No #offence but this is b*******

The #feminist in me cocked her eyebrow and pursed her lips in disdain at an outrageous reference to women, especially wives. I’m just glad and thankful to God that I did not hear these words from the horse’s mouth or the horse would have had his hoof stuffed in his mouth for life. I’m a pretty secular person and respect people’s beliefs and the rituals they like to follow. But sometimes  I don’t want to be secular, I just want to be #humanitarian. The offender in question was a muslim man with his wife at a laundry. On being questioned by a member of my family as to why he dressed up his wife in a #burkha he uttered an extremely creative simile. I agree the question was too personal but it is only such questions that force people to question and wonder about their actions and beliefs. Anyway. The very loving husband replied, “A wife is like a box of sweets. If you keep it uncovered it will be infested with flies.”

Wow. That was all I could say when I first heard these words. And these words were spoken loudly in the presence of the object under discussion. For isn’t this simply a man who is objectifying his wife in front of a stranger. I wonder what his wife felt. Perhaps her bringing up, years of hearing such comments and her absolute dependence on the men in her life had made her immune and submissive. But the woman in me was offended and hurt to no end. And I felt worse because I realised that the burkha-clad woman probably agreed with her husband. It’s possible that the man was merely possessive about his beautiful wife. But I don’t think so. This is like saying that all the women behind burkhas are exquisitely beautiful and will have men swooning after them if they were to expose their mere face. Also an implication that men are uncivilised #neanderthals who have underdeveloped brains and uncontrollable urges. If that be the case it should be the men who ought to be restrained. Maybe all men should have electronic devices implanted in the part of the brain that generates these uncontrollable sexual urges. A small electric shock to the brain should do the needful. Isn’t that what we do in the psychiatric wards to patients that have no control over their emotions and urges?

This is of course wishful thinking at the moment. And this isn’t just about muslim men. It’s about all #men. What all men basically want are beautiful, hard-working #wives who don’t speak or demand. Only the muslim world has been successful in achieving that. Isn’t a burkha just ensuring that a woman is just a vessel to give birth, do household chores and satisfy a man’s urge? Isn’t it ensuring that women would have no identity, no rights, no voice? In this so-called free world we have a flourishing system of #slavery of women and the followers of this system have the audacity to say it is God’s word. If you look around you, you will realise that there are many non-muslim men who slyly manage to practise this suppression even without the burkha. To all these men, shame on you for using the power that God gave you to suppress the #women who gave birth to you.