Let's Put Ourselves First Ladies

image courtesy : ias.edu

A year ago, I conducted a survey among 50 married women (myself included) from similar backgrounds… educated, liberal, upper-middle class. Basically, all these women are well read, well- travelled, forward thinking women. I had asked a single question to understand how we feel we are valued in the eyes of our husbands. Deliberately, I had structured the question as a harsh, physical abuse reaction, rather than a mental abuse question, as in my personal experience, most women always complained their husbands did not consider mental abuse as abuse at all.

Here’s the question-

What will your husband do if his mother slaps you?

1.     Leave the house with you

2.     Not talk to her for a month and hold it against her forever

3.     Reprimand her, not talk to her for a month, but eventually forgive her.

4.     Reprimand her momentarily and then go about life as usual.

An astonishing 52% of the women felt their husbands would momentarily reprimand their mothers and then go about life as usual. Another 24% felt their husbands would behave as per option 3, reprimand, not talk for a month, but eventually forgive.

The responses were a little surprising. Over 75% of us…. urban, liberal, educated women are living in relationships where we feel our partners will not support us or oppose the perpetuator of even a crime as severe and abhorrent as physical abuse against us. All of us are living in our marriages in spite of this clear knowledge and understanding of the balance of power, our standing in the hierarchy and the patriarchy existent in the family and our relationships. Most importantly, we seem to not mind the lack of value we have in the eyes of our partners and accept it as a basic fact of life. We go about our lives as usual, in our branded clothes and shoes, dining at fancy restaurants and vacationing at exotic locations. We seem to be happy and content with the way things are in our lives.

Over this past year, I have had several conversations with close girlfriends and have come to realise many of us are not ‘really’ happy in our relationships. We are living in these marriages because “this is the only option” or “this is better than going back to mom’s place” or “lack of financial independence” or “too used to this house and the ways” or “can’t lose common friends and social circle” or “this has been my whole life for 10 years” or “don’t want to give the kids a broken home” and several such reasons. Thus, we have come to accept it as the way of life. 

On a daily basis we go through humiliation and a loss of dignity in some way or other. Every day we are subtly bullied and intimidated by our partners. How much ever educated we or our partners may be, patriarchy runs deep within the family structure and our husband’s minds too. Most often we are taken for granted, it is assumed certain jobs are our responsibility based on gender. Almost always it is assumed we will be available as per demand and we will adjust and alter our routines and plans without complaints. Our husbands inherently believe what they are doing is of more value, their time is more important, their hobbies more meaningful, their health paramount to ours, their sleep more precious, their family, friends and social commitments more relevant than ours. 

But the sadder truth revealed by most of us during our conversations was, we too often think they are more important than us. We have been raised to believe so. We were raised by mothers who gave their husbands and in-laws a lot of priority. We grew up in houses where men ate before women. As girls, from a very young age we were told to participate in household chores and learn culinary skills. We were groomed by parents and relatives who taught us adjustment and compromise are necessities in a marriage and the virtues of a girl. We were brought up in times where children were always a mother’s responsibility. We grew up watching movies which reinforced these values. As young women we were bombarded with advertisements of super-women who managed everything from work to home to kids with a smile on their faces. We watched ads from lingerie to lipsticks telling us to impress the man. 

Then why is it harder for us to accept the patriarchy existing in our relationships than it was for our mothers? Is it because though we grew up seeing and absorbing the patriarchy in our houses and society, we were also raised to be independent girls at the same time. Our parents expected equal if not more education for us and our brothers. We read a lot more and questioned a lot more than previous generations. Feminism was taking roots in India. We travelled to places and interacted with a variety of people from different cultures and backgrounds. In our schools and colleges, we believed our guy friends to be equal to us. We chose similar education fields, partied as hard and worked as competitively as our male friends. Many of us chose our life partners from amongst these very boys, who we had spent a great deal of time with in college or office and who had treated us equally till we got married to them.

Therefore, we were unprepared for the rude shock awaiting most of us once the newness of our marriages settled down. Our husbands were not the friends or lovers we had married but products of the society we had all been raised in. Intellectually even though they agree in equality of genders, in their daily lives they are not ready to make the changes required or give up the conveniences which come with being a man. They choose to settle in the comfort zone and prioritize themselves over us because it is a much more agreeable option than living up to the ideals of equality. The advantages of turning a blind eye to the injustices and mental abuse they commit on a daily basis greatly outnumber the inconveniences that come with treating the other as an equal.

Keeping in mind our dilemmas and our partners’ convenient choices, we women need to stand for ourselves and each other more often. Instead of telling each other these inequalities are a part of marriage and mine is no different than yours, we should encourage and motivate each other to value ourselves more, put ourselves before our husbands and children. We need to keep pushing ourselves and our women friends to put their foot down and not accept nonsense, to respect themselves and other women more, to say no when they don’t want to do something, to create their own separate identities and above all to love themselves. We have to free ourselves from the shackles of people’s approval and expectations. 

And most importantly, we must learn from our husbands. Like them, once we shift the focus from others and make ourselves the centre of our world, belittlement and condescension will be replaced by self-esteem, happiness and contentment.