Translate

Friday 6 December 2019

A Woman's Place

The Arts Council of Pakistan has traditionally, like all other institutions in that country, been an all male affair.

Pakistan Male Chauvinism Rules
Male Chauvinism Rules .... OK?

So when it decided to organises a discussion in November 2019 on feminism called Feminism: The Other Perspective, it did what it has always done and invited only an all-male panel. Oh, they did have one token woman, discussion host Uzma al-Karim, whose name featured at the bottom of the promotional literature.

However what they forgot was that whilst many women may well still be tied to the home, in the land of the pure, they increasingly have access to social media, so very quickly, the original title, Feminism: The Other Perspective, drew much derision. "Should have just called it men's day" wrote one lady ... who added "Why did these men agree to participating?" .... others left similar comments.

The organisers tried to defend themselves said that the male 'decision-makers' were invited to share views on feminism, but many critics questioned why having an all-male panel to discuss feminism didn't seem the obvious way to tackle gender inequality in Pakistan.

Two Women Speakers Added - Equality At Last?
Equality At Last?

The organisers gave in and two women speakers were added to the panel and the discussion was renamed Understanding Feminism.

The lesson from all this, isn't that very much will be done to respect women's rights or equality in Pakistan, or other similar countries who follow an overwhelmingly patriarchal societal system, but that the rise of social media has given women comparatively safe forums in which to voice their displeasure at the systems that have locked their voices out of public discourse for millennia.

Perhaps there will be some changes in those societies where male pomposity is easily pricked by ridicule if social media allows women a voice that can be heard.

2 comments:

  1. That last point about social media giving a voice to the disenfranchised is valid but equally it gives voices to the uglier sides of humanity such as Jihadi preachers.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes it is a double edged sword as the #fakenews debate has shown. Thanks for the comment.

      Delete

All comments are welcomed, or even just thanks if you enjoyed the post. But please make any comment relevant to the post it appears under. Off topic comments will be blocked or removed.

Moderation is on for older posts to stop spamming and comments that are off topic or inappropriate from being posted .... comments are reviewed within 48 hours. I don't block normal comments that are on topic and not inappropriate. Vexatious comments that may cause upset to other commentators, or that are attempting to espouse a particular wider political view, are reviewed before acceptance. But a certain amount of debate around a post topic is accepted, as long as it remains generally on topic and is not an attempt to become sounding board for some other cause.

Final decision on all comments is held by the blog author and is final.

Comments are always monitored for bad or abusive language, and or illegal statements i.e. overtly racist or sexist content. Spam is not tolerated and is removed.

Commentaires ne sont surveillés que pour le mauvais ou abusif langue ou déclarations illégales ie contenu ouvertement raciste ou sexiste. Spam ne est pas toléré et est éliminé.

Followers

Blog Archive

Its a Pucking World

Its a Pucking World
Dreamberry Wine Cover

About Me

My photo
A middle aged orange male ... So 'un' PC it's not true....