I was having this discussion with one of my friends last week. He was of the view that women, whom he had met in his life, which he himself agreed was a very small sample, are in general intellectually inferior to men. It seemed he had not met one girl who could intelligently question something some of his teachers taught. He gave examples of famous CEOs of companies. The male subset of the CEO set is much bigger than the female one, he said. I tried to counter him by providing names of some famous women in fields like sport, music, business, media and politics. Even this did not force him to nudge from his earlier position.
I was quiet for some time, with my mind trying its best to make the knockout argument. During the search for the argument, I happened to think of the most obvious person in our lives. I was reminded of someone whom we all take for granted so easily. I reminded him of our own CEOs at home. The CEO, who works and manages our households, who makes homes out of the places we live in. Our CEOs do not expect much more than our love for all they do. They work when no one is watching so that our lives run smoothly. They make lives so much easier for the menfolk (read: CEO of some chip manufacturing company in the Silicon Valley!) without whom, I do not think my friend's presumed male dominance might last.
Any doubts on who is on top?
8 comments:
Loved it. Here are two links to complement it.
1) http://articlesfromthenetiliked.blogspot.com/2008/09/woman-in-your-life.html
2)http://articlesfromthenetiliked.blogspot.com/2008/11/husbands-nightmare.html
regards
Hi eta ..
Thanks for the encouragement.
I loved your articles too!! They were fun and good.
Anup
I have heard this remark way too often. How many women think on their own feet? How many women question? When I look around me, I don't see too many who do that either. I think your friend has a valid point.
There was a time when women didn't get the opportunity to step into an educational institution. Now we do! We have the opportunity to be empowered, be financially independent, break away from stereotypes. Maybe we are not leveraging this opportunity as much as we should. A lot many of us still turn a blind eye to eve-teasing, sexual exploitation at work, domestic violence, gender discrimination. We still have countries where abortion is not legalized, wearing so-called provocative clothing calls for barbaric punishment! Shouldn’t education empower you to be more courageous? Shouldn’t it make us stand up for ourselves and fight?
Coming to your point Anup, there are many women who run a house beautifully. But how many of them are happy? There are a few who find being a homemaker as their true calling. But, I still find a lot many of them struggling to find a purpose, to make themselves useful and productive in a way that it makes them content. Shouldn’t education be giving us that opportunity? Why are women still so silent? Why are they easily repressed? There are many questions to think about, many things to look into when you look at gender discrimination.
Lakshmi!!
All I wanted to say was that the men you are speaking about did not become what they are out of their own means. There would be many people who have played important roles in our lives (many of them women!). There are certain roles that only women can play well! I meant to say that without the women folk (be it mothers, wives, sisters, teachers or friends), men wouldn't be like how they are now. I don't think we can disagree on that.
About the point you made - it is encouraging to hear such strong words about freedom, choice, and gender equality from a woman. How many times are women allowed to think on their own feet? How many women are given a chance to question something that men say? How many women in India do you think have the opportunity to be educated? There are ills in the society for which you can not blame women alone. The onus is on the society as a whole.
But must admit Lakshmi, the women who can make some difference in this front(eg. you!!) must make their voices heard .. far and loud!!
Anup,
post was great and very sharply written, to make a point.
It was interesting to read the comments to this post. More so, the take of another lady, on the topic.
You know, the comment proves that the main thing holding women back is herself. While there certainly are soceities (religions) that practise barbaric methods to suppress women (presupposing that they need to supressed, indirectly saying they are 'on-top' in the first place), there is an equally, if not larger portion of the women population who have the oppurtunity to purge these soceities of these ills... There is enough opportunity and freedom, if even not in any earth-shattering way but in small, everyday efforts, to make a difference.
Repression is in the mind. Repression is never external- as many women who rebelled against the denial of education to women in Afghanistan will tell you.
Finally, Goodness and strength is not the absence of ills, but it simply IS- an existence by itself. It exists to present the opposite of the all that is decay or degeneration. A country is not evil for the presence of a few evil men. There are the good, the brave and the visionaries.
Similarly, the empowerment of women is not weakened by the presence of the less fortunate, but it gives a reason to believe and to move toward a better tomorrow- where more women can realise that the light they were born into- out of the darkness.
As to who is 'on top'... It is merely a manner of speech... for neither can find purpose without the existence of the other. But this debate is good as it helps 'gain some perspective'. :)
Nice to hear a man talk about it. Nice post, Anup. :)
It is the basic point, which I don't get in your friend's argument. How did he decide the inferiority in the intellect? As far as I understand nobody is perfect, and one who excels in certain things has a shortfall in other areas irrespective of gender. Numbers are always misleading. They definitely are not reflective of "intellect" of whoever it is, man or woman. Like you said our CEOs, our grandmoms may not be tech-savvy people, but they can plan,prepare,execute and cook for a huge amount of unannounced guests in the blink of an eye. Piece of cake for them! Can your friend do that?
Maybe you can tell him to read "A Thousand Splendid Suns" by Khaled Hosseini.I know this sounds cliched and out of the basic argument but nobody irrespective of any criterion should be considered inferior.
Liked the strong words Shankar!
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