People wonder where the society is heading. They point out flaws in the system just for the sake. The other day an erstwhile professor, a doctorate in sociology, was pointing out how the concept of feminism is exploited by the media and the advertisers to show woman as a mere object of desire, how women are portrayed as sensual beings, how their body is used in subtle ways to convey the same cliched meaning time and again. He was pointing out that educated people with whom we expect good intellectual and relevant advertisements exploit the same stereotype of the skimpily clad girl leaving nothing to the imagination, to sell their wares. Let me ask a question: If you are selling a lipstick what aspect of the product do you want to emphasize upon. What does a lipstick represent? Desmond Morris in his book The Naked Ape: A Zoologist's Study of the Human Animal, says that lipstick is used by women to fake the appearance of the labia in their private parts to attract the male partner. With this implication of the lipstick how can one not associate it with anything but sexual feelings. It is a sexual signal as much as a fashion statement. It has deeper meaning than the mere mechanical application of just another cosmetic. So if an advertisement is showing that putting lipstick enhances your odds of getting a mate, then I ask what is so obscene about it? I do agree that the meaning of feminism is twisted sometimes. But in today's world where women have equal rights the mention of insecurity is sometimes absurd. True, women has been abused in the past but this age has empowered her to join the workforce at an equal level with the male, girls get opportunities to study in the premier institutes of learning. The cultural mix of the east with the west is helping the girls shed boundaries, be free and independent. So if you are hearing sir, Mr. Nutty Prof. you were awesome with the knowledge quotient but I beg to differ on feminism in the 21st century.
3 comments:
Personally, I believe that there is a long long way to go before we can claim that an equal playing field exists for men and women. I found that the classes opened my eyes to all sorts of subtle biases and discrimination that goes on all around us. True, in some cases people (like the prof.) become over-sensitive and make a hue and cry about a seemingly harmless marketing gimmick. But seen from a broader perspective, its hard to miss the underlying theme of discrimination and exploitation. And the point you mention about women being free to pursue higher education in premier institutes is refuted by the gender ratio in class (5 girls out of 58). They are the exceptions that prove the rule.
Let me put it this way mate. Sure we have a very skewed distribution of the fairer sex not only in our class or our batch but in any higher professional education course for that matter. But is this because of the gender bias? Let me safely assume that most of us have come through the convent schooling system and the sex ratio is not that skewed back in school, the opportunities available to girl students are the same as those that were available to any of us. To add to this we find this every year that the girls have beaten the boys in the state level examinations on the pass percentage. This further shows that they get ample opportunities to study. But why so few members of the fairer sex make it to IIMs or IITs for that matter does not lead me to believe that there is a gender bias. I cannot say this about all households but surely a majority of the bourgeoisie wants its girl child to get the best possible education, and lack of resources available is not a deterrent anymore to secure the admission.
I do not understand why do we still attribute the skewed sex ratio in these institutions to the only scapegoat we find so convenient viz. the gender bias. There have come exceptional women who have made a mark for themselves in every possible arena.
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