In today’s expeditious world, where every passing day feels like a second, it is indispensable to keep our culture alive so that our future generations are aware of it and our culture is preserved, but the ideology that the responsibility lies entirely on just one gender is utterly vague.
According to societal norms, women are the ones who have to keep our culture alive in the form of clothing. Women are despised when they wear jeans and are constantly told “ye hamari sanskriti nahi hai”, but when a man wears jeans it’s completely acceptable and men aren’t expected to shoulder the responsibility of keeping our culture alive. If wearing a saree or a salwar-kameez is the only way to keep our culture alive, then why aren’t men expected to wear dhoti-kurta for the same?
If a girl is wearing salwar-kameez then she’s considered an ideal and respectable girl in the eyes of the professors, but if a girl is wearing shorts or a cropped top, then she’s considered immoral. Is this the mindset required in an educational institute? Is this the right attitude that the professors should have for their students? Should the students be judged for what they choose to wear?
If the professors, the mentors, carry such a perspective, then what should we expect from the students whom they teach? If the educators themselves aren’t mannered and educated enough to respect one’s boundaries and choices, what are they teaching their students apart from the curriculum?
Our apparels are what we choose to wear. It is how we want the society to view us. It is our way of expressing ourselves in this hard-pressed world. Is this the way of life that one is judged for their self-expression? Have we as a society accepted this judgemental behaviour?
An acquaintance of mine was wearing shorts in the summer heat on the campus of our university. Someone complained about her to the police officials, claiming that there’s a girl roaming around in the campus naked. How is wearing shorts with one’s own free will be referred to as “being naked”? Have we reached the pinnacle of shallow-mindedness?
If such incidents are occurring in prestigious educational institutions like LU, what should we expect from the rest of the world? It feels as if we forgot our moral science lessons as soon as the class ended, and it’s just another subject for us from which we have learnt nothing. Basic etiquettes and mannerisms should be a part of every curriculum until the day of doom because, apparently it’s not common sense to mind one’s own business.
How did one’s choice of clothing define one’s character? The politicians out there can freely pull a women’s niqab in public, rape a minor and be out on bail, threaten to kill the family of the victim, have numerous FIRs filed under their names, and still be considered respectful in our society.
Not only are women called immoral for wearing western outfits but also blamed if she becomes a victim of rape, eve-teasing, sex trafficking and the list goes on. It is never about what she was wearing but, always about what was he thinking? It’s extremely petty to see such practices in this evolving world.
If our clothes are the reason that such heinous crimes are being committed in our country, then what was the 86-year-old grandmother wearing when she was raped by a man in his thirties? What was the 8-year-old, Asifa Bano wearing when she was brutally raped and murdered in Kashmir? What was that 10-month-old infant wearing when was raped by an acquaintance of her family in Gujarat?
It is not the choice of clothing that women have to change but the mentality of this world collectively has to change.