Wednesday, March 25, 2020

Letter to Pakistani Society


Aamna Rao
Image, Identity and Culture
Letter to society

Dear Pakistani society, I need not to decorate you with some flattery words as you yourself are decorated with hypocrisy and double standards. You yourself are decorated in a manner that your nakedness is unavoidable. I have grown up in a society where the reputation of an individual weighs stronger than the character. I have grown up in a society where freedom of speech is considered as an offensive act, a word of truth is marked as something that lacks respect, where the repression of your rightful desires is addressed as a reward. I have grown up in a society where the religion of the poor is food. I have grown up in a society where a woman is allowed to run a brothel but not a taxi. I have come from a society where the idea of being a right woman is to conform to the norms you have imposed on us. I have come from a society that entitles a woman as characterless if she falls in love with a man of her choice. I have come from a society where a man marries a woman for either to integrate a physical relationship that leads to reproduction or for her to do the house chores. I have come from a society where a few women are burnt from acids by their own husband and in-laws for speaking of her rights. I have come from a society where a woman is expected to keep on giving birth to daughters unless a boy does not graces her womb. Even the devil uses Holy scriptures to fulfill its own conspiracies. My religion, Islam has been misrepresented by your feigned rituals, and how sad for the world to consider religion and culture alike having so much of difference amongst each other. A religion that aims to honor women has been falsely represented by your male chauvinistic norms. The Quran forbids women to be forced into marriages, to be forced into pregnancies. Oh society, if you continue to exist the way you have existed for centuries then women will continue to suffer the brutalities of your norms. If you would not resist your traditional method of flourishment, then women will continue to lose their lives in the name of honor killings, they will continue to experience rape and acid attacks.
My heart crumbled when I heard the news in 2018 that the six year old Zainab was brutally raped and murdered by a 24 year old man named Imran Ali in Pakistan. Zainab’s body was found five days later in a rubbish dump. It was also later acknowledged that some similar murders had taken place from the past two years in Kassur. The idea of the loss of innocent life shatters my heart. Qandeel Baloch, a liberal blogger was strangled to death by her brother in the name of so called honor in 2016. I have been raised in a society where there is a huge difference between tribal areas and metropolitan areas. The metropolitan ideology compels the daughters to get educated for the sake of their snobbish community as well as to find a perfect suitor whereas the tribal areas suppresses women to pursue education. There are so many Malala Yousafzadi’s still craving to achieve their careers. There are many like Zainab and Qandeel who suffer in your unjustness. Do you have the audacity to let this happen? Statistics from the Human Rights Commision of Pakistan suggested that there were 1276 murders over a two year period in 2014 in the name of honor killing. Although acid attacks have reduced in Pakistan from the past five years, they continue to take place.
I have reached a society of the West and I heard the beauty of equality in the United States, I thought that America is a land of free and equal. It turned out that it is a land of free and equal but there is an existence of invisible inequality that is hidden behind closed doors. Oh society, I wonder how long would it take for women to untie the norms you impose on them? I wonder when we will understand the true meaning of equality and freedom? Some women find modesty in wearing a cleavage blouse whereas others find modesty in covering their heads, both the kinds of women have the right to choose the kind of modesty they believe in.

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