Achieving gender equality requires the engagement of women and men, girls and boys. Its everyone’s responsibility – Ban Ki-moon
To all the misogynist men in the world I would like to put it straight. Feminism is not about hating men. It speaks of striving for gender equality that women have been deprived of for centuries together. March is Women’s History month; so I take the privilege of penning a few thoughts about Gender equality. The global scenario depicts that male dominance has been deep rooted in the society for centuries together. The emergence of the feminist era has broadened the social horizons thus paving way for the rising of women to their appropriate prominence. As a result the beautiful day will arrive when the whole world will recognize the harmony between man and woman.
Gender inequality refers to the difference in the status, prestige, power, opportunities, decision making rights and identities that the women are subjected to in comparison to men in a society. This is a global issue. For instance: In some countries of the world women are restricted from driving cars while in others women do not have the basic right of education too. Many a time’s women are paid less for the same work as men while in few countries house work is only vested with the women and not the men. Female infanticide and female foeticide are alarmingly rising in many countries. This is mainly because boys are considered to be the ones who shall carry forward the lineage of a clan. Women are deprived from inheriting the property too in various cultures and religions. These are only a few instances to name. The list is extremely long. Can a reasonable person recognize these instances as equality? We are women but we are humans too. We are not slaves or maids to receive such ill-treatment. Why is this simple aspect forgotten?
I agree men are physically stronger and more aggressive by nature whereas women are construed to be the embodiment of inner dignity and subtleness. In many cases this soft attitude is considered to be the weakness. In reality, subtle inner dignity is much stronger than the aggressive outbursts. The true liberalization of both the sexes would be when both the sexes forget their respective egos and work in harmony for the betterment of mankind as a whole. Both the sexes should strive hard to bridge the gap of inequality. Men should use their aggressive and dominant nature to good use whereas women should use the subtle nature not to portray weakness but power, motivation, understanding and intelligence.
Most of you may still pose the question, why this movement is still termed as Feminism and not Equalism or Humanism? Well, a simple answer to this is that we are still waiting for the beautiful day to arrive when women are considered equal in each and every field and in all walks of life. That is when this long struggle of striving for equality shall end and then probably we can rephrase the term from Feminism to Equalism or Humanism.