Adil Najam
As a rule, we try not to repeat posts too often. Sometimes, we feel that the message is either pertinent again or that the original may not have been seen by a new crop of readership. I am reposting this picture and this post, originally posted on this date last year, because the message is even more pertinent today than it was a year ago, and because I feel like I need to say it again.
For Pakistan, this has again been a year of struggles as well as achievements for women. It marked the assassination of Benazir Bhutto – clearly the best known Pakistani woman, whatever you think of her politics. It marked also an election that saw more women win on general seats than ever before in Pakistan. But there was more, much more, to the daily struggles and achievements of Pakistan’s 70 million women that we need to celebrate. Today, and everyday.
In the metaphor of the original post, the message is that we all are (not just women, but men too) crossing the road to better gender relations, but we ain’t there just yet. Not by a long shot. Read on, please, even if you have read it before. What follows is my original post from last year.
Today is March 8 – International Women’s Day. Today we wish to celebrate women in the fullness of what it means to be a woman in Pakistan. To celebrate their achievements (also here, here, here, here, here, here and here). And to celebrate their struggles (also here, here, here here, here, here and here).
I have thought much about how best to capture the meaning of this day. It seems to me that in many very important ways, this picture above does.
I have admired this picture by Jawad Zakariya (whose work we have featured before here and here) from the moment I first saw it at Flickr. I had been waiting, however, for the right time and the right context in which to use it. Today, I feel, IS that right time and right context.
There is both dignity and determination in the posture of this young woman as she tries to cross the road (Jail Road, Lahore). As in any good photograph, there are a thousand stories embedded in this one. The metaphor of ‘crossing the road’ is itself so very pertinent for today. So full of meaning.
For me, here is a woman who is not waiting for someone to ‘help’ her cross the road. She is not demanding any special treatment. Not waiting for assistance. Not invoking the chuvinism of the men around her. She is ready, prepared, even eager, to overcome whatever hurdles come in her way. She just wants to cross the road on her own; for people (mostly men) to get out of her way. That, ultimately, is what this day is about. It is not about seeking special treatment, special dispensations, special laws. It is about ensuring that women have what we men have always had. The ability to realize their own potentials. To rise to their own aspirations. To be able to cross the roads they wish to cross… on their own.
To the supposed “woman” Ahmed,
There is no country on earth where “most” of the women are single and childless–they are a distinct minority everywhere–even in Western countries 95% of women marry and over 85% bear children. So wherever you are living now, you are not expressing a truthful view of the social situation.
I still am convinced that the Ahmed letter is a fake and that it was written by a man. Shame on whoever did that.
Happy Women’s Day!
I have never, never, never heard any woman say “I wish someone had put a check on my freedom and kept me in the kitchen”.
An engineer with a big bank account is a catch, and should be easily able to get married should she so desire. The whole story doesn’t add up.
I cry foul. Being raised by a liberal, educated family who supports your decisions means being able to be a wife or an engineer or both. Plenty of women have done it.
No sane woman would write this letter.
This is a striking picture that conjures up many thoughts. But as you say we have to celebrate the struggles of women everywhere everyday.
Just read this on Yahoo News: Egypt bans female circumcision in the country.
I read it and was like,”okay, no big deal, they probably found a few people who did such a thing and instituted a law to ban the practice”. Then I read up on it and was shocked to find that 90% of Egyptian women undergo this procedure, most of them at home when they are between 6-11 years old. Gives me the creeps to think that this goes on not only in the subSaharan Africa but in the mainstream Egyptian population. I doubt that the ban will be enforced though.