I am someone who loves to see the headlines and to choose a couple of articles to read everyday. Yesterday morning was one those mornings which made me think about this societal fanciful drama that so many of us are living through, day-in and day-out. Although it was a funny incident but that forced me to think about the discriminatory drama being played by all of us at some part of our lives or other. Moreover this drama is affecting the lives of most of the women but still we are happy to enjoy the other side of the discrimination where we take the advantage of being a woman.
Last week while driving towards my office in the morning, the moment when I was about to take a left turn a policeman stopped me. The reason being I overlooked the barricade on the road and hence I made an attempt to cross the no entry zone unintentionally. But I was not the first one who did that. Moreover that was the first time when Gurgaon police made those barricade on that road, so it was quiet unexpected for all the travelers and hence people like me were making the same mistake one after other. Fortunately when the policeman stopped me there was no other rider behind me hence I (“Yes I admit this openly”) took the advantage of the other side of this discriminatory drama where a lady is treated leniently after an offence. Well that was not actually an offence but yes I was supposed to go straight and waste another one hour in traffic again to reach to my office. Doing that would have been just a mere wastage of destroying my one whole hour so I tried to convince the policeman standing over there. I started with my conversation with him very politely knowing that not doing that would just be like wasting my precious time.
“Sir, I did not know that you have made this stoppage and that was just unintentional sir, please let me go. Starting tomorrow, I will take care of this without fail.”
Eventually, my pleading won, by sheer volume of repetition.
My politeness was at its height and I could never imagine myself talking so softly with any unknown person in my day to day life. But yes I had to make the loss good and hence I tried my level best to convince him. Finally after requesting for another ten minutes he allowed me to enter into that barricade and take my usual route. I could have forgotten the whole incidence like any other normal incidences which often takes place in our day to day lives but that was followed by another incidence when the male rider behind me who also made the same mistake was not allowed to enter the same route from which I was supposed to go. Technically it was a no-entry point on that day. On the head of that where that policeman was talking so politely with me, he answered vey uncivilly even after a polite request made by him. He was also on his way to his office and he must also be getting late but now as per the instructions of that policeman he had to face the same traffic jam from which he just came out again. Fortunately the same happened in front of me so I again tried to convince the policeman, politely, to let him go to which policemen showed his unwillingness. I was literally shocked with his answer because he was getting so biased and that too in the favor of a lady and not for a man!! Well that was unsurprising for me because such cases could be seen in day to day life.
That day where at one point I was trying to forge the whole incidence, on the other side this incidence forced me to think about the discrimination being made in the society in one way or other. Sometimes it’s in our favor and sometimes it’s against us. Well I am not at all able to understand not I consider myself eligible enough to understand the plot on the basis of which this discrimination is made. Hence I decided to keep the whole dilemma in my mind without discussing it with anyone else.
But yesterday while surfing on internet my eyes caught a very interesting story about how the women traffic police officers are treated on roads. The whole story coverage was just boggling. The mass takes female traffic police officers so lightly and tend to make more offences in their presence than men TPOs. I believe they also get the training of handling the traffic in the same way the male TPOs get but then they have to face and listen to comments like“You don’t know anything” , “You don’t make a difference to us” etc. etc. I am actually unsure whether I should literally laugh on this discriminatory drama prevailing in the society going on in the heads of people or I should talk to people about this. I personally believe I am immature to understand the psyche of the society at large but am I the odd one out to think like that?
