WHY THE NEED FOR WOMEN'S DAY

INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY is upon us again. Every year March 8th comes round without fail and the chatter is almost deafening. Everyone pays lip service. The media is relentless in its features on women, usually the great. As a result its the same faces all the time. Why? Because truth be told so few women get anywhere, anyway.

Its true the world over. Women join the workforce. Each year the number mounts. Some men shout out loud that the women are stealing their jobs. Wish it were true, but its not. The economy expands, there are more jobs. Men move into better paying jobs and the vacuum they leave -- normally in slave-pay jobs -- are taken over by the women. For example, the army of clerks that keeps offices humming. When I was a child most clerks were men. Today the men go into better paying "skilled jobs" in factories and assembly plants of foreign companies. They take on technical and engineering occupations of pushing buttons and oiling machines and because the men do it it becomes a "skill". Women put away files, do the company ledgers, input letters into computers, yet they are considered general clerks and almost unskilled, which in turn makes for bad wages.

Women do the menial tasks shunned by men whose machismo will not permit them to be tea-persons and office cleaners. So, this being a men's world, machismo makes money. Although, it must be noted that the same does not necessarily apply to migrant labour. Now, they form a genderless underclass , which keeps the host working class a rung above and, therefore, relatively content.

Most men treat women as nothing but a bit of skirt. In many developing societies, CEDAW notwithstanding, patriarchy remains a stubborn legacy. Some Muslims sincerely believe that a woman's road to paradise is martyrdom, one achieved by submission to the will of the man of the family. Guardianship of women and children is the preserve of the male members of the family, in order of seniority. Fathers are always first in line, then the eldest son and so on. Unfortunately, the male mindset view this as a power structure and not a responsibility, therefore, a safety-net. The guardian tends to be oppressive and not, surely as God would want it, protective and caring. When a man fails in his duty as protector, he should lose the right to guardianship automatically, but no, he takes this right with him even when he abandons his family. Yes, even in this new millennium.

The realities of contemporary society has made gender irrelevant in this respect. Women too are economically capable of being protectors, guardians and custodians. And, that they are "naturally" viewed as caregivers should make them ideal guardians. However, because it does not suit the men it does not happen for Muslims. To further complicate the situation there are some Muslims who actually believe that wives may not leave the home without the husband's permission, which in turn means they cannot work without his consent.

This does not mean though, that non-Muslim women are having a whale of a time. As humanity plods on regardless, women who have decided to seize the day come what may actually find themselves lumbered with more than their fair share. Work is a socialising experience that has no substitute. Housework, on the other hand, is just too mind numbing especially when unpaid. Homemakers feel themselves to be in a state of dependency that robs them of all dignity. So going out to work is more than merely augmenting the household income. It gives these women a feeling of self-worth, it builds their self-esteem. Once home, unfortunately, even after a hard day's work there is the household chores to do. The lucky ones may have domestic help. But still, the wives are the ones who supervise the help and not good old hubby the "main" bread winner. And the help. She's a woman!

So there you have it. Women, whichever way you look at it do not have a field day hence, WOMEN'S DAY, a reminder that half of humanity is being let down by the other half and that this needs addressing. But the media cacophony, because it is unstructured, comes out as a day in praise of successful women. Nobody notices that it is the same old faces, year in, year out. More needs to be done so that one half of the decision-makers are women. And then, the successful woman will be as unnewsworthy as the successful man and Women's Day will be irrelevant.

MYTH OF THE HORNY DIVORCEE

SWEEPING statements can sometimes contain grains of truth, but fortunately not this time.

When the Pas MP for Rantau Panjang, a district in the northeastern state of Peninsula Malaysia, Kelantan, passed the comment that “golongan janda adalah gatal” or that “divorced women are sluts” here, if ever there was one, is an instance of unadulterated unthinking. That he carries the honorific “Yang Berhormat” or Right Honourable is obviously misplaced and inappropriate. Are not divorcees among his constituents, one wonders? Or, has he quite forgotten that he represents the constituency and all its voters and their family?

