“Empowering Women, Empowering Humanity: Picture it!” The theme for the International Women’s Day 2015 reiterates the principle that women’s empowerment lies at the heart of the empowerment of humanity.
Empowerment aims at, and is consequently reflected by women’s participation in all spheres of public and private lives. Only when the creation of opportunities aimed at provisioning equal and equitable share in economic, social, cultural and political decision-making is complemented by the creation of conducive environments enabling women to access those opportunities can women’s empowerment be realized in practice. Otherwise, women-empowerment policies will be redundant and reduced to an analogy of inviting women to a buffet, with dishes served to their liking, and then lining the subsoil of the pathway connecting the entrance to the buffet table with a minefield.
As has been the fortunate tradition of progressive societies, the International Women’s Day 2015, like past commemorations, will witness the world celebrating womanhood. Society will trumpet women’s rights, recognize the need for gender equality, and express their vision of a world where women can freely exercise their choices, without fear of violence, discrimination or stigmatization. There will be speeches, rallies, talk shows, articles, and Facebook and Twitter posts, even Hallmark greeting cards. Yet, every woman out and about on her day, be it a journalist, student, a participant of the rally, a mother, a daughter will undoubtedly start worrying about her safety as soon as the sun starts setting.
Ashika Tamang asks: ‘Men are in power everywhere. Why do you re...
Empowerment feels like a far cry, a luxury, when a right as basic, inherent, inalienable, and fundamental as safety cannot be guaranteed. Every second, a woman is getting raped. The five seconds it took me to write that down, five women in the world have already been violated. Every woman, out of three, will be subjected to violence, be it physical, psychological or emotional. It’s not a mere statistic you read off this paper. It’s a brutal reality, for every woman out of three in the world.
And yes, when we’re talking about the women of the world, it’s not only the women in Africa, or some other far-off continents, distant and unknown. It’s also the women in our lives, in our families: Our mothers, grandmothers, daughters, sisters, wives, nieces, aunts, friends, classmates, colleagues. And one out of every three of these has already been or will be victimized in her lifetime.
However, these atrocities aren’t what I consider the hypocrisies of our society. Crime is pervasive. Crime is a tragedy. If A gets murdered today, society will shed tears for the bereaved and stigmatize the murderer. What’s hypocritical is that crime against women, specifically sexual assaults, is interpreted with an entirely different shade.
The first question society raises with regards to a sexual assault will be with regard to the victim’s appearance, the inches of her clothing, her character, whether or not she was into drinking or drugs, and her sexual history. Rarely will the initial questions be about the perpetrator. The socio-cultural indoctrination that forms the basis of such behavior stipulates that it’s the woman’s responsibility to safeguard her from rape, assault, harassment; stalking and abuse because men will be men, and are genetically hardwired not to have any control over their sex drives, thus they can’t possibly be at fault. Rape is painted like a crime of provocation, such as that in the case a 40-year-old man having raped a 14-year-old girl, it’s the girl who must’ve lured and provoked him with her “slutty” behavior in such a manner that the poor man couldn’t help himself but rape her.
I don’t negate the necessity of prudence amongst women. How a woman dresses or acts is not an “invitation” to whistle, cat call, and taunt, harass or assault her. Yet, when you’re aware of how perpetrators wrongfully interpret a miniskirt or a hug or a glass of wine as an ‘invitation’, one has to be careful. There’s a thin line separating common sense from courage. You don’t drive without putting a seatbelt on, or leave your home without locking it.
We can’t change the fact that there are sexual perpetrators. There will always be. I concede that parents, and teachers, and society are justified in expecting women, and not only women, but every human being, to take certain precautionary and protective measures to safeguard oneself from being a victim of any crime.
Men aren’t born violent, nor rapacious. It’s the misguided socio-cultural environment that causes people to become one. But manhood shouldn’t and can’t be used as an excuse to justify violence against women. For, despite all the evidence to the contrary, women believe in men’s humanity and worth. All we’re asking is that society, of both men and women, believe in a woman’s worth as well.
This very expression of faith and respect, however, can’t be inculcated unless our sons and daughters are brought up in an environment where they realize the equality and complementary nature of their rights and duties. It’s the responsibility of the parents to educate not only their daughters but also sons about morality, ethics and respect.
Empowerment begins from home.
The writer is an undergraduate student of law at National Law College, and Youth Activist Council Member (YALC), YUWA.