A country where you will get to read magazines like Femina , Naree, Grahlakshmi, New Woman, Verve , We Women Today and so on and where you see newspapers embellishing the power of women by describing how a woman traffic police officer got selected for the position or about the first lady pilot or metro driver and many other such proud moments to add on to the history of empowered woman, on the other part of the picture, the same society which talks about such empowerment becomes sarcastic when it comes to delivering the duties. It is not about just feeling proud on the hard-work of that particular lady on attaining success but to be with her and support her in her journey. And I am not talking about only our country; I believe the discrimination persists in the whole world. We generally boast about women at top positions and how they made to that level. Can we just go deep inside the numbers as what percentage of top positions they hold if actually compared with the population of the world? According to Catalyst, the percentage of women at top positions in Fortune 500 companies has been stagnant over the past five years and that’s just 14% on an average. Should we actually feel proud on this percentage? Fourteen Percent? The ratio is even lower in countries like India. According to a study the women holds only 5-7% of the topmost positions in India. The same website shows that women in India are just 3% of the legislative, management and senior official positions. According to Gender Diversity Benchmark, 2011, India has the lowest national female labour force and the worst leaking pipeline for junior to middle level position women. Furthermore the sex ratio is almost equal in terms of population. Well, again this topic can take whole of my life to understand the reason and the basis on which such discrimination which is done.
I believe this is not just discrimination, infact perceiving this as just discrimination would be a little less for me. This is a societal fanciful drama as I said earlier. A drama which is created by the society whenever there is a need to make us believe that a particular thing is right at a particular point of time. Examples are many and we can see the same at every point of time even in our day to day life. Apart from just focusing on the position of women at corporate or taking about women empowerment which is also a crucial issue I want to focus on an ordinary girl her daily struggles with her daily thoughts and the world ofcourse where people are ready to make jokes out of a girl’s way of thinking. On daily basis we receive atleast three or four jokes related to how a girl reacts when she is with her boyfriend or those husbands –wives jokes which have actually started haunting my personal thoughts whenever I seriously think about such jokes. Is this really true that after marriage or while being in a relationship a girl becomes so over possessive, so domination or so meaningless or the world has stopped portraying an intelligent woman in books or on social media. On the contrary we also receive messages which talks about how you should respect a woman, but on the other hand we laugh on such silly jokes where wives and girlfriends are portrayed as someone very dumb to even understand their partners. How pitiful is this that where we are asking people to respect a girl, we only make jokes related to their behavioral aspects. And as a matter of fact still a girl is told that she is loved for the way she is. Don’t you think this is something very annoying? Or should I say funny?
Moreover if I talk about the corporate world I have seen people talking about why a woman should not be hired for a particular role and especially for an important role at the managerial level because she might be having behavioral changes or timing issues. Ofcourse we can see top positions being taken by women but still this mentality still prevails in the market. I was talking to one of my friend few days back who is working with one of the topmost groups in India. On asking why his company is so reluctant towards hiring a woman employee, he had the same answer. The management does not find a girl suitable to work for such a niche position and hence they hunt for a male candidate. And believe me this is not the only case. Corporate find it really difficult to accept a woman for a position which demands time, sincerity and dedication.
I remember a similar incidence which took place on this Monday when one of my colleagues was discussing in the group how women are less passionate at workplace as compared to their male counterparts. He was telling to his colleagues that women find it difficult to work for the whole day and hence they find reasons to sneak from workplace because they are not career oriented. Well I decided to move out of the conversation because I feel there is a big heard of people who have such perception about women and nothing can be done about that. Moreover I am trying to find the source from where they perceive such thoughts. What makes them believe in the theory that women are not passionate about their career and men are? On being asked the number of great examples of women who were passionate about their dreams and achieved that Google can give you enough examples to make you believe in the fact that this is not true.
Well, this discussion is endless and perceptions may differ from person to person. I just made an attempt to brainstorm and analyze how the society molds this discriminatory drama in their favor according to their interests. I am not a hardcore feminist nor do I try to indulge myself in proving what are the pros and cons of being a woman but amidst these fights I am unsure that we are get benefited in any of the manner. Adding to the situation, I am worried about the disoriented approach of the society towards a woman’s status.
Also featured on Alphadigest at: http://blog.alphadigest.com/2015/09/25/the-drama-of-discrimination-you-win-some-you-lose-some/
