Dear once a year feminists
Dear Human,
You woke up this morning as a feminist, I’m happy for you.
I’m happy for 24 hours in 365 days, you’ve awakened a part of you that recognises women, not her sexuality, not her desires, not even the acceptance of her body, but you recognise that you’re “thankful” that she exist — for the needful things, of course.
To be brutally honest, your need to wish me, congratulate me, & thank me for giving immensely to this world is nothing but insulting, demeaning, saddening. You say that without my ability to carry you into this world, you wouldn’t exist, yet where were you when she was being killed at birth? You congratulate me for my strength, yet you fight for the sensitivity towards men, so all this while, through decades of female suffering in its ugliest of forms, where was your need for equality then? You accept that my life in this world is a higher struggler than yours, then you jokingly say she pulled the “woman’s card” at a party while you’re drunk, of course you do, you’ve never had to deal with pinching, groping, teasing.
You walk the streets like you own them, while with every step I take, I am aware of being raped through those mere eyes. You don’t know what it’s like to be raped without being touched, every single fucking day. I can feel his breath on my neck, I feel him staring down my shirt, looking me up & down as though I am nothing more than flesh, drooling over the shape of my breasts. From the moment I walk out of my building to the time I reach work, I have been raped 15 times. He’s raping me in his rear view mirror. He’s raping me at the bus stop. He’s touching me from behind his stall. He’s brushing past me in the crowded streets. He’s looking at me with a smirk in the lingerie store. He’s pinning me down, leaving me bruised & cold, bleeding to death. It makes me shudder. You know what’s worse? I can’t scream, and I cannot shout. I can’t even cry. Because for the rest of the world, it isn’t happening. It may be only in his eyes, but for me, it’s in every bone of my body. It’s imprinted in my mind, it is my reality, day after day.
You must think I’m crazy for talking about my sexual desires and my breasts in a world where I’m the reason behind my very sorrows.
If she’s such a feminist, why are her boobs on display? If she wants to stand for women’s rights, why won’t she focus on a girls education instead of her panties? Because my beloved human being, these girls aren’t raped in class rooms and examination halls, they’re not burnt and sold for having a higher IQ, if and when they get that far — they’re raped for having desires, they’re taught “a lesson” for having a vagina, they’re shamed and trolled for growing breasts that are visible.
They’re tortured with foreign objects and murdered silently by their own families, for having hormones. Yes, hormones. They’re married off for their fair skin and their ability to reproduce. They’re verbally and physically assaulted for the having expressions — you ask me if I’d wear a bra in front of my father and my brother? What part of my breasts should be alarming or shaming to anybody that has given birth to me & raised me? The vulgarity with which you so casually put my father and my breasts in the same sentence, saddens me because to you, in that moment, my breasts in front of my own father become sexual. And the idea of human beings like you existing, terrifies me.
When the mother that alarmingly asks her 15 year old daughter to shut her legs and sit appropriately in front of the men of the house — terrifies me. This isn’t, and never has been, men against women. You, as a human being, where were you when I needed you?
Today, here you are, mocking me for having little rights that give me justice towards inequality, but where were you when I was slapped and told to sit at home because what the hell would I do being educated anyway? You stereotype me for being aggressive, Nazi, bra burning, but where were you for 15 years, when I quietly laid the dinner on the table and got looked at with disgust because my cleavage was visible?
You are petrified that your daughter won’t be treated well in her new home, but where were you when your son left me bleeding, sobbing on the floor, every night? You are mad at me for a law that saves me from the beasts that bought me for materialistic needs in the name of ever lasting love, yet I don’t see you standing next to me when I’m told “if he’s your husband, then madam it cannot be rape, it’s your family matter.”
Instead your little voices echo in my ear “You’re the woman of the house, the nurturer, you must keep this family together”, you say, “his home is your home now”. You disagree and say “not all men”, even though you’re the first to disapprove when I travel on my own, in my comfort of clothes, on my chosen time. If it’s not all men, why don’t you have faith in your own? If it’s not all men, surely someone will help me, won’t they? If it’s not all men, there must be more like you. Or my dear human, is that exactly what you’re afraid of?
You come in forms of my mother, my best friend, my lover, my mentor, my brother, my stranger, and today you stand so proud, my fellow feminist. But to conveniently pick a day once a year to thank me for being alive, makes my misery even sadder.
You may love me, but do not wish me.
For it isn’t “Happy-” it is an alarming reminder, day after day, of the wars we fight. It is another attempt, another chance, at desperately reaching out to you, hoping you’ll understand, that my adamant attempts to free my vagina (this little, vulgar, dirty, objectified part of my body that you came from), normalise my breasts, to acquaint you to my body — is important. It isn’t frivolous. It isn’t petty. It is my birthright. And because I would stand with you until death to help you get yours, is it too much that you to do the same?
So while you woke up this morning, full of gratitude and feminism bursting out of your energies, I swear I am happy for you, but may I request you to sleep over this today, and wish me on another day?
Yours,
Just another woman, on any other day.
