Dear daughters keep screaming, speak up and speak out – Stay safe. Stay strong.
Men and women both may be suffering in a relationship (because who said women who also happen to be humans cannot be demanding difficult, lack understanding, manipulative etc etc) also human beings. But this by no means is an excuse for violence against by men on any woman. Abuse should never be justified. However, unlike men, those who have to bear greater burden of diseases, honour, blame, shame , honour and burden of proof when faced with harm of any form in the chaste space of her family or professional space are most frequently women.
A survivor’s ethnicity, geography, literacy, class, power and prestige influence to some degree the length, intensity, frequency and response to violence. This is not new rather timeless. Whether it was a concentration camp in Germany, North America-bound slave ships or World War II Japanese brothels filled with “comfort women, sexual, physical and psychological violence remain an active weapon against the weak, oppressed and unarmed women.
Generations of women’s rights activists, feminist writers and artists have struggled for equality and social justice.. Tons and tons of documents have been produced from various international forums including UN.
Recognized commitments like the Convention on Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), Beijing Platform for Action 1995 and the Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development Goals(SDG) are in place. These impressive instruments and give birth to pro-women policy dialogues, parliamentary debates and laws . All these, primarily, are meant to endorse that women are also equal human beings and they should not be raped, assaulted, beaten, threatened, maligned, decimated and instead should be treated with respect. Sounds unbelievable! One wonders if one is actually living in a modern technology driven and apparently civilized world?
When a woman and that too with no social and political power discloses her experiences of violence and when the alleged perpetrator is her husband she is usually not only condemned at family level but also on social media
A vast majority of people are still in denial when it comes to domestic violence and many are actually doing it i.e. performing a pattern of behaviours used by one partner/spouse to maintain power and control over another partner/spouse in an intimate relationship/marriage.
Our society is suffering not only from endemic violence against weak including domestic abuse against women (mostly) but also from some serious issues that should fall into the category of moral disorders. One is denial (that it does not exist ), two is ruthless judgment ( that if it happens with bad women/feminist aka lesbian women) and three is fatalism embedded in conservatism ( poor woman was ill fated and she should observe silence, prayers and patience).
When a woman and that too with no social and political power discloses her experiences of violence and when the alleged perpetrator is her husband she is usually not only condemned at family level but also on social media (sadly young couples too are experiencing and doing it) and being social media savvy their matters are uploaded on twitter and Instagram too. Such a woman may gain some applause from a particular liberal circle (that actually backfires and make her guilty of some more sins) but usually her life becomes more problematical. She is so much despoiled, plundered and devastated that many opt for living again in an abusive relationship-just to fit in with appropriate social norms. Being married and unhappy in an abusive marriage is considered a better rather unmatched privilege than being happily or at least comfortably divorced.
In a country like ours where medical doctors are not even trained to remain nonjudgmental and know their role in addressing a case of domestic violence, where police , judiciary and lawyers are largely not sensitized on gender issues and media is still largely patriarchal it becomes almost an impossible mission to even hope for not being misunderstood yet alone getting justice .
Recently a famous entertainer (was one of my personal favorites) was accused by his wife of being an abuser. I am not giving any verdict on any party’s innocence or otherwise, but I was just wondering by merely having a cursory look at the twitter trendsthe level of callousness that has achieved societal endorsement in Pakistan? People did not even shy away from bringing Allah and legitimizing beating of a woman in His name.
All my life I raised my voice in my limited capacity against such sick mindsets and intolerable behaviour. Even today I fail to understand that why any woman if not guarded by a man becomes immoral and target of all denunciations? What I have understood, and I speak from experience that foul language and bigoted thinking defines them-the aggressors-the assailants- rather than determining the quantum of evil in a woman.
My idealism and optimism have yet to become old and stale. I still dream of a society where at least homes are violence free and men choose not to throw acid, rape or kill a woman who stands up for her rights including her right to choose and consent . There is no magical wand to materialize this dream into a living reality. All I can say is that keep screaming, speak up and speak out while remaining cognizant of the cost; this would not be an act of courage, but this is the only option we have.
The writer is a freelancer