Men of Quality Respect Women's Equality

Women’s Day is just around the corner! And before all you ladies begin an endless tirade on the sorry state of women in this country, women’s rights and their empowerment (or the lack of it), let’s take a brief pause…to spare a thought for all the aggrieved Men out there this Women's Day.

In all the brouhaha over rising violence against women, it is the men who have been the worst sufferers! Never in history have their irrefutable high stature been threatened as today. Forget raising a hand, they can’t even raise their voice against their belan-brandishing wives without being accused of domestic violence! Never have they felt so powerless. They've to carefully consider & reconsider before paying an honest compliment to a female colleague, lest they be accused sexual violence at workplace! While earlier it was a sign of chivalry if a man offered to pay the bill when on a date with his girlfriend, today they’re called chauvinists for doubting the ability of a woman to pay for herself! No social gathering is complete without female friends labeling men as the proverbial ‘Wolf in sheep’s garb’ ready to lure innocent victims and pounce upon them. Never have they suffered such mental anguish. Their plight utterly neglected, they've been left by themselves to silently nurse their wounded egos. Oh, poor men, accept my sympathies!

All this for seemingly no fault of theirs! Men are the saviours of humankind. The “stronger” sex - superior to all other beings - living or dead. And they've religion, history and politics to substantiate their claims. Surely, such superior beings are not meant to do menial jobs like cooking & cleaning which are clearly beneath them! Also, women almost always cause trouble. All evil befell on earth because of women. The cause of the great Mahabharata war is often attributed to a woman, who also happened to be the wife of one of the wisest men in the world, often called Dharmaraj – a man who could do nothing unethical. Clearly, ethics compelled him to wager his wife in a game of dice! Another famous husband, often worshiped as Maryada Purushottam – the greatest of all men – doubted the integrity of his wife, made her walk through fire to prove her chastity and ultimately abandoned her to fend for herself while she was pregnant! Hence, blaming men for all the cases of wife-burning and dowry deaths is brewing a tornado in a teacup, really!

And frankly, women are terribly difficult to understand. Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus, you see. Because when a woman says NO, she almost always means YES. So, if you ask a woman if she wants to discontinue her studies to get married, the answer is NO, implying YES surely! Or if you ask her if she wants to quit her job after marriage to wash her husband’s dirty laundry, the answer again is NO, implying YES of course! And in the rare instance when a NO actually means a NO, well, their assertiveness must be squashed promptly. If a bikini-clad woman is raped, it’s her fault because she clearly “deserved it” even if she was screaming ‘NO!’ on top of her lungs! And so did the burqa-clad woman, who must have “wanted it”, as it must be terribly suffocating under all those layers of clothing! Certainly, men have their urges which may choose to manifest themselves anytime anywhere. Censuring men and curbing their freedom to do whatever they want and whenever they want is simply preposterous!

But grieve not dear men, for there’s still hope. Because for every man who catcalls on a passing woman, there are 100 others who march in solidarity for upholding women’s rights. For every man who rapes a woman, there are 10 others who are working to empower women. And for every man who beats up his wife, there is 1 man who treats his wife as his equal, doesn't question her when she comes home late from work and offers her a cup of chai at the end of a long day.

Be that Man.