I don't label myself as a feminist...but because I do speak against men who say things or act in manners lessening the
status of a woman I get labeled as one by others...
but...I like men just as much as I like women...which isn't very much.
For years as I was growing up I blamed women for allowing themselves to be oppressed.
I asked why Afghan women who saw and felt how they were treated by their fathers, brothers, and husbands, raise their
sons to be exactly the same: spoiled princes (without the charm or wealth).
Recently, after working with more males and people coming to me to listen to their marriage woes (why? what the hell do i know??), and studying male-female styles of communication in school, I started seeing this pattern of male insecurity leading to the need to control others; not just women...and so now I blame both...men for their own emotional issues and women for theirs...stop being emotional people!
I have become convinced that it is (mostly) a woman's stupidity and/or need to care (which is at least innocent)
and a man's insecurity (inflated ego), which has made it ok for men to have such a controlling nature - men try to make women insecure about themselves, in order to heighten their own
security...and women just let it happen because they fall for it...they believe it. They don't question the logic of what the guy says
because they trust the person who helps take care of them...stupid.
My way of thinking has nothing to do with the roles I believe the genders take on...
I do believe men are the caretakers of women...but what happens when they are not taking care at all or when
they go too far for their own selfish reasons (which I believe are based on their insecurities)...someone like me stands up
to it and depending on the time/location/society gets called something like a feminist, liberal, shameless...
I see how our society has developed into one where women are encouraged to take on higher education
and have careers while also taking care of their households...
How fair is that? Now they are career women and house wives as well? (and still on a national average get paid less than men!) I think it's great for women to have a choice to do what they want, but personally I don't see the luxury in doing both at once...actually, personally I want an education because I love learning, but don't WANT to work...i just want to be able to work if I want to work, which i don't want...sometimes the stress I feel from thinking about work is overwhelming, and it makes me grateful that it will not be my duty to take care of my family financially...it even makes me sympathetic towards whoever will be :(
I just want to keep learning things and helping out at different non-profit organizations that I like...and live off my dad/future husband's $$
oh...and not send my kids off to a day care Inshallah...
oook...i do believe these things are situational...Allahu Alam
end point - people need to sthu and be happy with what they have and not take their own shortcomings out on others...
Men - stop being crazy egotistic and insecure
Women - start being supportive and not too demanding...and stop letting men treat you like shaysa
in the movie, Mona Lisa Smile, a feminist professor works to
ReplyDeletemake the women at the college see that they can
do whatever they want to do in life...they don't have to
follow the norms or roles society has placed for them..blah blah blah
in the end one of the women decides to become
a house wife and the professor basically lashes out at her..
the student then makes the professor see that if she teaches that women can do whatever they want she
has to accept that being an educated wife and mother was what she wanted...
the other women in the movie go on to do whatever it is they want...
i like that way of thinking...not having a role specified for women by anyone other than the individual woman for herself.