Violence Against Women Awareness Month 2011 Team invited us for a live twitter chat about street sexual violence. To follow up and continue the conversations look out for #VAWAM on twitter.
http://twitter.com/VAWMonth
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Anonymous
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Male Ego or Female Arrogance? "The male ego is boundless", says Pooja Gandhi in the DNA Article, "Three Pak hotties stump cricket".
Brief Background:
Pakistani actresses Atiqa Odho, Maria Wasti and Ayesha Umer have got themselves into trouble! After attending the Pakistan-Australia one-day international match in what the authorities call 'skimpy attire', they've been blamed for diverting the players' attention, which allegedly resulted in the team losing the match. Ironically, it was the Pakistani Cricket Board who had invited the actresses to cheer the team.
And the DNA After Hrs Section, takes one-sided biased and male-bashing views on the above incident and passes off males as egoistic and non-accepting. Analysis:
While this may not be the first time that the media has resorted to male-bashing, as male-bashing is the media's favorite pastime, what's interesting to note here that it's so easy to blame men, easier for society to accept it, and easiest to not to protest it. Far worse, even males do not protest. As a men's rights activist but I do protest against the way the entire thing has been presented.
Before blaming Pakistani players of being egoistic and non-accepting, the question that should be asked is who told the movie stars to wear revealing clothes? But no, spineless men call challenging a woman as sexist, saying "A woman has rights to wear that she wants". Well, Mr. Male Feminist, then in that case even, "A man has rights to react the way he wants". Remember your famous dialog of Gender Equality? Well, it has to be on both sides.
Then there are arguments like, even Australian players were there on the field, why did they not get distracted? Well, Miss Right (Always), you should know that there are stark factual differences and contrasts in the upbringing of Australian and Pakistani players in addition to their cultural differences. When a man who is brought up in such a conservative culture which fosters burkha clad women, sees a woman skimpily dressed it's but natural for him to get distracted and if he doesn't, probably a medical check-up is the call of the day.
How can the society blame the man for this? It's part of his psyche, nurtured and nourished by a conservative culture that has led to the distraction and that cannot be put to social prosecution by taking Australian players' reaction to the skimpily clad women as benchmark, because they are used to seeing women in revealing clothes, as part of their liberal culture.
If the man gets distracted, he is blamed as pervert flirt and if he does not get distracted he is termed boring, impotent and non-manly, what kind of a double jeopardy is this?
I guess whether it's "The Male Ego" or "The Female Arrogance" that needs to be dealt with here. But more than female arrogance, it is this inaction of the society that's more harming. Anything that a woman does is taken as her ‘right' and anything that a man does is taken as his ‘wrong', and still they call it a man's world!!!
It's again a choice with the media and the society. They want to continue with their male-bashing tactics, they may continue. However, in this process the cornered men (victims of bias), will turn into Baazigars and will give a damn to the society. Depends on what they want, Men or Baazigars?
Can men be Sexually Harassed? Perplexed? Looks like a statement made in an inebriated state? Well, the answer is a both a Yes and a No. No because the author is not in an inebriated state, however the society that is listening is definitely is. Years of hardwiring and constant input from media about the problems faced by women, the society, including men themselves, believe that harassment of men in any form, sexual being one of them, is a funny topic.
This is quite natural because, Too Much Audio Visual input jeopardizes the cognitive ability of the brain. Because of continuous bombardment into the media regarding the problems of women, men's problems have become irrelevant now. Even a mention sparks humor and people tend to ignore it first unless something legally outrageous act like a road show or a media event is done to draw attention, even then people forget it the moment it's over.
And sexual harassment of man is a topic which never gains ground, although sexual harassment of men is going on. Before going into details I will first talk about what I mean by the phrase, "Sexual Harassment".
Sexual Harassment is a type of harassment that occurs to any individual due to the sexuality of either the individual in question or any other individual.
Women often complain of sexual harassment and say that a particular man looked at them in an obnoxious manner or made some lewd comments on the dress or some ‘indecent proposal' was made et al.
But it does not end there. First it has to be realized that why only ‘some' women are ‘sexually harassed'? Is it not a fact that those women do dress skimpily to draw attention? Otherwise who stops them from dressing normally like other women who do not complain of harassment?
And when they dress skimpily to attract ‘MEN' (obviously, unless the woman is a lesbian), and arouse the sexuality of men and then complain against the same men for making remarks, is that not a SEXUAL HARASSMENT of men? Of course it is. Also if the woman drags the man to a police station or files a case against the man because he reacted (as part of natural tendency), to the skimpily clad woman is also SEXUAL HARASSMENT of the man since he is harassed because of the SEXUALITY of the woman.
There's an ad shown on TV wherein a woman inspector, inspecting for drunk drivers, asks the man to repeatedly give breath samples as she finds freshness in his breaths and later allows the man to go. Just imagine this ad with a girl being asked to do so by a male inspector, immediately the Women Empowerment Brigade and a volley of Women Pamperers would have jumped into action, marked off the ad as ‘sexist' and would have had it off the air.
But just because the target is a man, everyone is silent, how is this not portrayal of men as SEX OBJECTS and how manhood is not SEXUALLY HARASSED by this ad? A question to ponder over and would probably also answer, Can Men be Sexually Harassed?
In my opinion the answer is YES and men do need protection from that as well.
Yes, I agree with your viewpoints. Many women across the world is discriminated every day, are being molested, raped and are facing domestic violence. We all know about, think about it, but how much do we do about it?
