None of us are unfamiliar with the disparity that exists between various classes that reside within our society. History is a testament to the fact that equal consideration has never been given to the views of the demeaned classes of our society. The existence of patriarchy, of course, aggravates this situation whereby, the views of the female gender belonging to the lower class are either completely ignored or are suppressed to give way to notions that are utterly absurd. Only a few days ago in Lahore, as I sat in my car, I witnessed an incident that explicitly demonstrates this.
My attention was captured by the voice of a young girl, about fifteen years old and apparently a housemaid, who was complaining that the driver sitting in the car behind ours had taken her photograph using his mobile phone. She also repeatedly pleaded to the man accompanying her to check the driver’s phone to substantiate her claim. On being questioned, while the driver pursued the apparent alternative that was to deny all accusations that were being hurled at him; what was more astonishing was that in a matter of few seconds, the woman who was apparently the owner of the car the driver was seated in, stepped out and began to defend her driver. The alarming part was not seeing her reaffirm every single thing that her driver said, but rather the obstinate manner in which she refused to listen to anything the maid said. Perhaps, a more legitimate response would have been to ask the driver to prove that his side of the story was indeed credible so that the so –called allegations could be dismissed in an unprejudiced manner. The woman who seemingly belonged to the educated elite class, however, not only resumed to hurl insults blatantly at the young maid but also resorted to making personal remarks about her including strings of words such as “Who would ever want to take pictures of a girl such as yours? Have you even looked at yourself in the mirror because if you had, you wouldn’t have such a high opinion of yourself?”
Such ignorance is reflective of how the vast majority of the people fail to comprehend the fact that harassment is rarely associated with beauty, that such attitudes towards women exist not because of how they look but the mere fact that they belong to a gender that is deemed worthy of disrespect; a gender that is perceived as one that is meant to be tormented both physically and mentally, as if it is somehow the divine right of men to subject women to such inhumane treatment.
On another level, the precedence that such obstinate and indifferent attitudes set for the entire society is problematic in itself. Failure to take the initiative to compel men (or one’s own driver in this case) from pursuing such debasing behavior is a flaw on our part, when instead of reinforcing the truth, we blindly support a perspective that is in line with our self-interests and our deeply entrenched obsession with dignity, honor or “Izzat” as we prefer to call it. This inevitably gives rise to a situation whereby every man perpetrating such a crime, does so cognizant of the fact that his actions will either go unnoticed, or the society will simply turn a blind eye to it for the ancient need to uphold their pride.
This parable has other troubling connotations too. By suppressing the views of underprivileged women, we inadvertently end up creating a society in which the female voice begrudgingly recedes to its corner of banishment and women gradually begin accepting their demeaned status. When speaking for one’s rights is inextricably linked to imminent indignity while silence is equated to modesty or “Sharaafat” (which is preached as an utterly crucial feminine quality and is in certain cases made a pre-requisite for them to find a place for themselves in this society), we cast a permanent shadow of silence over these victimized women. We conveniently beckon them into a corner from where they reluctantly learn to acknowledge the fact it is only the male voice that is supreme and worth listening to. The few young girls who wish to have their opinions expressed are hushed, silence is preached as a virtue to them, their role repeatedly defined as that which is confined to the four walls of their homes, their views constantly overruled by the male voice, their will snubbed by men who deem themselves fit to make laws for them and their mindset molded to the extent that they themselves grow up to be mothers who relay similar notions to their daughters. They learn that protesting against the status quo will bring shame upon their families and being outspoken will only earn them the title of immodest little girls that have no “honorable” place in this society. And then it escapes our imagination as to why women who are subjected to such treatment prefer to maintain silence. Until we make a sincere effort to put an end to this ignorance on our part, our concerns about the observed silence of women over tabooed issues such as rape and domestic violence are not only absurd, they are utterly hypocritical. as
