An Imaginary Dialogue Between A Rebel & Me

When principle steps forward to fight irreverence.

Me: Hey buddy! You look good today, just like your usual sweat faced angry self!

Rebel: And you too. You do always manage to keep your silly do-gooder smile plastered on, literally every day of the month. Don’t you get exhausted?

Me: Alas, it is my nature.

Rebel: I really don’t understand why you go about pretending like the world is a wonderland filled with galloping unicorns. Don’t you recognise the problems of this world?

Me: Which ones do you mean? Have you made a personal list?

Rebel: You bet.

Me: *sighs*

Rebel: *inhales deeply* There’s the never ending gender bias! How rotten India is! How much nicer all the foreign universities are! How terrible the male species is! And don’t forget how much womankind would prosper in their absence!

Me:*wry* A progress that might sadly perish once Earth’s population flames out.

Rebel: Shut up— *inhales deeply once more* — Why my mother never allows me to wear ripped shorts to college, or get green highlights, or curse. How much of a taboo there exists on everything girls do — *another deep breath* — How our freedom is going to the dogs, how useless our prime minister is, how the government is conspiring to wash out this nation’s diversity —

Me: What is the scale of your issues? Are they personal or national? Are you trying to pop a balloon and then pop a pin under the globe at the same time?

Rebel: Was that your attempt at being funny? It crashed and burned.

Me: Honestly— you sound sort of ridiculous.

Rebel: See, I just knew it! You always fail to understand my problems.

Me: I’m not denying them. I just find your constant griping about them off putting. Perhaps you could curse outside of class— why do it before exasperated middle-aged professors? You could learn to highlight your hair through YouTube yourself if your mother refuses to pay for a salon job.

Rebel: *frowns* What are you trying to do?

Me: Find solutions to your problems! *frowns* You could educate yourself about India, firstly. You’d realise that our educational foundations date back further than the dawn of civilization in your over glorified foreign lands. *takes a deep breath* You could quit the anti-India attitude, and if it’s not too much of a stretch, quit the anti-government attitude too.

Rebel: Ah, look at you. Another brainwashed nationalist.

Me: Do your research: I’m not a nationalist, I’m a patriot. Why don’t you stop harping about divisive cultural differences? You do realise that they are designed by media influencers to fray the emotional nerves of vote banks? Try to educate yourself about the statistics and actual ground work of this government. Mathematics does not lie. You’d realise how much more progress the current prime minister has actually achieved for this country, and how much India’s international stature has risen through the work done under his leadership.

Rebel: All this just sounds like you are fending me off — you agree with nothing! You can’t appreciate a critic. It means you have something to hide.

Me: I am not against pointing out flaws to improve. But I detest your attitude. It’s a classic ‘rebel without a cause’ type.

Rebel: Is that it then? *sneers* Am I putting you off? Do I make you uncomfortable with my swearing, society’s little good girl? Are you threatened? Is it my attitude that bothers you or my volume?

Me: For God’s sake, woman.*sighs* Don’t make your voice louder, make your argument stronger.

(Invisible hype gang: cheers)

Me: I don’t dislike that you are against things. I dislike that you speak hopelessly, as if nothing can be changed and the world can only be hated. I dislike that you hate things for the sake of hating them, ignoring both facts and ethics. You bulldoze any reasonable person who tries to counter argue because you can’t bear to ‘lose’, not because you care about the truth at all. You don’t even research the opinions that you passionately scream about!

Rebel: *makes a sour face to hide her nerves*

Me: I dislike that you hate the nation I love. I dislike how you spread the old Empire mindset, putting young people around you in an inferiority complex, reinforcing the myth that Western people’s lives are better than ours in every way. That is nothing but a lie. Starting from music to pop culture, you know more about them than your own people, don’t you?

Rebel: *grasping on a familiar straw* What about women’s rights? What about them? Are you not a girl yourself? Do you refuse to acknowledge the inferiority we face?

Me: An inferiority you face is an inferiority that you accept within your mind first. Nothing under national law today stops a woman from achieving what her male counterpart can. Why don’t you lead by example? Do something instead of complaining and sitting on your backside all the time.

Rebel: What the —

Me: If you want to be inspiring, achieve something. The women who won us equality in the past were the ones who worked for it. And they sure didn’t work so much for us to make poster victims out of them, forever claiming their oppressed history. Those women defeated oppression. They were the silent heroes of their time, not the victims. They would have wanted us to build on their progress, and enjoy the freedom they fought to protect.

Rebel: What even is your point? Are you trying to question me?

Me: Why are you determined to hold on to their pain like a quota that will guarantee you a shower of sympathy and support? You saddle your fellow women with an invisible historical baggage when you speak like that. You stop them from succeeding fearlessly. You draw a red line that cuts through society. Is this ‘forever has been, forever will be’ gender discrimination narrative supposed to be helping us?

Rebel: You are crossing a line.

Me: How can I? You’ve beat me to it. Most of us are more equal today than we have ever been before in history. Why do you act otherwise? Your pessimism sure won’t help that actual particular section of women in society who are still fighting bias today, who in most cases are born into unfortunate circumstances, with economically challenged and uneducated families who are unwilling to support their growth. Try to be of some use. Working to empower them in real life will help, not talking about how unfortunate what they are facing is.

Rebel: *turns around to sulk*

Me: Women have achieved great things in every sphere on the planet today. Don’t act like something is holding back our potential. Don’t divide people into opposing camps based on their biological identities, because then you threaten the very fabric of human society. We are best known as human beings. We can only make a better world as wise companions, not wary competitors.

Rebel: * goes to a corner, praying quietly for a scathing comeback*

Me: I’m not a perfectionist, rebel. I don’t believe the world will ever run out of things to correct and improve, because it was never the ‘perfect unicorn wonderland’ that you accused me of believing in the beginning. But it is a beautiful, deeply interesting place. I dislike a person who critisizes the world without ever trying to change it. You lack gratitude. Life is a gift — don’t fail to notice that.