5 comments:
Male Ego or Female Arrogance?
"The male ego is boundless", says Pooja Gandhi in the DNA Article, "Three Pak hotties stump cricket".
Brief Background:
Pakistani actresses Atiqa Odho, Maria Wasti and Ayesha Umer have got themselves into trouble! After attending the Pakistan-Australia one-day international match in what the authorities call 'skimpy attire', they've been blamed for diverting the players' attention, which allegedly resulted in the team losing the match. Ironically, it was the Pakistani Cricket Board who had invited the actresses to cheer the team.
And the DNA After Hrs Section, takes one-sided biased and male-bashing views on the above incident and passes off males as egoistic and non-accepting. Analysis:
While this may not be the first time that the media has resorted to male-bashing, as male-bashing is the media's favorite pastime, what's interesting to note here that it's so easy to blame men, easier for society to accept it, and easiest to not to protest it. Far worse, even males do not protest. As a men's rights activist but I do protest against the way the entire thing has been presented.
Before blaming Pakistani players of being egoistic and non-accepting, the question that should be asked is who told the movie stars to wear revealing clothes? But no, spineless men call challenging a woman as sexist, saying "A woman has rights to wear that she wants". Well, Mr. Male Feminist, then in that case even, "A man has rights to react the way he wants". Remember your famous dialog of Gender Equality? Well, it has to be on both sides.
Then there are arguments like, even Australian players were there on the field, why did they not get distracted? Well, Miss Right (Always), you should know that there are stark factual differences and contrasts in the upbringing of Australian and Pakistani players in addition to their cultural differences. When a man who is brought up in such a conservative culture which fosters burkha clad women, sees a woman skimpily dressed it's but natural for him to get distracted and if he doesn't, probably a medical check-up is the call of the day.
How can the society blame the man for this? It's part of his psyche, nurtured and nourished by a conservative culture that has led to the distraction and that cannot be put to social prosecution by taking Australian players' reaction to the skimpily clad women as benchmark, because they are used to seeing women in revealing clothes, as part of their liberal culture.
If the man gets distracted, he is blamed as pervert flirt and if he does not get distracted he is termed boring, impotent and non-manly, what kind of a double jeopardy is this?
I guess whether it's "The Male Ego" or "The Female Arrogance" that needs to be dealt with here. But more than female arrogance, it is this inaction of the society that's more harming. Anything that a woman does is taken as her ‘right' and anything that a man does is taken as his ‘wrong', and still they call it a man's world!!!
It's again a choice with the media and the society. They want to continue with their male-bashing tactics, they may continue. However, in this process the cornered men (victims of bias), will turn into Baazigars and will give a damn to the society. Depends on what they want, Men or Baazigars?
Can men be Sexually Harassed? Perplexed? Looks like a statement made in an inebriated state? Well, the answer is a both a Yes and a No. No because the author is not in an inebriated state, however the society that is listening is definitely is. Years of hardwiring and constant input from media about the problems faced by women, the society, including men themselves, believe that harassment of men in any form, sexual being one of them, is a funny topic.
This is quite natural because, Too Much Audio Visual input jeopardizes the cognitive ability of the brain. Because of continuous bombardment into the media regarding the problems of women, men's problems have become irrelevant now. Even a mention sparks humor and people tend to ignore it first unless something legally outrageous act like a road show or a media event is done to draw attention, even then people forget it the moment it's over.
And sexual harassment of man is a topic which never gains ground, although sexual harassment of men is going on. Before going into details I will first talk about what I mean by the phrase, "Sexual Harassment".
Sexual Harassment is a type of harassment that occurs to any individual due to the sexuality of either the individual in question or any other individual.
Women often complain of sexual harassment and say that a particular man looked at them in an obnoxious manner or made some lewd comments on the dress or some ‘indecent proposal' was made et al.
But it does not end there. First it has to be realized that why only ‘some' women are ‘sexually harassed'? Is it not a fact that those women do dress skimpily to draw attention? Otherwise who stops them from dressing normally like other women who do not complain of harassment?
And when they dress skimpily to attract ‘MEN' (obviously, unless the woman is a lesbian), and arouse the sexuality of men and then complain against the same men for making remarks, is that not a SEXUAL HARASSMENT of men? Of course it is. Also if the woman drags the man to a police station or files a case against the man because he reacted (as part of natural tendency), to the skimpily clad woman is also SEXUAL HARASSMENT of the man since he is harassed because of the SEXUALITY of the woman.
There's an ad shown on TV wherein a woman inspector, inspecting for drunk drivers, asks the man to repeatedly give breath samples as she finds freshness in his breaths and later allows the man to go. Just imagine this ad with a girl being asked to do so by a male inspector, immediately the Women Empowerment Brigade and a volley of Women Pamperers would have jumped into action, marked off the ad as ‘sexist' and would have had it off the air.
But just because the target is a man, everyone is silent, how is this not portrayal of men as SEX OBJECTS and how manhood is not SEXUALLY HARASSED by this ad? A question to ponder over and would probably also answer, Can Men be Sexually Harassed?
In my opinion the answer is YES and men do need protection from that as well.
Yes, I agree with your viewpoints. Many women across the world is discriminated every day, are being molested, raped and are facing domestic violence. We all know about, think about it, but how much do we do about it?
Divya Bhaskar
MyGrahak.com
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