The nature of the beast

Rhona Canoy .

SO… A few days ago, I saw a news feature on women’s empowerment. Each time I see one of these things I’m impressed by the passion emanating from the women expressing their sentiments. Passionate, articulate, intelligent, well-meaning, idealistic, hopeful. Sometimes, though, in our eagerness to push a particular agenda—any agenda, for that matter—we oftentimes become myopic.

Having grown up the only girl with three brothers, I suppose I unknowingly lived the women empowerment credo. It was not easy to claim my own equal space. The fact that I was the eldest and female held no value nor relevance. And having to defend myself against physical onslaught was ordinary, to say the least. It goes without saying that I was quite skilled at verbally and facially provoking these attacks. It was never seen as a male attempt to oppress or dominate or even abuse. Somehow among us siblings, it was more a battle to determine who was right.

But as I went through the necessary phases towards adulthood, I grew more and more aware of the peculiar and negative dynamics between men and women. The attempt to understand this strange relationship led me to scrutinize how we are subliminally groomed for the mindset. As hard as women are going to try to change how we are perceived and treated by men, nothing will happen unless we are brutally objective, and yet subjective with surgical precision.

For as long as women buy into the traditional expectations, we aren’t going to me very successful at having the world see us as equal to men. Or maybe we should be clear to ourselves–what are we empowering ourselves for? We are not equal to men, let me point this out. If equal means the same, we are never going to be equal to men. By our very nature and physicality we are different. Not inferior. Different. Maybe that’s what we need to understand and internalize from the get go. Maybe we need to understand that what we are seeking is for men to realize our equally important place in this world. Which leads me to the next question.

When are we going to break out of the mold men and society have diligently put us in? I see women who call themselves empowered. In marriages which they want to believe are enlightened. They work just as hard as their husbands, making a mark in the world, highly successful in their professional careers. And yet subconsciously accepting the pre-defined role and full responsibility of being a housewife and mother, the two most traditional expectations in this world. Because they are women. Men will come home after a long, tiring day at the office and the traditional imbalance kicks in. The women become servile to these men, even after they have spent an equally long and tiring day at the office. Expected to supervise the household, the evening meal, the comfort of their husbands, their children’s homework (blessed if they have the luxury of hired help).

It will never occur to most men to pick up the slack and take care of domestic things if the wife should, for some reason, be late. It will never occur to most men to attend their children’s school parent conference unless there is no other choice. It will never occur to most men to check the kitchen pantry and cupboards to make a grocery list, and then go to the grocery by themselves so their wives don’t have to. It will never occur to most men to do the family’s weekly laundry because… well, it just will never occur to them. Men, however, will wash their own clothes when they are away on a long trip. There are too many traditional role definitions which we still have to shatter and redefine before women empowerment makes a dent.

There is nobility in a woman totally embracing her being a domestic goddess. That is more than a full time job in and of itself. Not piled on top of other jobs. And, yes. For some reason women are expected to maintain their physical appeal, in the face of husbands who proudly wear their potbellies and saggy pants in public.

Don’t get your panties in a bunch, women. What I’m saying is true. Men will treat strong women (I’d rather call them strong than empowered) differently from “standard” women. That doesn’t mean the men are enlightened. It just means they can tell who they can’t push around. Sadly, this fight is going to be a hard one because it will take a whole lot of women to become stronger and collectively push the idiomatic envelope before we can even make a dent.

All the brouhaha over the President’s onstage kiss with some women while he was in Korea is a very clear case in point. Oh, yes. Just as many men complained and raised a ruckus over it. Take note. Men who already hate the president to start with. Or at least take issue with his nature and his demeanor. And yet, the men and women who support him totally are so cavalier and completely brush off his actions. But what Duterte showed publicly is how many men treat women as a rule. A high-positioned male friend of mine left me stunned when he casually made a joke (in my presence) to one of his female subordinates. He was talking about how her breasts had grown larger since she joined the company and how, if she was going to come any closer, he would squeeze them. This man is highly-educated, ostensibly a good husband and father (yes, he has a daughter), an upright member of society (pun definitely intended). And yet, this mindset reveals itself even if only through jokes. And for as long as the man is the boss, hardly any woman is going to complain for fear of being fired.

We live in a society where men decide what role women play, where men decide how women should be treated, where young boys are taught to see girls as the weaker sex. Oh, yes. How many times have we heard or said, “Please don’t hit your sister because she’s a girl and you’re not supposed to hit girls”? Thereby planting the evil seed of seeing females as weak and inferior. Why not, “Please don’t hit anyone because it’s disrespectful and violent”?

And for as long as young girls are taught by media and their unenlightened mothers to regard men as the ticket to heaven, this struggle is going to continue. Oh, yes. How many mothers have we seen, especially in the malls and restaurants, pimping out their daughters to aliens in the hope that the whole family may benefit from this arrangement? And how many young girls have we seen with older decrepit (probably married) men because of the same goals? We have so much yet to do in order to right this imbalance. And even more yet to learn.

It should not be about women’s empowerment. It should be about redefining respect in our society.  Women shouldn’t need to be empowered. Men and women should be reprogrammed and enlightened. Frankly, I don’t know how that is going to get done, but for each women who finds her strength, that’s one less individual that needs fixing. Oh, yes, Maria. The struggle is definitely real.