2001 as Year of Women's Empowerment
By Esther Chunnu Haokip
So then what kind or
empowerment have we seen for our mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters?
Or is Women's Empowerment still uncharted waters here in Manipur? Because even when a rare and sparsely heard of women's right violations exists, society often prefer to bury them under the rug rather than recognize that such an episode has taken place.
In reality women constitute a substantial portion of our society. It would be wrong, unfair on our part to continue closing and blinding our vision in seeing them standing strong and resilient against the winds of injustice and inequality, being bonded by the disadvantaged gender roles and restrictions which have been culturally emphasized and promoted through ages. And we haven't stopped talking about development, education, gender equality and women's empowerment.
In her book "Transforming Theology For Empowerment of Women" Dr R L Hnuni says empowerment, as a process is to allow women to make decisions, assert opinions, think and have self-confidence; women's development is identified with human or society's development. Dr Hnuni is also of the opinion that the greatest barrier against women empowerment is traditional values and practice, and there is a need to break down these barriers.
Many often breed crimes against women in our own home. Women being at the bottom of all hierarchies know what harm inequality can do, how it can maim, kill and destroy. In other words does it change anything if instead of having male cancers cells, we have female cancers cells? The question is how do we fight these cancers, which are plaguing our societies, and not how to change the sex of the cancers cells.
Well at least women are less responsible for creating these cancers and that is a good enough qualification to begin with. Women speak and act passionately against injustice, violence, against war because they create, feed and nurture with their own bodies and they know what pain is all about.
No wonder they are the ones leading and spearheading peace movements everywhere. Women have given us the potent slogan 'Personal is the Political'and have proved time and again that personal problems ultimately become social ones. Women are the ones pleading to internalize struggles against all hierarchies. Women have been saying let us all begin with our selves, let us all start fighting the patriarch, dictator, exploiter, sitting in each one of us. The goal of women's' empowerment is not just to change hierarchical gender relations in society i.e. classes, caste, race, ethnic, north-south, east-west relations.
Women's' empowerment is not and cannot be separate from the empowerment of nature, empowerment of all the marginalized people and countries. Women's struggles and movements therefore need to be closely linked to peace movement, ecology movements, worker and peasant movements, human rights movements and movements for democratization and decentralization of society. Religious laws, which go against our Constitution, which deny women their fundamental rights, need to be questioned.
It is unfortunate then that the statements concerning the role of women by St Paul in the Bible have been used to force a rigid role pattern even some 1900 years later. In defense of St. Paul we recognize that this great leader faced many practical problems in establishing Christian congregations in Hebrew/pagan culture, not least of them being the tradition denying women legal recognition or opportunities for independent living. Paul did what had to be done in his day, but that day has long passed and with it the cultural conditions restricting the life of women at that time.
There would have been no incarnation, no birth of a Baby in Bethlehem, had it not been for the woman Mary. Mary the only human involved in the conception of Jesus was acting as her own free agent, the scriptures tells us, fully aware and conscious of what she was agreeing to, even questioning the procedure to be used in the conception of Jesus (Luke 1: 34) when she chose to co-operate in God's redemptive plan. Mary is no meek and mild girl-child, but a strong woman free to express her faith in and inspite of the social stigma involved in premarital pregnancy. Her spirit inspire songs called the Magnificent Signs of this faith in a God of personal concern and social justice in a world still crying out in pain from the same needs.
Again the polarity of the sexes is reinforced from the moment of birth, with the answer to that first question. "Is it a boy or a girl? An entire set of cultural and traditional expectations is set in motion for that child. We know them so well: girls must act helpless; boys must grow up to dominate and be strong. Boys must be independent, girls must learn to be dependant, girls must grow up to be submissive, boys must grow up to make lots of money, girls must learn to work just as hard for less or no money. Girls will be full time mother; boys will be part time fathers.
All the machinery of cultural conditioning operates to produce a culturally perfect product. School textbooks depict cultural role models, television commercials dramatize them and comedians base their routines on them. Unfortunately some valid questions about the whole process are never seriously dealt with. Is this conditioning compatible with God's calling for individuals and with the child's innate characteristics or is it something imposed on both the sexes regardless of individual potential?
Because these questions are ignored a tragic situation develops as many men break down under the pressures of having to be a winner or having to stay at the top or having to be worth a lot or having to be the responsible person at the top of an imposed divine order or of simply having to act aggressively and decisively when that is not their nature.
Similarly depression haunts many women who have great intellectual ability, much physical strength, or the capacity to administer well, but who are forced instead to subjugate all of this God given ability and talent to play the submissive role which society and church approve e.g. women are called shameless, prostitute, wayward as soon as she try to step out of their defined space and roles. When you start fighting for your rights, you become an outcast, you are in a position of doubt and scrutinized and you become a challenge, but if you take oppression and suppression, you are accepted and can be handled. What a waste for both the female and male child. With options limited from birth many can only look forward to a life of frustration and waste of their resources.
For those unable to cope with this drain on their emotional energies, alcohol drugs and suicide too often become a way out of their role dilemma. We must all free each other from the prejudices, which have grown all too convenient since too long.
It is the need of the hour to have a vision of the society we wish to create. We need to step back and look at what kind of society we wish to create and allow our women to contribute her complete potential to personal and societal relationship.
Practical attitudes have given us a skewed division of labor, unequal access of women, a certain tolerance for male violence against women and other elements, which constitute women's subordinate position, in society, but all these issues can never be death with in isolation. More over the low value placed on women has made sons desirable and the label of an ideal woman is always that of tolerance. Girls are taught that they should forever tolerate and forbear.
Few would readily admit but isn't it a fact that one common phrase we haven been able to drop from our vocabulary is still 'because I am a man, and you are a woman, so do this, do that, stay here, go like this' etc. etc.
A woman who is always reminded of her inability, inferiority or incapability is not likely to make any headway. Pregnancy and lactation are not part of weakness, but they are essential part of human parenthood. The only difference we have is our biological makeup.
Referring to some biblical verses like, Matthew 15:21:28, Luke 7:1-10, Matt :12, 41-42 Matt 24:40:41 and Acts 10:34 we can be sure that God shows no partiality. Freedom and liberty can never be controlled by one group or class. It belongs to God working directly through the Gospel to free people to be all that God wants them to be.
Education being a main factor for women's empowerment, cannot only mean mastering the three Rs, but should enable us to be masters of our lives. It ought to teach us not only how to make a living but also how to live. It should help us acquire the necessary analytical and questioning skills, strength to refuse to submit to conditions of indignity and inhumanity, values like love and care, justice, equality, honesty, truthfulness and most important it should bring lots of joy and creativity.
And so what good is intellectual education without understanding social justice, human values, dignity and compassion? And I do also sincerely believe that education of the mind without morals and basic human feelings is a menace to oneself and society. And the loss of values, norms, ethics, and morality is what threatens our common future and existence.
(Courtesy: The Imphal Free Press)
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