Women are told to be empowered, educated, and independent. Society always appreciates women who stand for themselves, challenge stereotypes, and become opinionated. However, when a woman performs any such act, breaks stereotypes, does not align with traditions, and becomes opinionated, society becomes uneasy. These women, eventually, are labeled as rebellious.
In Pakistan, women are now suggested to become empowered, but men are not ready to live with those women. This certainly shows that change has been taught only to one sex and not the other. This clearly is the reason for many growing issues.
In Pakistan, people demand highly educated women for their households yet do not want them to make money out of it. Women working is like a faux pas to them. People do not want women to have power over themselves. This is because making this happen will lead to women empowerment, making women worthy of their own time, energy, and body. Eventually, men think that their power is being taken away from them, which threatens their position.
Gender equality is not just to empower women but to work on both genders. People, mostly men, assume that women working 9 to 5 is women empowerment. Real empowerment is shown when a woman takes crucial decisions, makes it to leadership, and is highly opinionated. Thus, when women are empowered and men are not ready to accept the real empowerment, it will continue to cause chaos instead of progress.
According to the World Economic Forum, Pakistan ranks 148th out of 148 countries in the gender equality gap. The fact shows that societal norms forbid empowering women despite stating the opposite. In institutes, women are liked only until they ask no questions. Likewise, in marriages, women are liked only until they ask for no resources. This is indeed where the problem lies.
This is the sort of conversation people do not intend to have. Society interrogates women: how will they claim their rights? On the other hand, society never interrogates men: How will they respond? How will they react? This is essentially because men do not like their power to be shared.
Thus, who will teach men how power is meant to be shared? In our societal norms, power is taught as something to be owned and not shared. If boys grow up believing authority is theirs, then women asking for equality feels like it’s their loss and not fairness. The problem is not that women are claiming their rights. The issue is that no one taught or is willing to teach boys that equality includes sharing space, freedom of speech, and decision making.
Another crucial question that ought to be raised is that who will teach boys that respect does not mean control? An enormous amount of societies confuse respect with obedience. This thing exposes that whole mindset. True respect allows autonomy, not control. If men believe control equals respect, a woman’s independence automatically looks like disrespect. The actual issue is that we do not have the conversation about women empowerment without addressing the issue of how men ought to socialize.
Until all these issues are addressed, empowerment will remain a burden to women and a threat to men. Certainly, this is not about blaming any specific sex, specifically men, yet simply to acknowledge the truth. Real social change requires education and learning, not denial.
Talking about solutions, we must change the mindsets of both sexes. Manhood is the term that needs to be explained in society. This will extirpate the toxicity in the people. Empowered women should not be considered a threat but a chance to make the country better.
Households should try sending their children to co-education. This enhances the sense of affiliation in the boys that makes them wonder how respect is earned and given. When something is new to girls and boys, they do not fathom what to do and how to behave. Awareness about gender studies is very crucial for both sexes when they are in their teens. Young boys and girls create new behavioral patterns in their teens which in turn influence their coming life decisions. This awareness through all the major platforms is important.
Mothers ought to teach their boys about difficult situations they face regarding girls. They must teach that integrity of both men as well as women is intransigent. When boys are not to compromise, likewise, girls should not too compromise on their beliefs and careers.
A society that prepares women to move ahead and does not prepare men to live with that change creates chaos and not equality. Gender equality will indeed begin the day boys are taught not only how to let women stand high but also stand beside them. Equality cannot be achieved by empowering women alone.