Is he gay, is he bi, is he straight? Or is he just superman? How does one ask this question in this day of political correctness? Aren’t we supposed to be cool with whoever that person is and engage with the entire personality rather than one bit of the identity? Especially since that is what I am constantly telling people in all the workshops that I do. “Let people choose their own identities, do not foist one upon them. After all behavior is not indicative of what the person actually believes in” blah, blah and blah. But when it comes to the crunch, one should know.
So boy meets girl and both hang out together. They have fun and seem to have some common spaces they inhabit but lots of uncommon areas too. Girl is busy trying to figure this man out since it has not rained men in a long while and she is now getting a bit anxious about meeting “someone interesting”. Now that she has, she is racked with the lack of knowledge of the swing of this one person. She cannot ask around since that will surely get back to him and he would figure out she is interested. And how awful that would be if he was straight – she would appear to eager, if he was gay – she would appear foolish and if he was bi – that would be wishful thinking!
I know countless women who are searching for that “one” person they could engage with. The constant refrain I hear is that men today are gay, married, confused or all of the above. What is a woman to do then? Married men are easier to spot since they often have tell tale signs but in these days of metrosexual men, nothing is quite clear.
Men on the other hand are constantly cribbing about the lack of women. Their complaint is not that the women are lesbian, they just find them too competitive and independent. Why can’t women be just women and be happy with having doors opened for them and being taken out for meals. Occasionally, they want the intellectual discourse but for the rest of the time they are happy just having a “woman” around who is what she is meant to be – according to the male lexicon. None of this strident feminist stuff, makes the women look ugly; they should be sexy and smart and be available when the men are ready to engage. Ideally, there should be no talk of commitment, because that scares them so. But if the woman does not appear needy, then who knows commitment may follow!
So here we are in a world, where the available men are not the men we want since we do not know where their preferences lie and the women are not the women that men want since they are not women really! All operating at cross purposes and the search continues eternal!
May 29, 2011
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Isn't it time men said No to violence
Where do all the men disappear to when women are attacked? The attacker is there and the woman or women, but the others who inhabit this earth – where do they all go off to? Has anyone heard of men who have got really angry with the current scenario of violence against women and have got together and said enough is enough – men say no to violence?
Violence has been part of my life in many different ways and public spaces are often the playing field of the violent. The occasional touch; the stare that could be appreciative or threatening depending on who is interpreting it; the following of the female pedestrian or the stopping by at bus stops where a lone woman stands; the passing of random comments which apparently is not targeting the woman passing by but is indicative of the Asperger syndrome that the man is occasionally afflicted by when women pass him by. And each time, the reaction of the woman is more or less the same – ignore the irritant as one does often with mosquitoes, if you cannot kill it, you move away from the spot that is mosquito infected. Or it could be defiance – a change in stance and aggressiveness pours out or else it is the age old mantra – we will not suffer violence anymore! I am a bit tired of the latter since I seem to have been saying this for over three decades now and the violence has continued unabated.
Obviously as a society we have not taught our men that they have to move beyond the roles of perpetrator, passer by, joiner in of protests and adopt a whole new radical stance. One of intolerance. Intolerance of violence that is meted out to women and anyone who does not pass. It does not matter what clothes you wear, what class you belong to, what city or village you come from, whether you are biological woman or not. The fact that you have a vagina or else you look like a woman and are dressed as one is reason enough for many men to be violent. They could desire you, they could revile you, they could feel that you needed to be taught a lesson or that you arouse passion in them – all of this results in violence and they get away scot free. We do not teach our women to stand up and fight. We do not tell them that they can and should retaliate wherever it is possible and that is not their lot in life to have to accept and move on.
So when do men get up and say that they do not believe in violence? When do they think their time will come to aggressively demand that killing someone in the street because they did not return your love, or did not serve you that drink post closing hours, or did not feel that they needed to go with you when you “innocently” offered them a lift, is not okay by them. When do we women get to join in protests organized by men as bystanders and supporters.
Not all men are violent and not all men want to grope women. Then why are those men not saying to violence against women? They can say no and get others to do so, but that means challenging what masculinity means to each one of them. It means that they need to understand and explain to others that violence is not their birthright, and they need to exercise and control their emotions and not aggressively covet everything. They need to grow up and take responsibility for themselves as well as for the others around them, so that when women do say no to violence, they understand that no means no and does not in any way include a loophole for them to wedge themselves in and wreak havoc.
May 29, 2011
Violence has been part of my life in many different ways and public spaces are often the playing field of the violent. The occasional touch; the stare that could be appreciative or threatening depending on who is interpreting it; the following of the female pedestrian or the stopping by at bus stops where a lone woman stands; the passing of random comments which apparently is not targeting the woman passing by but is indicative of the Asperger syndrome that the man is occasionally afflicted by when women pass him by. And each time, the reaction of the woman is more or less the same – ignore the irritant as one does often with mosquitoes, if you cannot kill it, you move away from the spot that is mosquito infected. Or it could be defiance – a change in stance and aggressiveness pours out or else it is the age old mantra – we will not suffer violence anymore! I am a bit tired of the latter since I seem to have been saying this for over three decades now and the violence has continued unabated.
Obviously as a society we have not taught our men that they have to move beyond the roles of perpetrator, passer by, joiner in of protests and adopt a whole new radical stance. One of intolerance. Intolerance of violence that is meted out to women and anyone who does not pass. It does not matter what clothes you wear, what class you belong to, what city or village you come from, whether you are biological woman or not. The fact that you have a vagina or else you look like a woman and are dressed as one is reason enough for many men to be violent. They could desire you, they could revile you, they could feel that you needed to be taught a lesson or that you arouse passion in them – all of this results in violence and they get away scot free. We do not teach our women to stand up and fight. We do not tell them that they can and should retaliate wherever it is possible and that is not their lot in life to have to accept and move on.
