Daily Times

On 21 January 2017, the peaceful and magnificent marches were held by a sea of hundreds of thousands of people in US cities and some 600 protestsin cities across the world in solidarity with US protesters, a day after President Donald Trump was sworn in. Women’ Marches were reportedly intended not to get gynocracy but to achieve human rightsputting up a stiff resistance to the Republican hardliner.For many, Trump will roll back the rights of women, immigrants and minorities. The marches are a massive display of disapproval of his misogynistic behaviour and his policies of allegedly clamping down on human rights, especially women’s rights.

The march is both an anti-Trump protest and a rally for women’s rights because these two things are very well connected. Trump has played acentral role in abacklash against feminism that has been plannedfor a long time. He hates women overtly, and for him, women are property and ornament. His victory is seen as a triumph for apparent racism as well as overt sexism.

Misogyny, sexism, and harassment are Donald Trump’s striking characteristics. For decades, he has been infamous for his objectification of women and their dehumanisation with sexist remarks. He has been calling women with discourteous words such as pig, dog, slob, and disgusting animal.

One of the celebrities named America Georgine Ferrera addressing the March said, “It has been a heartbreaking time to be both a woman and an immigrant in this country. Our dignity, our character and our rights have all been under attack, and a hardliner president assumed power yesterday. We marched for the moral core of this nation against which our new president is waging war.”

The fact is that if these worldwide women’rallieswereheldduring the USelection campaign, itwould have brought aboutthe revolutionary change in the political history of the US. It may have resulted in Trump’s defeat, and Clinton’s victory would haveundoubtedlypaved the way for the development and reinforcement of feminism all over the world.At this time, no doubt,women’s marches do not have the potentialto topple Trump, but we should make sure that these demonstrationsare not anunproductive and unconstructive initiative. In reality, women organising these marchesin many cities around the world that are overtly expression of solidarity with American womenhave proclaimedthat they have become the uniteddynamism of the world.One of the momentous goalsof the marches isto invigorateand connect womenwho themselvesfeel powerless and unaidedwhen they experience violations of their rightsand dangers to their lives and honours all over the world. It is a message and warning for the violators of women’s rights.It is claimed that after the potentand gigantic marches, women would be seen and heard preferably.

In Pakistan, because of the existence oftrumpismto the epidemic proportion,the situation of women’ rights is startling and apathetic.The undeniable fact is that the incidents of objectifying and disrespecting women are not anunusual occurrence in the country. It looks as if men are legally and socially entitled to make women victim of harassment and abusive language at public places with no fear of punishment.On 20 January 2017, ImdadPitafi, the Sindh Minister for Works and Services, had made derogatory and sexist remarks against MPA NusratSeharAbbasi in Sindh Assembly during the question and answer session.This is the worst example of workplace harassment against women. The incident is worstin this sense thatboth were lawmakers.It shows that effectiveness of laws enacted with an objective to empower women is subject to our success in changing conservative approaches and misogynistic attitudes of males.

In Pakistan, regrettably, the situation is different becauseunlike American and European women, Pakistani women face alack of solidarity and sympathy among themselves. It is generally observed that women do not help and support women who have been made atarget of injustice, discrimination and insulting remarks. MPA NusratSeharAbbasi complained that women lawmakers remained silent when a male lawmaker was making indecentremarks against her in their presence.

It is pertinent to mention here that NusratSeharAbbasi being active and committed politician always raises voice and puts questions in Sindh Assembly on almost all problems especiallyviolation of women’s rights, violence against women, and honour killings.The ruling party lawmakers due to their inefficiency and lack of interest to solve the problems are found unable to satisfy her with their answers related to problems. The fact is that the use of insulting language against her is a well-planned conspiracy to suppress her, silence her and clip her wings as she may not raise questions on these burning issues in the assembly.

The shocking situation of women rights and startlingand ever growing incidents of harassment against women at workplace and honour killings,violence against women, widening gender disparity in education and labour market all that call for women lawmakers, women’s rights activists, female teachersand other influential women following footsteps of American and European women should shoulder responsibility to help and support hapless women, the victims of abuses, staging the protesting marches.In this way, they will be able to create solidarity among women community that cancompel the government to implement laws related to women’s rights efficientlyand can change theextremist mindset, conservative approaches and harsh patriarchal attitudes towards women.

The writer is an academic and can be reached on Twitter @ARShykh