Surnames - male domination the subtler way

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet."
- Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet: Act II, Scene ii

Surnames have been around for a long time now. Though still construed to be a kind of identification, surnames in their own subtle way, actually end up destroying a woman's identity. In fact a lot other stuff also contribute to this, but not so powerfully. For example, take the way a woman is addressed. It seems the honorific used to address a woman always depends on her relationship with a man. An unmarried woman is Miss, a married woman is Mrs. and a divorced or widowed woman is Mz (thankfully this honorific is almost extinct these days). Though the neutral Ms. has become popular, many suppose it should only be used for unmarried women. Though it seems to be a rather trivial issue, its implications are serious. The honorifics subtly imply that a Miss is her Father's property, a Mrs. is her husbands property, whereas a Mz. is yet to find her owner. Yet a man is always a Mr., no matter his marital status. What nonsense!

Maybe Shakespeare got it wrong. Its true of course that there's a lot in a name, certainly not in the context of Shakespeare's play. Surnames define an individual's identity. Yet they are almost universally based on the Father's name - either the child's father or the mother's father. I'm yet to meet someone with a mother's name for a surname. Still worse is the logic of most governmental institutions that almost by default ask for a father's/husband's name as if a mother had no role to play in the child's development. The story goes on with the society expecting and often compelling a newly married woman to adopt her husbands surname. Its ironically funny that when Miss A marries Mr. B, Miss A becomes Mrs. B overnight. Miss A suddenly ceased to exist. Family and friends never care to ask her if she had adopted her husband's surname. Whether she likes it or not, everyone start addressing her as Mrs. B.

The worst starts when a child is born. It is no secret as to how much pain the woman goes through to give birth to a child. Yet, every child is assumed to have the father's name suffixed. In the most feminist case the mother's father's name is suffixed, usually in a double-barrel-ed way - that leaves the child in a rather difficult position to fill application forms. I still wonder why a child cannot have a mother's name for a surname?! Why can't governmental organizations ask for father's name and mother's name instead of father's/husband's name? Why can't society have a neutral honorific for women? Will our male-dominated patriarchal society ever change?

Well, only time can tell. But for now, I can only reiterate that
If you are female, if you are feminist, you are FREE!

How society and the big media systematically denegrate women

Victimized women are always on fire for doing the wrong things!? Whenever there's a rape or molestation, the media and society jump in almost immediately to the conclusion that the victim was wearing short skirts, went out all by herself in the dark night, was dead drunk or whatever they could imagine of - to such an extent that the audience would even sympathize with, or justify the attacker. Worse still is the case of domestic violence. Women are supposed to take in all their husbands' egoism and chauvinistic sadism with meekness and quietness - for the sake of the so-called family honour. Its so obnoxious that makes one wonder how honourable can 'family honour' be when its blind to the honour of a woman - the mother of the family. Damn!

Recent days have shown to how far the media can go and denegrate women. Two women have been favorites for several news media - Sania Mirza and Sunanda Pushkar. Case 1, Sania might have done the worst possible thing in marrying whoever she is now married to, but isn't that her right. There is no real reason as to why she shouldn't marry a foreign national. Honestly, she was in the news for no fault of hers. And she in fact deserves appreciation now, that she's announced that she wouldn't be dropping her maiden name. I've no idea if she's a feminist, but certainly its a good start.

Case 2, Sunanda might be innocent or not. I have honestly no means of finding out if she used her relationship with Tharoor to win the bid - in fact, no one knows! She might have and I'm in no mood to defend her. However, the way the media has treated her is horrible. It seems the media just cannot accept that women can be successful in business. They went to the extent of projecting her as a slut. Its so unfortunate that media in a country like India, which has seen women like Kiran Shah, Indra Nooyi and Kiran Bedi still struggles to accept women as independent and capable of succeeding in business all by themselves.

Obviously things get worse when these attitudes are reflected by law. The recent judgement of a Bombay court that forbids abused women from filing cases in police stations other than the place of abuse has raised eye-brows. People end up wondering if there is any point in asking a woman who had just escaped a place of torture to go back to the same vicinity to seek justice. Families also contribute to this jeopardy. Young women are taught to obey their husbands and in-laws too.

Here's a typical scenario. When a couple get married, say the wife prepares tea for her husband. He thanks and appreciates and even makes a godess of her. Next day when she prepares tea again, he might thank and appreciate. Day three, he merely thanks her. Day four, he asks her to leave the tea on the table. Day five, he doesn't even care. Day six, she is now supposed to prepare tea. Day seven, she's got headache and needs someone to prepare tea for her. This guy calls her mom and rants 'your selfish daughter didn't even give me a cup of tea!' If your planning to marry, I think I should advice you to let your husband prepare tea for himself from day one.

With dipping sex-ratios and a male-dominated social setup, feminism in India has a long way to go. Yet, this is what I believe in the core of my heart - if you are female, if you are feminist you are FREE!

Women can choose to be free

The thing women have yet to learn is nobody gives you power. You just take it.
- Roseanne Barr

The Women's Reservation Bill has caused much controversy in the Indian political scene. While I do support the reservation, it should be understood that India is actually trying to build a palace with no foundation to lean on!!!

Its only too unfortunate that this nation has a long way to go in terms of women emancipation. Topping the list is the dowry business, as someone famously said, "Indian Marriage is a market where parents do the shopping," besides abuse, beautification, domestication, incest, purification, subjection and virgin-ism. In spite of all the progress India claims currently, most govt. applications always define women in terms of their relationship with men - they're always the daughter of some father (never a mother), or the wife of a husband - its only of late I've seen newspapers refer to women as Ms. and not 'Miss' or 'Mrs.'

Even women don't seem to refute social stereotypes. Almost every other woman I know switches to her hubby's surname after marriage. While its liberty to be identified by her husband's surname, its a huge compromise on her self-identity. I'm yet to find one good reason as to why a woman should choose to live behind her husband's shadow. The consequential problem is even worse. A child always has a father's name suffixed - because the mother's original identity had ceased to exist post-marriage... in spite of the fact that the woman went through a horribly painful nine month pregnancy and not the man!

Women, however, in my opinion, can choose to be free. But the fight can only work out from the bottom-up. Reserving parliamentary seats and educational courses is a great idea. But it can permeate the society only if women start from the foundation. They should learn that all the outward glossy freedom is by far overshadowed by what goes on behind closed doors. It would be really great if a woman can be a parliamentarian and independent, rather than one who is waiting to leave the Lok Sabha Chamber to prepare dinner at home. Right-to-choose, self-identity and total-equality are some things the women's movement can never choose to ignore.

I am prepared to sacrifice every so-called privilege I possess in order to have a few rights.
- Inez Milholland, Suffragist 1909