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Mainstream, Vol 62 No 46, Nov 16, 2024
No Male Tailors or Gym Trainers for Female in UP: A Step towards Women’s Safety or Regressive Patriarchy? | Pragya Ranjan
Saturday 16 November 2024
#socialtagsUttar Pradesh’s state women commission has proposed that men should neither tailor clothes for women nor cut their hair as part of an initiative to protect women from "bad touch" and avoid any "ill intentions" by male workers in these professions. The proposal even extends to having a female gym and yoga trainer for female clients, and those who want to have a male trainer need to sign a consent form. Babita Chauhan, the head of the commission says in an interview that, “I have lived among women and I know the problems of women.”
The media outlet is talking about the consequences of this measure on the loss of employment and right of choice for women, but none of them talks about the male or phallo-centric aspect of this proposal. These measures on papers are proposed to protect women from sexual harrasment and rape cases. Around 30.9% of violence against women in the country is done by someone in her own family. The recent cases also show the increased number of sexual harassment in hospitals. Then does this measure also suggest that a woman should stop seeing their male relatives, doctor or patient and only engage with female members and staff?
Here again the steps taken are not to protect women but compartmentalize them into a separate section, and therefore restricting their contact with the opposite gender. It is a measure to protect the traditional woman, the woman who is a husband’s or a father’s property, a woman whose sanctity is so precious that even an outsider’s gaze may pollute it. The commission says, ‘Men shouldn’t tailor women’s clothes, cut their hair’. The ‘should’ here implies a traditional moral standard, which means ‘women’ should engage with ‘women’ only. Moreover, women are required to sign a consent form if they choose to train under a male instructor, effectively placing the full responsibility on the woman if any harassment occurs, as her consent is treated as a waiver of accountability.
Though this policy may not seem very concerning on the surface, it signals a step toward the restoration of traditional patriarchal structure, reminiscent of restrictions seen in countries like Afghanistan.
Patriarchy thrives on creating strictly separate male and female spaces, as this division makes it easier to impose and maintain hierarchies. In Afghanistan, for example, one of the first actions taken by the Taliban after regaining power was to severely restrict women’s freedoms. The regime banned women from talking with or even looking at men outside their families. In regressive patriarchal society, there is a tendency to limit a woman’s interaction to another male. It pressurizes women to preserve the unsaid purity and sanctity of their mind and body. The opposite gender remains a mystery in this set up, and also certain stereotypes often lead to the development of their behavior. To go from separate schools and colleges for boys and girls to co-ed institutions, it took us more than fifty years after independence. In India, Mixed-sex education became mandatory for primary schools in 1957 and for all universities in 1975. The mystery still exists amongst the two genders but it has significantly decreased in the coming generation.
Power is difficult to relinquish once it’s been granted, as humans are naturally inclined to find satisfaction in control and possession. This measure, too, further deepens the possession of men over women by limiting their freedom in public spaces and an increased vigilance over them. There will be eyes pointing at a woman, every time she goes to a male trainer or tailor for measurements if this policy is implemented.
In India, many instances of sexual violence stem from a lack of open discussion about sexual intimacy and the societal mystique surrounding the opposite sex. Rather than treating sex as a natural part of life, it is often imbued with an exaggerated mystique, making it a taboo rather than a normal aspect of human experience. The solution lies in fostering awareness around sexual consent, normalizing discussions on these topics, simplifying the process for women to file police complaints, and implementing tangible safety measures for women. Isolating women in exclusively female spaces addresses only the symptom, not the root causes, of the problem.
The aim to make an inclusive society for women should be to foster an environment where both genders can understand and respect each other, rather than creating division through prohibition. Femininity and masculinity are social constructs, and even if certain positive traits are deemed masculine, then women should be encouraged to embrace those traits to thrive in real-world environments. Similarly, if women are considered feminine, men should be encouraged to develop emotional awareness and empathy, aligning their actions with their own emotions and those of others.
This is not the first time that, rather than addressing the core of a problem, only its surface has been treated and amplified into a national issue by the current government, which is eager to bring back the ill-famed Manusmriti that portrays women as subservient to men. If our population is growing, then Muslims are to be blamed for it. If the economy is declining, then an impractical solution of demonetization should bring the entire country to a standstill at 8pm. If there is growing unemployment, poverty, illiteracy, then invest the entire nation’s energy on building Ram Mandir. The current government likes to set up a huge political circus, and people enjoy being spectators to a lineup of performers staging new stunts every day. But it is they who laugh at us, as we pay the price for their facade of a show.
BJP’s success is rooted in its ability to tap into people’s primal instincts. According to Freud, there are two fundamental drives: Eros, the life instinct, and Thanatos, the death instinct, which encompasses anger and risky behaviors. These primal instincts are regulated by the ego and superego—internal forces that guide us and prevent us from acting on these impulses, as they are considered morally wrong. The BJP, by appealing to these base instincts, bypasses these moral constraints, mobilizing emotions like anger and fear to drive political support. It is the Thanatos, or the death instinct, that the BJP taps into, which is why people often become excited by its agenda. It stirs anger, rage, and a primal instinct to inflict violence on others. Emotions like hate, the desire for war, power, and violence are far easier to provoke in people than fostering ideals like love, peace and empathy. By appealing to these darker instincts, BJP generates intense emotional responses that resonate more immediately than positive messages. The Nazis, Fascists and all kinds of dictators and autocrats have survived and still survive on driving this instinct among people.
Here again, in this recent proposal in UP, it is the desire for power over women that excites and garners support from men, rather than a genuine concern for women’s safety. It is a classical example of a patriarchal solution to a woman’s problem. When the government should be hitting the roots of the problem, they keep us busy by cutting off the branches.
(Author: Pragya Ranjan is a critic, a story writer and a translator who majorly concerns herself with literature and socio-political issues. She is currently engaged in writing about women’s discourse and societal hierarchies. Email: pragyaranjanonly[at]gmail.com)