So when do men get up and say that they do not believe in violence? When do they think their time will come to aggressively demand that killing someone in the street because they did not return your love, or did not serve you that drink post closing hours, or did not feel that they needed to go with you when you “innocently” offered them a lift, is not okay by them. When do we women get to join in protests organized by men as bystanders and supporters.
Not all men are violent and not all men want to grope women. Then why are those men not saying to violence against women? They can say no and get others to do so, but that means challenging what masculinity means to each one of them. It means that they need to understand and explain to others that violence is not their birthright, and they need to exercise and control their emotions and not aggressively covet everything. They need to grow up and take responsibility for themselves as well as for the others around them, so that when women do say no to violence, they understand that no means no and does not in any way include a loophole for them to wedge themselves in and wreak havoc.
May 29, 2011
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Too big, too small, too short, too dark
Too big, too small, too tall, too short, too dark, too fair – maybe that does not happen. Maybe no one can be too fair! But what is this obsession with the body? No one is comfortable with what they have, they all want something that no one really has and in the end there is dire sorrow all around.
I am fat and it took me years to acknowledge that. I grew up in a home where there was no conversation around body size and I always knew I was beautiful. So when I did get out of the house and then had smart alecks on the street comment about my body or my weight, I was gob smacked! For heaven’s sake could they not see that lissome body trapped inside that outer shell and could they not see the intelligence flow out of me. How crass to expect more beauty?
Isn’t it strange how a set of rules set by a few impact many? Do we ever think about it? Do we ever wonder why there is this unholy obsession about the perfect body? I watch people today and am amazed at the self-control they seem to exhibit. All of them are clear that they do not want to become fat, they cite health reasons. No one ever seems to say that they are uncomfortable because peer pressure renders them unhappy, romance accords them the invisibility cloak and families strive to remind them everyday of their self indulgent self which has allowed them to become fat. So fat has now become the new mantra to stay away from.
What is it about our bodies that cause us so much angst? Is it because the set of rules that we have to abide by are set for us and we feel that we have to play along or else we lose out? Surely that cannot be the reason. There are so many ways in which we challenge many set ideologies because we do not ascribe to them and yet anything to do with the body causes us sleepless nights and we try to make some things more and other things less. Do we ever connect this with violence? Can we see the links between what we do to ourselves and our supposed aversion to violence? Why do we always assume that violence is done to us by someone else and not that we do it to ourselves quite easily and then have a million explanations to justify why we do not eat, why we use Fair and Lovely face cream, why we spend hours in the gym under duress, and why we focus incessantly on how much one has gained or lost in kilos and not in a metaphysical sense?
What is the point of saying my body is mine when actually we mean that my body is partially owned by me and the rest is a joint ownership between my parents; the gym; the people whom I desire and do not desire me; the media, society and the countless faceless people who feel that they can advise me and tell me what I should look like.
I look the same every day. Tall, big, dark woman. For others, what I am varies. Some days it’s a beautiful woman, at other times it is a fat woman. For some I am a man, for others my gender confuses them. Some people see me and think I am hot and others who feel that I should instantly go in for a 90 kg weight loss program.
I am all of this and I am not.
May 16, 2011
I am fat and it took me years to acknowledge that. I grew up in a home where there was no conversation around body size and I always knew I was beautiful. So when I did get out of the house and then had smart alecks on the street comment about my body or my weight, I was gob smacked! For heaven’s sake could they not see that lissome body trapped inside that outer shell and could they not see the intelligence flow out of me. How crass to expect more beauty?
Isn’t it strange how a set of rules set by a few impact many? Do we ever think about it? Do we ever wonder why there is this unholy obsession about the perfect body? I watch people today and am amazed at the self-control they seem to exhibit. All of them are clear that they do not want to become fat, they cite health reasons. No one ever seems to say that they are uncomfortable because peer pressure renders them unhappy, romance accords them the invisibility cloak and families strive to remind them everyday of their self indulgent self which has allowed them to become fat. So fat has now become the new mantra to stay away from.
What is it about our bodies that cause us so much angst? Is it because the set of rules that we have to abide by are set for us and we feel that we have to play along or else we lose out? Surely that cannot be the reason. There are so many ways in which we challenge many set ideologies because we do not ascribe to them and yet anything to do with the body causes us sleepless nights and we try to make some things more and other things less. Do we ever connect this with violence? Can we see the links between what we do to ourselves and our supposed aversion to violence? Why do we always assume that violence is done to us by someone else and not that we do it to ourselves quite easily and then have a million explanations to justify why we do not eat, why we use Fair and Lovely face cream, why we spend hours in the gym under duress, and why we focus incessantly on how much one has gained or lost in kilos and not in a metaphysical sense?
What is the point of saying my body is mine when actually we mean that my body is partially owned by me and the rest is a joint ownership between my parents; the gym; the people whom I desire and do not desire me; the media, society and the countless faceless people who feel that they can advise me and tell me what I should look like.
I look the same every day. Tall, big, dark woman. For others, what I am varies. Some days it’s a beautiful woman, at other times it is a fat woman. For some I am a man, for others my gender confuses them. Some people see me and think I am hot and others who feel that I should instantly go in for a 90 kg weight loss program.
I am all of this and I am not.
May 16, 2011
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