The Malay Mail of 27^th April 2006 quoted Abdul Fatah Harun as saying, “Most of these divorced women go to parties and are gatal. It is quite obvious why they ended up divorced or why their husbands left them. They are gatal.” Gatal, of course, means horny.

Firstly, there is this obviously false assumption that most divorced women spend their time partying. Where does this man get his statistics from? Has he done a survey of women who party? Or, has he been intelligence gathering? Which, pray tell, that can lend credence to the assumption that ‘most divorced women go to parties’. Don’t share unfounded opinions with the public, please, especially when you are an MP!

Secondly, why is it assumed that when women go to parties they are sluts? Have the man not heard of innocent fun when people of both sexes gather to network, to exchange ideas and information across industries and intellectual disciplines and/or to relax at gatherings classified as parties. In a world where more and more women are working, being in the public space is no longer taboo. Even in a conservative, patriarchal society it is not always considered scandalous for women to partake of the pleasures of socializing at parties, albeit within a very structured environment.

Parties are occasions where humans learn to socialize. Socialising is an essential part of character-building. A society that is peopled by strong, confident individuals with a capacity to interact without open friction, to communicate well and are mindful of others is much needed in multi-ethnic, multi-religious Malaysia. Under these circumstances, are not women too required to be properly socialized? Or, is there here a prejudice on the part of the man to keep women tightly within the domestic confines of child-bearing, child-rearing, husband-caring and such other banal activities that women, as chattels, do as in pre-Islam jahilliyah?

It is not that household chores are necessarily bad. The contribution of the mainly-women domestic workforce, including unpaid housewives, is not to be sneezed at. They it is that make certain the reproduction of society and in what image. Which, in turn, makes it important that the domestic sphere, too, is liberally laced with mental stimulation.

Thirdly, the questionable presumption that women divorcees are always divorced by the husbands. While it is true that the Islamic establishment make few provisions for women to divorce their husband, oftentimes Muslim wives are given their freedom because a husband has his eye on another woman, that is, when he does not intend to be polygamous. There are also enough examples of women abused within the marital home who want a divorce badly.

Within the Malay-Muslim milieu there is a far greater tendency for women to be divorced because the husbands are gatal. There have been many high profile cases where mature women are divorced by husbands bent on marrying sweet-young-things. So, I ask you, who is the gatal one?

Women are free agents like men, more so when they are divorcees. Furthermore, these are women who have been through the mill, taken the hard knocks of life head-on and been through the school of life in unhappy marriages. It is hard to imagine that after such travails most of them are raring to entangle themselves in sexual webs that could go very wrong again. If there are prudent humans, they are it.

In today’s world of self-supporting women who are economically independent, divorced working women have no need to burden themselves with men. Yes, we all, women and men, are looking for our soul mate to share our life with in an until-death-do-us-part relationship. We want enduring and loving companionship. This is a very human pining. And so we go with our gut and marry the person we love (or maybe lust after). If our gut feel was spot on in the first place we will be living happily ever after as in a fairy tale.

However, reality is far from perfect. Divorces are on the increase and broken homes are no longer a novelty in most societies. Who takes care of the children? Usually its mum and you think mum can go out partying on a regular basis and be a slut!

Think again man or start thinking, whichever applies. Divorcees are not sluts. In fact, few women ever are. Men, it is, whose fantasies take them into realms where real women do not exist: women who work hard to help support the family and are given little recognition; single mothers abandoned by philandering husbands left to cope with their children; abused wives under pressure to keep the violence under wraps for the sake of the children. To these women divorce is probably seen as a blessing. These are real women who, when push comes to shove, may insist on becoming divorcees. Are they deserving of such abusive tongue-lashing? THINK MAN!

A version of this article was published by Madam Chair