism. Feminists can ask me the question: "don’t you think women are treated badly?" To that I’d say “yes, but so are men and so are children” and I don’t see anybody taking up a special baton to rise up in their defense while there are too many women getting an easy ride playing victims of this and victims of that. And anybody who disagrees or says “give me a break” is either dismissed as being barbaric or as being a softie or a male sympathizer. But why does one always have to agree with the feminists...?
There was this elderly female professor in Calcutta who wanted to leave a feminist meeting ina hurry since her husband was ill and alone at home. Some of her colleagues questioned her feminist credentials. She gently but quite firmly told them that she owed a great deal to her husband as a human being, and not being beside him when he needed her was not her understanding of women's liberation. One could see the incident from many angles, and I could write another five paragraphs about this. Now I’d probably have not gone to the meeting but that aside, the incident in a deeper sense comes back to knowing that first and foremost an individual is always more important and more real in one’s own life and that the exception matters. I wish, at the very least that women would remember this as they go about their lives and their work. I always remember one old boyfriend whom I've not met in many years who has told me off not a few times for my bad habits and pre-conceived prejudices, and yet as I say even now, he has made me a little less of a barbarian and has never let me forget what it means to be human among a few other things.
But this post has already gotten too long, and for those who have managed to read through patiently: here’s a little list of girls and women (either from fiction or from history) whom I like and/or respect and/or admire or I find fascinating along with all else, either for a long time or across the years, and it’s more or less a chronological list (in when I started liking or admiring them that is). I know I’m missing outsome women and girls but this might give an understanding of the kind of females I respect and/or like:
George Kirrin, Enid Blyton, Heidi, Joanof Arc, Florence Nightingale, Anne Frank, Rani of Jhansi, Marie Curie, Mumtaz Mahal, Agatha Christie, Portia, Amelia Earhart, Kira, Ayn Rand, Leslie Bach, Dagny Taggart, Miss Marple, Leslie (from The Bridge Across Terabithia), Meerabai, Clara Schumann, Rosalind Franklin, Helen Keller, Rani Rashmoni, Irene Adler, Indira Gandhi, Abigail Adams, VirginiaWoolf, Emily Dickinson, Cleopatra, Anne Sullivan, Leela Majumdar, J.K. Rowling, Pushpo (from Debjaan), Nandini devi Chaudhurani, Kadambini Ganguly, Dominique, Anandamayi(from the Shiva trilogy), and Tara - and let it be known that more than half of the women on my little list come from reading my friend whose two blogs appear on the right, and over the years or from remembering and reflecting over what he writes or through different experiences.
