Our philosopher-king has passed ridiculously coldhearted remarks in the context of rape and its underlying causes. Being an advocate of Riyasat-e-Madinah, he seems to be a little too much of a critic of Western society and a fan of Turkish dramas, but he needs to understand that it’s never too late to educate himself of things he doesn’t know about. His poor understanding of this highly sensitive issue has offended women all over the country.
To many, it was a shock that how a man of this stature could be this ignorant, but to me, it was just an ignorant remark coming from a privileged gender living in an institutionalized patriarchal society. If that man had the audacity to victim blame then he should have informed the vulnerable gender about the ‘obscene’ dress code so that we can protect ourselves from the uncontrollable opposite gender. Not just the female gender, but this dress code should have been informed to the minor boys of Kasur, minor girls like Zainab and Farishta, the female dead bodies being raped in Okara and Karachi so that such inhumane incidents could have been avoided.
If an Oxford graduated man has this understanding about rape then what could we expect from an illiterate population comprising a big portion of our society? How can we expect to normalize the fact that either she’s dressed, under-dressed or overdressed, she’s not asking for it? Rape has nothing to do with the dressing but with the mindset only.
Surviving this toxic patriarchy is not an option anymore but problematizing it. Unfortunately, it’s not the first time a man is telling women how to live her life, how to exist or behave? It’s not the first time we are treated like an object. Traditional thinkers have believed that man is born to dominate. World’s renowned thinker Aristotle, to be more precisely called a misogynist believed that “the courage of a man is shown in commanding, of a woman in obeying”. Not just that but calling a female gender a mutilated man. Men of stature have abused their influence in the pursuit of institutionalizing the cancer of patriarchy so that women are deliberately kept away from power positions.
This discriminatory and segregationist approach where women have been controlled, insulted, and disregarded has been evident in every society. Imran khan’s pointing out Western society or its culture is not logical as violence against women is evident in every class, every society of every part of the world in different forms.
Be it Freud calling women’s autonomy a destiny, or Aristotle labeling us as a mutilated man, exaggerating biological differences and making it a ground to treat women as second sex is not acceptable. Asking women to observe purdah and not the men to control their filthy temptations is not acceptable. A man’s insensitive view of a women’s traumatic experience is not acceptable. A man living in a male-dominated society, giving his manly views, victim-blaming, and offending every woman is not acceptable. Giving alleged and potential rapists a justification for rape is not acceptable. Luring us towards the euphoric ideas of Riyast-e-Madinah and at the same time being this ignorant is not acceptable.
Enough is enough!
- Mr Prime Minister! Human Beings Are Not Objects - 11/04/2021
