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Why is violence inside the home, be it by parents, spouse, in-laws, siblings or an insider in our society so acceptable?
Why is violence inside the home, be it by parents, spouse, in-laws, siblings, or an insider in our society so acceptable?
Shivani’s teen daughter came running to Shivani after her online class and said, “Maa, you know what, one of my classmate’s mic was unmute and we all could hear her crying badly, and the sound of her mom beating. Soon, she muted herself, but I am shocked and feeling terrible. How can I help her? I have already messaged the teacher and hope she talks to that girl’s parents. But isn’t there any law which can prevent or punish a parent for beating their children badly?”
Shivani’s daughter had a valid point. Corporal punishment is taken as very normal in Indian families. Most of our generation or generations previous to that have grown up getting beaten up by our parents and we tend to justify that as ‘discipline’. Jokes circulate now as to what was used by our mothers to beat us, “belan, chappal, stick, broom” and people tend to laugh at that.
Beating is considered as the correct method to discipline children, teach manners and respect, or put them in their place. Now, when that child grows up he/she thinks it’s perfectly alright to follow the same rules for his/her children and another generation is raised with parents hitting them as punishment.
As Shivani’s visibly shaken and disturbed daughter asked, “Why is it that instead of realizing that their parents had been wrong in beating them they continue to do the same with their kids?” That’s a million dollar question. The mothers-in-law who once were disrespected and abused as daughters-in-law continue doing the same with their own daughters-in-law instead of breaking the chain. Sometimes boys who saw their dads hit their mother do the same with their wife considering it to be the right thing to do!
During the earlier times, teachers used to throw dusters, hit the students with ruler and canes, slapped them, and that was not considered to be wrong by the teachers, parents or the society.
Just think of Shivani’s daughter’s classmate whose mic was unmute for a few seconds and the entire class and the teacher heard her cries and heard her getting beaten up; that was such a humiliation for her. Even domestic violence where husbands beat their wives is considered ‘normal’ by many families and the society and women are asked to tolerate and remain silent.
Why is violence inside the home, be it by parents, spouse, in-laws, siblings or an insider in our society so acceptable? Why are the victims asked to remain silent and bear it all as speaking up about would ‘tarnish’ the family image? Even laws are not really helpful here.
But just think once, what if as a grown-up you did a mistake or refuse something and you get hit or slapped… how would you feel?” The little children feel exactly the same..
Image source: a still from the film Taare Zameen Par
I am a travel expert by profession and an avid blogger by passion. Parenting and women's issues are something that are close to my heart and I blog a lot about them. read more...
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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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