The status of women in the 21st century

Lamneivah Kipgen *

We all know that women has always been in a position where they are considered weak and frail and incapable of making "important" decisions. This misconception of women has prevailed in society since time immemorial.

And it is because of these misconceptions and narrow mindset that women have fallen prey and victims to many crimes. Starting from eve teasing to assault and even to the extent of rape or murder.

A girl is forced to be brought up in such a way that they are made to believe that all they are made for is marriage and procreation and to be the caretaker of her husband and children. Not implying that marriage or having children is a bad thing.

But it is about the choice. Some women are forced to marry at such a young age because of the pressures of the society. A woman's "prime time" is considered to be only from the age of 18 till 29 like the rest of her life after she hits 30 doesn't matter. We often hear people talk about a bachelorette in her thirties to be unwanted by men and therefore is not suitable for marriage.

We also often hear remarks like "You should start considering getting married and having a family after you graduate" or others like "Why are you still unmarried?" or even family forcing their daughter to get married while she is still desired or wanted by men.

The question is, why should women be defined on how much she is sought by men ? Why not for her qualifications or achievements ? Why must women be defined by how old she is ?

After all, women are also humans. Everyone has dreams and goals that they want to achieve so why should women be snatched away of their rights ?

We all know how much women are victimised everyday. We all see it in the news. We are already in the 21st century where everything is so developed yet we still hear about so many crimes and cases of women being assaulted or abused because of dowry or other reasons.

According to the report of the National Crime Bureau Record (NCBR), the rate of crime against women in the 2001 census was 58.8 per lakh women population in 2018 but shockingly now the Report of 2019 reveals an immense upsurge compared to the previous years. It recorded the crime rate of women at a whopping 62.4 in 2019. The increasing amount of crimes against women every year is a huge concern.

There was also an incident where three women were claimed to be rapists without any sound proof yet we were so quick to judge and make memes and make their whole identity open and viral. Why can't we do that for male rapists too ?

Women are always so easy to be judged and victimised by society. If a man marries two or more women he is considered a man but if a woman is divorced she is considered a person with a reputation that is ruined. I came across this post on the internet recently. It was a picture of a chart with the title "A bad girl".

And it supposedly gave a pictorial representation of what a bad girl is. Starting from a girl who eats too much to a girl who eats too less or a girl who walks outside with her hair down , lectures at other boys or rides a scooty and it also claims even to the extent of saying that a girl who can't roll round rotis is a bad girl. It made me wonder why and how should round rotis define who women are as a female.

It was hilarious yet intriguing to think that this is what we are basically teaching our daughters and sisters and men to believe. To make women believe that saying no is wrong, to defend ourselves is considered rude and having an opinion is being disrespectful.

Sometimes it feels like society is just focused on oppressing women. People say they are tired of hearing about all these "complaints" but they should know that we are still talking about it because there isn't any change or improvement.

No matter how much we stand for the empowerment of women, women are still oppressed and victimised. As long as these oppressions and exploitations and injustice prevail the need for empowerment will always be there.

Hence, we need to start taking action and also educate ourselves on basic human rights which also includes the rights of women. And women must also believe in themselves and be strong and to never back down because after all, our opinions also matter.