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The author sensitively portrays the journey of a boy growing up to be a man, burying all those softer emotions. The harm patriarchy causes our boys!
When it was nothing more than a blimp on the ultrasound, they hoped for it to be a He. They told us things we could do; fasts we could keep, gods we could pray to.
Men and women colluded alike in this want for the XY chromosome. One of them a grandmother, abandoned by her own. And yet, with little sense of irony and nary a scorn, she prayed for a “laddu gopal”, and not a “lakshmi” to be born.
Nine months passed and he arrived, celebrated like a king. The gods were duly appeased, And the neighbours duly fed, The “hijras” danced a whole lot more, for a whole lot more of money. “The family name shall live,” they said. And everyone went home happy.
Deeply loved and treasured the boy grew, Believing there was nothing wrong that he could do, little that could go awry.
But then one day he cried … And the list of wrongs, kept growing long. No shoes with glitter… No game of house… No girly colours… No mamma’s blouse… No pretending to be a fairy… No showing hurt, no vulnerability… No dolls, just guns or cars… No hugging, no kissing his pals…
He couldn’t understand why it was so, his sisters encouraged to “be like a boy”, but the reverse always a big NO.
Bullied to within an inch of his life, one fine day he had had enough, No more of the “girly nonsense”; He decided to “man up”. He was buff, he was gruff, he didn’t cry anymore. He too, learnt to mock the “sissies”, learnt to settle his scores.
Yes, he was all man now, the way they had always wanted to see. Since the day they had prayed to see a tiny penis on the ultrasound; things finally how they were meant to be.
I’d thought we hated just our daughters, turns out it’s our sons too. In the pursuit of hallowed “manhood”, deviations hold no virtue.
Image source: pexels
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UP Boards Topper Prachi Nigam was trolled on social media for her facial hair; our obsession with appearance is harsh on young minds.
Prachi Nigam’s photo has been doing the rounds on social media for the right reasons. Well, scratch that- I wish the above statement were true. This 15-year-old girl should ideally be revelling in her spectacular achievement of scoring a whopping 98.05% and topping her tenth-grade boards. But oddly enough, along with her marks, it’s something else that garners more attention – her facial hair.
While the trolls are driving themselves giddy by mocking this girl who hasn’t even completed her school yet, the ones who are taking her side are going one step ahead – they are sharing her photoshopped pictures, sans the facial hair, looking nothing less than a celebrity with captions saying – “Prachi Nigam, ten years later”.
Doctors have already diagnosed her with PCOD in their comments, based on photographic evidence. While we have names for people shamed for their weight – body shaming, for their skin colour- racism, for their age- age shaming, for being a female- sexism, this category of shaming where one faces criticism for their appearance has no name. With that, it also has zero shame attached to it.
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