Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest of them all?
What defines a Woman? What defines a Woman’s identity? If a woman asks this question to the famous wall-mounted mirror on the wall, I suspect she may get a multi-layered version of herself as an answer. A layered image – created by the many roles dictated by society and obscured by the many versions of herself created in her head by cultural patriarchal influences. Which is the fairest of all? It is a very difficult and unpleasant question to answer, if you ever dare to ask one. A person’s identity is defined by different factors, the genes, social and cultural upbringing, education, the list goes on. It gets even more interesting to see how a woman’s identity is evolved.
We idolize people who sacrifice and when it comes to women, we expect it to be her second nature. An exalted woman, who sacrifices her career for the sake of her family is a common narration in popular media. It is inscribed in a woman’s thinking and we normalize it unconsciously. Such narration puts woman’s sacrifices on a high pedestal. Considering that we are a society that gives importance to family and its values, this does not sound out of the ordinary even in the current times.
It is an emotional pitfall normally women fall into. I love my kids unconditionally and that’s the purest and truest form of love I ever experienced. But does that love define me and who I am? What’s the balancing point between your aspirations and your conventional roles? To be more precise, what’s the sweet spot between your dreams and your family? For Women, it always turns out to be a balancing act where you ‘Lean In’ on to one side, and the other one goes for a toss. Why is it that only women have to face this choice? If you pick the family you would be the ideal one and if you pick a career, you most likely get a delinquent tag. Even the women who choose to pursue their career, have to put an enormous amount of effort to be a superwoman who pulls off both the roles of her life effortlessly.
Mostly it is the self-effacement nature honed by decades of social conditioning that makes women a relationship-honoring one. It takes a lot of effort and perseverance for women to break free from such norms. It would be wrong to say that all women have similar predicaments. You may find many women who are ensconced comfortably in a patriarchal social setup, and this is a considerable percentage of women. The world might really be missing the hidden talents they have or the unfound geniuses in them. We may never know. They may refuse to see this downside of it especially when their choices are venerated by society.
The problem with unnecessary sacrifices may force women to be unauthentic with smothered dreams over a course of time. They may fuse their dreams into their partner’s or children’s dreams. They themselves start playing the second fiddle to achieve their goals. Such pseudo dreams are simply not theirs, to begin with, and by the time they realize this truth, it is too late.
Recently I watched the movie ‘Thappad’ which tried to change this common narrative. The movie talks about an inadvertent slap and how it clears the mirror to reveal a woman’s identity. It shows how women from different social and economic classes deal with domestic abuse in various forms. They try to live with such abuse and a realization changes their lives. In the movie, the slap was the point where the protagonist realized her individuality and how her dreams and aspirations forked away from that of her partner.
Just the way women are conditioned to think a certain way, Some men are also socially conditioned to think in a certain way. Because of which they think they are entitled to such an act of physical or mental aggression on the other sex. Many men don’t realize the difference in environments a woman and a man are brought up and conditioned in society. In Virginia Woolf’s essay, A Room of one’s own, Woolf invents a fictional character Judith, Shakespeare’s equally talented imaginary twin sister, to explain this disparity. Judith could not get recognized like her brother just because she was a woman. When we flip through the pages of history listing all the Scientists, Mathematicians, and prominent personalities, we should spare a moment for all the neglected women genius’s who lost out a place in the list just because they were born into ‘fairer’ sex. When a person stands for a woman’s equality, they silently acknowledge the individuality and unrecognized abilities of their mother, grandmother, and great grandmothers, which would have evolved differently in a suitable era and time.
Education can make great headway in reducing social inequality. Education helps women create an identity of her own and broaden her thinking. It also helps to have a definite knowledge of her own preferences and dislikes. A family is an important unit in society, so is self-respect and individual freedom. If women in a family do not have the freedom for self-expression and personal destiny, they become an unhealthy pocket in society. It certainly will not pave the way for an ideal society. Over the course of time, the position of women has improved in society. Education and awareness can greatly accelerate such change.
Many times, it is tough for a woman to have some time for herself and pursue her passion. Many women suffer from a kind of double consciousness, the need to stay true to your self or to the image of herself created by social and cultural patriarchal notions. Hopefully, as time goes by women will feel less guilty of having her own interests to pursue and dreams to fulfill. While talking about the woman and her personal time, it would be interesting to do a check to quantify the personal time a woman gets.
Finkbeiner test(named after the science journalist Ann Finkbeiner) is a checklist to help science journalists avoid gender bias in articles about a woman in science. It would be interesting to apply the basis of Finkbeiner test on the conversations we have in our daily life. I have omitted a few and clubbed a few to suit the context of this article. Let’s try to quantify the personal time woman have based on the conversations they have. Any conversation,
- refers to her husband’s job\achievements
- refers to how she is bringing up the kids
- Alludes to the fact that she is a woman and her struggles\achievements as a woman in any field
should be excluded when you count the number of conversations women have on their own personal interests. When a woman applies this checklist to track her conversations, you can see the range of personal interests a woman has other than what her role demands.
“A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction” – A Room of One’s own, Virginia Woof
In a money-driven society, it is inevitable that money defines power balance in society. Women earned the right to keep their own money legally towards the start of the 19th century in many western countries. The actual effects of this law would have taken decades to trickle down to the poorest classes of society. Though we started off late, there has been steady progress in terms of woman’s involvement in the economy. Financial freedom will increase the confidence of a woman to pursue her own interest.
For most of us, woman empowerment means breaking the glass ceiling. The thing about glass cages is that it makes you believe that you own the sky. Only when you take flight will you get to know about the glass barrier which lies between you and your dreams. That realization is the pivotal moment when a woman realizes her real standing. Self-realization is the first important aspect when it comes to woman empowerment.
‘Mirrors are necessary to all violent and heroic action’. – A room of One’s own, Virginia Woof
As the UN’s website outlines, Gender equality is not only a fundamental human right, but a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world. Half the population of the world is women and to realize the potential of this sidelined sector, each and every woman must discover her true potential. When a woman looks in the mirror, she should always seek the best and the fairest version of herself. When you know your identity and acknowledge your self-respect, you will always see the ‘Fairest-of-all’ version in the mirror.
A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf
Hazy Dreams and Reflections 