Daily Times

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?

Actually, who are you not to be?

You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world. There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.

We were born to make and manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” — Marianne Williamson

As the year 2013, full of its trials and tribulations drew to an end, Pakistan made the headlines, yet again, but this time for good reasons. The Chief Justice (CJ) of the Federal Shariat Court (FSC) has done us proud. For the first time in history, ever since its establishment over three decades ago, a woman judge has been appointed to the constitutional forum, which examines and decides “the question whether or not any law or provision of law is repugnant to the injunctions of Islam, as laid down in the Holy Quran and Sunnah of the Holy Prophet.” The CJ of the FSC, commenting on the occasion, reportedly said, “It was a historic oath-taking ceremony today when an able lady judge joined the Shariat Court…There was no bar in the constitution to make a woman the judge of the Shariat Court and there is no discrimination between men and women…I took the initiative as it would send the message in the world that we are enlightened people and would dispel many misconceptions.”

When I was in labour with my first baby, there was a terrified woman in the same room going through the same ordeal, but worse. She had seven daughters and was about to give birth to her eighth child. With the axe of divorce hanging over her head, the sheer intensity of the labour pains had become insignificant in comparison to the pressure and threats being exerted by her husband and his family. I, on the other hand, had known that I was carrying a baby girl and was ecstatic — her room had been planned, as was the rest of her paraphernalia, in pretty shades of pink. A daughter was something I wanted; being the only daughter, the rest of my siblings being boys, I was swathed with love, mostly unspoken but felt and seen. As I came out of the delivery room, I saw that the woman had delivered her baby too. It was a boy. There was immense relief on her face; there was no other emotion, which I could read. Her baby boy lay in a cot next to her bed, clothed in the most ridiculous embellished baby clothes I had ever seen in my life! He slept, crowned in a funny, multiple-cornered hat, covered with gota. The proud father, bursting at his seams, kept popping his head through the door, strutting like a peacock about to engage in a mating dance!

It enraged me then to see him gloating as though he had created something divine. Prior to the delivery, I had tried to console the woman by imparting my knowledge of biology and how the sex of the child is determined but she could not process the information being deeply mired in the rot and filth, which is fed by an ignorant and self-serving society. The blame of giving birth to a female child lay with the woman, while the Oscar for delivering an heir to even a pauper’s throne went to the man, always. Galling as it was then — it still is now when I come across the ignorance prevalent around me — why are children not taught simple math? The woman carries the XX chromosome always while the man carries the XY. It is the Y, which determines the sex of a baby boy. Either way, there is no responsibility on the woman, if one was ignorantly looking to put one, for determination of the sex of a child. Blame the man, if one must!

We talk a lot about female empowerment but is not knowing about the biological miracle of conception, birth and one’s own body directly related to empowerment? We have a holy book, which has explicit passages on conception and intimate relations between a man and a woman, yet we choke when we even have to utter the words ‘sexual and reproductive health’. Why? There are no issues when men watch the horrific amount of free, limitless and un-banned pornographic material or when entire walls are dedicated to their male anatomical issues, yet we cringe at the thought of teaching our daughters and sons about their own bodies?

The World Health Organisation (WHO) currently defines sexual health as “A state of physical, emotional, mental and social well-being in relation to sexuality; it is not merely the absence of disease, dysfunction or infirmity. Sexual health requires a positive and respectful approach to sexuality and sexual relationships, as well as the possibility of having pleasurable and safe sexual experiences, free of coercion, discrimination and violence. For sexual health to be attained and maintained, the sexual rights of all persons must be respected, protected and fulfilled.”

There is a growing need for women to become aware that their sexual and reproductive rights are an integral part of their basic human rights. Without advocating ‘lewdness’ as many may blame me for, we need to propagate the rights, already guaranteed under our constitution, which are critically linked to sexual and reproductive rights, and include: “the rights to equality and non-discrimination, the right to be free from torture or to cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment, the right to privacy, the rights to the highest attainable standard of health (including sexual health) and social security, the right to marry and to found a family and enter into marriage with the free and full consent of the intending spouses, and equality in and at the dissolution of marriage, the right to decide the number and spacing of one’s children, the rights to information, as well as education, the rights to freedom of opinion and expression, and the right to an effective remedy for violations of fundamental rights.”

Why should a woman shrink and hide her light to protect the complexes of insecure men? Why are we frightened of light, of being enlightened? Secure men, like my father and husband, let their women shine while they stand silently in the shadows watching. “How does the meadow flower its bloom unfold? Because the lovely little flower is free down to its root, and in that freedom bold.” — Listen to Wordsworth.

The writer is an advocate of the High Court