Conspiracy against Women?
I
was reading this book, ‘In the land of invisible women’ by Qanta A. Ahmed. It
talks about life of women in Saudi Arabia. There was one interesting
observation by the author which struck me. There, the women dress up for women.
The laws of the land are such that women and men cannot meet socially as freely
as they do in other countries. As a result of which, interaction between two
sexes are extremely limited. If a woman buys an expensive jewelry or a great
dress or goes to a parlor, it is not to impress anyone from the other gender.
It is for one’s own kind, the women folk to see and appreciate.
Initially,
I found it as an interesting observation. Then I felt, isn’t it the same in our
country? Yes, most of the women tell us that they are doing all the efforts
w.r.t presenting themselves well for the men around them. But how many times has
their husband or boyfriend or any man in their lives taken notice whenever they
have made some change about how they look? Look at something as simple as a
haircut. Many a time, we men fail to notice that change. But their girlfriends
notice it without fail, every single time! For us to notice a change in the ear
ring, it has to be the size of a mini mammoth. But women can spot it from a
mile away.
The
conspiracy that I am talking about here is the one which women are doing
against women, most of them without realizing it. So if women stop judging
other women on the kind of clothes one wears, make up they put on, accessories
they choose to flaunt, life becomes much easier for everyone around. For instance,
try and watch the fairness cream advertisements. In most of them, after a woman
uses a fairness cream, the response or the reaction comes from another group of
ladies and not a guy. In some of them, men are completely absent. When a multinational
firm designs an advertisement, it is very conscious about its target group. If
men were key influencers, they will definitely be there in the advertisement.
The fact that presence of a man is minimal in such advertisements points to the
fact that men are not an influencing group in this regard. Even the voice over
is that of a woman in almost all the Ads.
So
if you try and play down the appreciations or the passing remarks based on how
one presents one self, you might save an annual expenditure to the tune of
about $950 Million. That is the size of cosmetics industry in our country.
Also, many a time feminism emerges only when a woman is being attacked by the other gender. Somehow the thought of a woman putting down another woman doesn't knock on the feminist conscience! Don't you think it should arise as a support system for the fellow women rather than adding one more aspect to be bothered about? It will be nice to be empathetic ( Thank you my friend, Harleen for putting this seed of thought) rather than pointing out flaws.
Also, many a time feminism emerges only when a woman is being attacked by the other gender. Somehow the thought of a woman putting down another woman doesn't knock on the feminist conscience! Don't you think it should arise as a support system for the fellow women rather than adding one more aspect to be bothered about? It will be nice to be empathetic ( Thank you my friend, Harleen for putting this seed of thought) rather than pointing out flaws.
Now,
before some of yours claws come out, let me tell you that we the men
folk also fall prey to such conspiracies. What we fall for are things like
white goods, sports shoes, high end watches and such.
Arun Babu