Once upon a time, there was a so-called 'unsinkable' ship called the Titanic.
Alas, it was found to be sinking!
To make matters worse, there were too many people on board and too few lifeboats.
The men in charge pulled out their guns and screamed an order: "Women and children only!"
That was not about flirting, holding doors, or pulling chairs - it was about who lives and who dies.
It meant that the men holding life-taking guns would go down with the Titanic into icy watery graves, and the unarmed women would live on.
This was not the decision of one individual, but of an entire group of men. It was not out of helplessness; there was a choice. It was not sudden; there was time to change their minds.
And yet, it was executed as planned, and most men did die.
Till the very end, even in the face of certain and imminent death, the chaos was far below what one would expect. Most men remained disciplined in death.
You may already know all of this.
What you may not know is that among the men on the Titanic was a Japanese man named Masabumi Hosono.
He somehow escaped, dressed as a woman.
Hosono was employed by the government of Japan. When they found out, they fired him for taking away a lady's seat in the lifeboat, thereby bringing death to some unknown woman left behind, and disgrace to Japan.
That was not all. His name made it into school textbooks, and children were taught how not to be like him!
In most cultures, across geographies, women and children have typically been kept away from the harm's way.
Not necessarily because she is physically weak, but to borrow the movie caption: "There's something about Mary" that makes her special.
A man is more - in fact, is a gentleman, putting on his best manners in the presence of a woman.
Unless men are fighting each other over her - tongue firmly in cheek!
A man's principled duty is to protect her.
Why?
Because across cultures, she is the first nurturer of the family and the moral guardian.
And the man?
Across cultures, he is the first protector cum provider and always wanting to save his family while expanding his territory.
What feeds his sense of well-being vis-a-vis other men is either his higher wisdom, strength, or prosperity.
These are the three key parameters by which he compares and competes with fellow men.
In the Hindu-centric culture, the sources of his wisdom, strength, and prosperity are the Goddesses Saraswati, Shakti, and Lakshmi, respectively.
That the high and mighty bow to these feminine deities with no hesitation whatsoever is Indianness at its core.
Anyone who says men and women are equal hasn't understood women. He is the mighty, but sinkable Titanic. She is his mariner's compass, showing him his North.
A lady is not just a non-male. She is distinctly unique.
Oh woman, oh woman, you are a labyrinth of complexities, an intriguing tapestry, a mystery.
And if she becomes him, what uniqueness does she then have?
The patriarchy debate in India, led by the feminist, as it is framed today, is largely an imported ideological lens.
The feminist movement was much needed in America to fight patriarchy as in their earlier theological culture, they believed that the creator made the man first and then later the woman from his side - to help him in his premier roles.
Forget leaders, they didn't accept woman as a valid voter for over a century after the first modern election when only the elite white men voted in America!
That's not exploitation, it's even worse - discrimination.
So, we must go by our civilizational context, experiences, and culture.
Here, we have Goddesses in our faith, females as heroes in our history, iconic freedom fighters, and other role models in our culture.
The imported arguments of today does more to obfuscate and divide the society than to explain it.
Sure, there are wretched people out there - men and women, who exploit others for personal gain. Some rich exploit the poor, the powerful the the powerless, the privileged the underprivileged, etc.
However, it has nothing to do with just men.
Division of labor and responsibility between the sexes has existed everywhere, from advanced societies to the most primitive tribes across the world.
If one may, it is an anthropological observation - a functional reality, not a timeless global conspiracy. However, de-glamourisation of traditional roles of women, is a Western import.
And so, the family, a unit building block of society, is strong here, but weak there.
In India, we have traditionally celebrated both femininity and feminism.
The distinction that comes to the fore is that the former is about being at ease with one's intrinsic gender based nature and the roles that flow from it, while the latter is about the extrinsic role that evolves with demand of circumstances, be it that of a caring mother or a daring warrior - like Rani Lakshmibai or Goddess Durga herself.
One can oscillate between the two.
What should not happen is force-fitting a young lady into an ideology that is not naturally her's, else be deemed incomplete, which a "modern" feminist often does. She must be encouraged to decide for herself and do whatever she likes, while being mindful of her psychological and physiological parameters which differ from person to person.
Viewing women empowerment from a Western lens is coloniality.
A woman who has made herself wholly equal to a man is, by definition, stripped of femininity, and thus, utterly subjugated!
No man will sacrifice life to save her in the next sinking Titanic.
Bolo Bharat Mata Ki ... Jai Okay Please 🙌🏽🇮🇳
