The curse of Eden

Ahh I love Sundays! Not only am I watching a very random Govinda movie (in my defence Sunday television sucks. Not only do I have to wait until Monday to catch Desperate Housewives, they don't show my favourite programme on BBC Food on Sundays. Oh, did I mention I enjoy Govinda movies :p I love the 'bus toh road pay chalti hai' type of Govinda jokes haha)

ANYWHO, during the 'intermission', I came across this ad:




and it made me chuckle. It also gave me some food for thought..Now, Im no misandrist, but I hate the double standards of Desi society. I'm at that point in life where I KNOW that it is not possible for men and women to be 'equal', especially seeing our society and religion. I accept it, yet I don't like it. So it's okay for the son to have a million and one girl friends (not that I condone that by any means) and parents take it light heartedly, it's just a phase after all. Heaven forbid if the daughter wants to marry someone of her own choice. All hell will break lose. I know of some employers who openly state that they refuse to hire any females as they will 'get married and leave and what's the point'.Why, oh WHY are we, as Desis, such two faced hypocrites.

I was at a friend's place recently and her grandmother was telling someone about her grandchildren. When asked about her eldest daughter, she said " MashaALlah say, uss ka do betay aur aik beti hai" ( MashAllah, she has two sons and a daughter). When the lady asked her gran about the youngest son's children, she replied " Uss ki to sirf do betiyan hain" (He only has two daughters). Not only that but her gran sounded positively apologetic when she said that.

Coming from a moderate and open minded family, I was really shocked to hear what she had to say. Some people may dismiss that by saying that she's an old lady and her thinking is outdated. I beg to differ! Even now, in this day and age, social evils like infanticide exist in Desi land. Or, on the flip side of the coin, women keep giving birth to cricket team-esque size of families, in the hope that the all coveted male heir, the one-who-carries-the-family-name, will be born. Why is there so much hatred against females? Even swear words in our culture mostly have female centred meanings.

Even if one overlooks incidents of newly married daughter in laws being burnt alive by their in laws as something that will not happen to most urban Desiites - What about the so called educated women who still insist that their daughter in laws bring a truckload of jahez with them - How does one justify/rationalise THAT?
Incidents of forced marriages, vani, karo kari , marriage to the holy Quran (God forbid) and other such social evils are all done in the name of religion. Don't the perpetrators of these horrendous crimes realise that they will eventually be answerable to God one day?

Who are we, the educated Desiites, to blame the Taliban for flogging women and putting them under chaddar and chaardiwari, when our society has programmed us that male = good and female= evil. When the educated men and women of our society create problems for other women, who are we to point fingers at a bunch of mountain people who've probably never seen a book in their entire life. And who am I, as a woman, to point a finger at men when it is women after all, who will date married men and ruin homes and consequently destroy the children from the broken home. Women in the workplace backstabbing other women to get to the top at any cost. The in-laws ( usually the women) trying to get the daughter in law under their control, because they feel threatened, the scheming aunts making their niece's life miserable. The list just goes on and on.

I have been very fortunate (mashAllah say) to have parents who have treated me the same as my brothers and I am thankful to God for that. I do know though, that it is a dog eat dog world out there and there will be times, whether at work, during marriage, out in court, or even out in the market, where I will be discriminated or treated badly JUST because I am a woman. I very much doubt that this is what God intended. Everyone thinks that praying 5 times a day, fasting, haj (all haqooq-ul-ibad) makes a person a good Muslim. Haqooq-Allah (e.g. not hurting some one's feelings or not causing harm to someone) are JUST equally important as Haqooq-ul-ibaad. Then why are women all over Desi land, or even the world, cursed and treated like pariahs?