Feministaah

I n Meg Wolitzer’s novel,  The Female Persuasion , a character called Faith Frank, a second wave feminist, gives a speech to students at which she says, “Whenever I give a talk at colleges, I meet young women who say I am  not  a feminist. By which they mean I don’t call myself a feminist, but I want equal pay, and I want to have equal relationships with men, and of course I want to have an equal right to sexual pleasure. I want to have a fair and good life. I don’t want to be held back because I am a woman…What do you think feminism is, other than that? How do you think you are going to get those things if you deny the political movement that is all about obtaining that life that you want.”    Whenever another celebrity says with a sneer, that she is not a feminist, this is what she should be told. Jessica Hamzelou, in a report in the New Scientist, quotes studies that found that “ feminists are more keenly aware of gender stereotypes, even when they are pre...

You read with a mixture of alarm and skepticism, the poll report by the London-based Thomson Reuters Foundation that India is the most dangerous country in the world for women, beating Afghanistan, Syria, Somalia, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Pakistan. According to reports, a total of 548 global experts on women’s issues-- 43 of them from India-- were asked about  risks faced by women in six areas: healthcare, access to economic resources and discrimination, customary practices, sexual violence, nonsexual violence, and human trafficking. And shockingly, India comes out as the worst! We see women progressing in every field in India, but, there is also the increasing violence against women and young girls reported every day; not long ago, female tourists felt safe in India, now women travelling solo are constantly targeted. Everyday there are reports of the rapes and murders of minor girls, often accompanied by unimaginable torture and mutilation. There has been outra...