Looks like people are headed in a whole new line of development altogether. I was shocked today to see that an actress – Gauahar Khan was slapped for wearing short/skimpy dress. The reason given being as simple as this – A woman belonging to a particular community and a man in that particular community thinks it is sacrilegious for women to wear such clothes. I am dumbfounded when people assign relligiousness to a personal choice. I had always thought that religion was established to make personal life simpler and easier while this seems to be a completely opposite factor now. People seem to find a safe haven or an excuse in religion to make way for their own personal shortcomings.
If I remember properly, even Sania Mirza was issued a fatwa for wearing a short skirt, jeans. I wonder how someone who can plays tennis can wear a full length dress and play. Forget religion, this is downright intolerance of some people. And there are instances of people throwing stones on women for committing adultery and there have been issues when this is done in public in support of the local government. There have been issues of women not being able to read or go to schools/cinemas just because they belong to a particular community.
In the same light when France introduced a ban on burqa, there was a huge uproar saying that it was a violation of personal rights and it was a violation of religious rights as well. I wonder what a religious right and what a personal right is. If the ban was not introduced, wouldn’t the same people be forced either in the family or the closely knit community to wear a burqa and portray it as a personal choice instead of an imposed one?
WHY THE SLAP?
My real question would be this. Why the slap? What is the meaning of the slap? Wouldn’t it be the same man who leered at this protagonist for wearing revealing clothes or maybe some other woman. Where does a personalization come in a matter like this when he walks up the stage and slaps, literally slaps an actress amidst people just to prove a point or to spread his message of the community to the world? There was a prophet who spread the message of being a muslim or islam in such a great fashion that it became a religion. There is a follower here who thinks his own personal view of the religion is the world view and everyone else should pander to it.
I do agree that I am sounding caustic when I write this. There is something about objectification of women which seems literally disgusting and there is another thing which is about controlling them in every which way possible. I think this comes to the second category.
WHAT SHOULD BE DONE?
What should be done for matters like this? I am sure that this man would be put to jail for about a week or so and then slapped a fine and then released. But what is the outcome of that, it will be one man behind bars. He slapped a famous woman and then got caught. What about the millions who do it for the not so famous ones and walk around the towns as if they own it? What about the hundreds who rape them without the fear of punity. What about the tens and ones who just stand there are watch? What is a solution to all this?
Is the answer in mere tolerance? Is the answer in education? Is the answer in public growing up a little more? We are on the brink of embracing a civilization called the global world and in a place where a celebrity can be slapped for wearing a short dress, it makes me shudder with fear about the plight of a common woman.
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