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Almost every woman has faced some kind of sexual harassment or abuse in her life. Doesn't that make #NotAllMen kind of pointless?
Almost every woman has faced some kind of sexual harassment or abuse in her life. Doesn’t that make #NotAllMen kind of pointless?
#NotAllMen
Aren’t we all familiar with this hashtag? Every time a crime against women gains a slot on a news channel or trends on social media, the first reaction we see in the comments is men putting up #notallmen.
As a feminist and a woman, I find this extremely annoying. This is an open letter to all those men who are constantly pushing this propaganda forward.
First things first, yes, we KNOW #notallmen. We have all had the privilege of knowing a few good men. And we know good men exist, you don’t really have to shout it every time there’s a discussion about women’s safety.
Every time you shout #notallmen, you seem to be saying, ‘Not all men are bad. Don’t drag us, good men, into this discussion because the men who are to be blamed are a bunch of uneducated perverts. And don’t judge all the men by the work of a few sexually deviant and vile men.’
Is that what you’re trying to say?
If so, let’s do a social experiment. Go to any woman you’re close to – your mother, sister, daughter, colleague, friend, girlfriend, wife, or cousin. Ask her if she has been sexually harassed at some point of time in life. From catcalling to being slut-shamed to being groped in public places to hearing sexual language or jokes at work. Ask them about any major or minor event they remember.
I bet every single one of them will have a story to tell, most probably more than one story each. So according to your #notallmen theory all these women, all across the country, are harassed by that small bunch of sexually deviant men that you aren’t a part of?
Well then, they are doing a pretty good job of covering so many places in very little time. They’re like a weird version of Santa Claus.
Doesn’t this scenario seem (at least) a little improbable to you? Isn’t it probably time to admit that we need to educate men with things like consent, individuality and gender equality?
Maybe the hashtag could be #NotAFewMen? Or rather than putting up these hashtags, we could have proper sex education for everyone.
Then, maybe, one day in the future, our daughters will be able to step out of their houses without worrying about what they’re wearing. Maybe, then, they would be able to enjoy a night out with their friends, their purses light, without the pepper spray.
Picture credits: Still from Bollywood movie Ranjhanaa
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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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