MARCH ON THE WOMEN!
Every year, the eighth of March comes clamouring by in Non-Government organisation India. “Non-Government Organisations” refers to societies and trusts set up to do social work, and they operate primarily on Government or international funding.
The term for these entities, in Hindi, the ‘national’ language, is swayam-sevi sanstha. Swayam means self. Sevi means serving. Sanstha means organisation. The word is a double-edged sword, and very apt as well. Swayam-sevi, can mean ‘voluntary’ or ‘self-serving’. Most organisations are both.
And so, as in the past decade, international Women’s day was largely ‘observed’ with breast beating, wailing, and the Gucci-gartered self-proclaimed saviours of women once again ranted and raved about how everything and its brother were responsible for the ‘exploitation of women’.
Rubbish. Some of the recently made Indian laws are so badly skewered against men, that a day may come when no successful man may want to get married! One example, the so called ‘anti-dowry’ legislation stipulates that in if a woman is perceived as being bodily harmed within the first seven years of marriage, her statement to the police will be considered as paramount evidence. In other words, whatever she says will be gospel. Even if the woman basically is telling a bare-faced lie. There have been several cases, where the brother of the bride is the extortionist, threatening the husband of dire consequences unless he coughs up given sum.
All this ‘female foeticide’ hype and ‘don’t disclose the sex of a foetus’ bad laws. Eyewash. Oriental societies the world over prefer male children. It’s a fact of life.
All the hogwash just won’t work unless the heartland of India -- the great unwashed rural masses -- let their girls out of their houses, educate them, and let them have boyfriends and risk pre-marital sex.
As long as India sets an unduly high premium on the virginity of its women, and lives in a culture of shame and hypocrisy on matters sexual, the girl child will remain a liability, and the female foetus will continue to be rubbed off.
Women are still treated as ‘property’ and the state of her hymen is still integral to her father’s and grandfather’s and great-grandfather’s and brother’s honour
It’s only when the rural Indian woman can really own her own body, when she can make choices as to whom she will marry and on what terms, when she has the freedom to wear a short skirt or a backless choli or a bikini on the beach, when she can flirt or ‘sow wild oats’ like the men, that all this female foeticide and dowry rot will stop.
.And that’s a day not coming soon
And the self-serving hypocritical middle class women ‘social workers’ rushing around to nowhere with their moralistic blinkers firmly in place will continue to exploit ‘Women’s day’ for profit.
Every year, the eighth of March comes clamouring by in Non-Government organisation India. “Non-Government Organisations” refers to societies and trusts set up to do social work, and they operate primarily on Government or international funding.
The term for these entities, in Hindi, the ‘national’ language, is swayam-sevi sanstha. Swayam means self. Sevi means serving. Sanstha means organisation. The word is a double-edged sword, and very apt as well. Swayam-sevi, can mean ‘voluntary’ or ‘self-serving’. Most organisations are both.
And so, as in the past decade, international Women’s day was largely ‘observed’ with breast beating, wailing, and the Gucci-gartered self-proclaimed saviours of women once again ranted and raved about how everything and its brother were responsible for the ‘exploitation of women’.
Rubbish. Some of the recently made Indian laws are so badly skewered against men, that a day may come when no successful man may want to get married! One example, the so called ‘anti-dowry’ legislation stipulates that in if a woman is perceived as being bodily harmed within the first seven years of marriage, her statement to the police will be considered as paramount evidence. In other words, whatever she says will be gospel. Even if the woman basically is telling a bare-faced lie. There have been several cases, where the brother of the bride is the extortionist, threatening the husband of dire consequences unless he coughs up given sum.
All this ‘female foeticide’ hype and ‘don’t disclose the sex of a foetus’ bad laws. Eyewash. Oriental societies the world over prefer male children. It’s a fact of life.
All the hogwash just won’t work unless the heartland of India -- the great unwashed rural masses -- let their girls out of their houses, educate them, and let them have boyfriends and risk pre-marital sex.
As long as India sets an unduly high premium on the virginity of its women, and lives in a culture of shame and hypocrisy on matters sexual, the girl child will remain a liability, and the female foetus will continue to be rubbed off.
Women are still treated as ‘property’ and the state of her hymen is still integral to her father’s and grandfather’s and great-grandfather’s and brother’s honour
It’s only when the rural Indian woman can really own her own body, when she can make choices as to whom she will marry and on what terms, when she has the freedom to wear a short skirt or a backless choli or a bikini on the beach, when she can flirt or ‘sow wild oats’ like the men, that all this female foeticide and dowry rot will stop.
.And that’s a day not coming soon
And the self-serving hypocritical middle class women ‘social workers’ rushing around to nowhere with their moralistic blinkers firmly in place will continue to exploit ‘Women’s day’ for profit.
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