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| Kathmandu, Tuesday April 08, 2003 Chaitra 25, 2059. |
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When can a woman rebel ?
By SANGITA RAYAMAJHI
Albert Camus, a French writer and existentialist
thinker in his well-known book The Rebel says "Freedom, ‘that terrible word
inscribed on the chariot of the storm’, is the motivating principle of all
revolutions. Without it, justice seems inconceivable to the rebel’s mind".
As a woman interested in the concept of
non-radical rebellion, I was taken in by two things in this remark. First, that ‘freedom’
is a terrible word. And second, one should feel nostalgic about freedom, only then can one
claim for justice and fight for it. What about rebellion concerning women then? This topic
hardly features in the serious works of the scholars. As some feminist critics say, Camus
was a very well-known male thinker. His concept of freedom and rebellion encompassed the
whole of human kind, without categorizing them into gender specific slots. He talked about
the whole of human-kind, and the human male as such has been highlighted. But I like that
book. Though written much earlier than the existence of those very many feminist
discourses, much earlier than the time when it came to be known that women were relegated
to the attics of the big houses as mad, this book makes many interesting points. And what
gets across to me from this book is that rebellion is an act of the educated person aware
of her/his rights.
The word rebel interests me in yet another way,
by bringing into discussion a series of questions. First is, when can a woman rebel? Or
more importantly still, where should a woman rebel and how should she rebel? My own
position in matters of rebel is that a rebel should not think of doing injustice to
others. At the same time, a rebel should know where she rebels and why she should do so. I
have a fair sense of justice and work. I make that as the main principle of my life. My
experience is perhaps the experience of many women. I do not want to be unfair to others
and I do not want to do anything that may cause a dent in the prestige of someone else.
But these very principles are the basis of my seeking justice for myself. I want to be
treated fairly, be it by my family or the people at my work place-I do not want them
undermining my prestige. But if and when I feel I am wronged despite my being fair and
respectful to them, I draw a complete plan for rebellion and I rebel. Nothing and nobody
can stop me until I can draw people’s attention to my call for justice. I know I am
made of such sterner stuff. But this has been interpreted by family, friends and seniors
as my disadvantage. But I am convinced my nature is my friend, my only source of my human
rights. I feel the same way about other women also. If they are made of sterner stuff,
first of all they should ask who says so? If I say I am made of sterner stuff, that gives
me self-confidence. But if others say it, a woman should look askance at this and see if
it carries a derogatory meaning and is a trap.
But again, is it a crime to use your respectful
sense of rebellion to speak about the injustice doled out to you? That is not radicalism.
One thing I do not like about radicalism is that they seek an excuse to fall out. One can
always find excuses to fall out, but they tend to create problems, too. People should feel
that radical ways are not the right ways.
Why did I talk about this sense of rebellion in
personal terms? First of all this ‘I’ is me and then it is the women who share
my feelings. I have noticed one serious problem among women, especially among us educated
women-we have the habit of swallowing hook, line and sinker all the male stories
fabricated by the jealous, power-crazy male psyche. Our society, ruled by men, creates
narratives. One important point of this narrative, the theme that men like to highlight
about their narratives is that women are jealous of each other. But honestly speaking, we
too do have the weakness. We tend to accept the male narrative, and the worst side of it
is that we become jealous of each other. All right, every human being is jealous! But we
should see this as a vulnerable point, I am speaking from my close study of this
phenomenon. The second myth of the male story that we swallow once again hook, line and
sinker is that we show off and vie each other to show off. I think we all as human beings
do that. These themes of male narratives are not gender-specific themes. But
unfortunately, the great story writers, the seekers of Moby Dicks, the great prudent men
who produce great speeches about equality look at their own ‘deformed’
narratives and chuckle with delight. They constantly engage in creating animosities among
women and consolidating their rules.
The reason why a woman’s sense of rebellion
gets weakened is because we willingly fall into the trap of the above kind of male
schemes. Every time I talk about this story, a colleague of mine, a scholar and writer
Arun Gupto says, "you see, it is the hegemony that you swallow hook, line and
sinker".
But women are vulnerable to injustices. They
swallow bitter pills too. They feel helpless when their innocence is called forth to
justify itself. They know that the society demands that since they are women they should
not speak out at all. I think every form of women’s education and men’s too
should ensure that women’s confidence is built up. The educationists have failed
here. They teach the rural women to repeat radical words. The radical words do not fit nor
do they function in the rural setting. The words become mere clichés, meaningless noises
in the course of time. What the educationists should understand is that women should be
truly empowered in this respect. They should be capable, self-dependant, confident to
fulfil their purpose in life and meet their goals. Hence the main message that should get
across to the men and women in the rural backdrop is that men have only that much right as
women have. Recently, I completed writing a book for Mainstreaming Gender Equity Programme
(MGEP) by using the studies of the programmes they have conducted on capacity building for
the empowerment of women. I have emphasised this aspect of education. My point made in the
book is that empowerment becomes a mere cliché if we fail to make the women rebellious
enough to safeguard their self-respects and their rights to progress. If they are made of
sterner stuff, they should be told to use it to save self-respect.
But the above message I do not think needs to
cut across the educated mass. We all are aware of our places and positions in the society,
the home and work place. To me empowerment contains the same sense of being aware of one’s
power and rights as the sense of rebellion would inculcate in us. To rebel is to be
confident of the fact that you are doing justice to yourself. Therefore, to me rebellion
contains a sense of ethics. If a woman swallows direct injustice doled out to her and does
not rebel, and if a woman does not pause for a second and think that she is being played
off against another woman who is equally being done injustice to, she is not fulfilling
the responsibilities not only of a rebel but of a human being as well. Rebellion is a
spiritual strength born out of the belief that one is doing the right thing, and therefore
hitting back without fear at the one who dares to take a chance at undermining the
self-respect and individuality of the person.
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