Where in our lalaland, we debate on how women’s clothing is harming our culture and values, six cases of violence against women have been recorded across Pakistan. Flagrant comments on clothing and its impact on the ‘sacred’ culture take the headlines with women being killed, abused, abducted, molested and tortured alongside. Yet, the question we should prioritise is: how is women’s clothing robbing society of its sanctity? The sanctity that has been enabling men to commit crimes against women for ages continues.
The fully clothed women who have been attacked over the week were not targeted because suddenly the society has been rotten by the 1% of the “ill-dressed” but because of the mindset that has been harbouring abusers in the cloak of honour, culture and gender. Whether it’s a doctor who is thrown acid at, the young girl who fell in love with a monster, an older woman who used her right to consent, the teenager who dared to walk on a street alone or the women who had been present on social media, it was never about what they wore that unfateful day. They had been entrapped by the mindset that puts men on a high horse, boosting their fragile egos. With every pat on the back, with everytime someone hides a young boy when they commit crime, with everytime they back up culprits with, “larkay aise hi hotay hain!”, with everytime a woman is shut down for calling out a harasser; a new monster is made.
In detail of the haunting torture of the 18-year-old, her husband had hit her in the head with a screwdriver and salt and tea leaves were shoved into the wound; in Jhang, the teenager was abducted outside of her house, gangraped and abandoned to die in a hospital. It is not the length of the shirt that led to it, but the sickness of the mind. Yet, the focus of discourse must remain on how feminism has brought ill into the society by giving women the right to choose for themselves, their profession, marriage, the ability to walk in a street and consent. The fault lies with the women as they try to practice their basic rights without the realisation that it would trigger a fragile ego and cut them short of their life.
Also read: The price of a man’s ego: What enables the war on Pakistan’s women?
While we wait for justice in many pending cases, hangings delayed in death sentences, the count of women victims continues to rise. Till justice is served, lets hang around and talk about visible ankles and torsos, length and tightness of clothing while get abused at every quarter.
