Of Swaps And #ShareTheLoad...

Student life is full of curiosity. I too have been so, throughout my journey so far. Probably, this factor brought me to the Engineering stream where I am at the verge of completing my journey and stepping into the professional world to start a new journey. When I was too young I used to feel a lot for my mother who was a teacher by profession. She would wake up early in the morning, finish house chores, get ready, and rush to her school. On the way she would be planning so many things that she had to do after reaching home later in the day. On her way back she would again be recapitulating her agenda of the rest of the day, giving her plan a better shape putting timelines to each of her tasks in the agenda. I am sure her plans never reached completion as per the stipulated timelines because by the time she would reach home, there would be ten more unannounced, unarmed and unanticipated tasks waiting to be added in her task-list.

#ShareTheLoad was not even in the air during those days in my family or society. Rather it was completely opposite. Men who would share the load of house chores with their wives would be criticized and mocked for performing the tasks that are meant only for women. Such was the gap between the genders as far as the home chores were concerned. And it was so wide that nobody would dare to fill this gap in such a biased atmosphere around. When I reached my secondary level studies I started feeling strongly about it. I decided to revolt against the system. After all, it was important to light a candle at home before making an effort to bring light to the society.

It was fairly easy to take my brother in confidence. We decided to collaborate to bring a change at home in a big way. The plan was to change our father's mindset to break the barriers of inequality at home. We convinced Dad to swap places with Mom for two days and he agreed quite easily thinking her life would be fun for him. He used to boast a lot about how loaded he used to be at office and how his boss relied so much on him for all important tasks. He had an impression that Mom was not as loaded as him in spite of observing her doing all chores related to the house, each day. But those two days were more than enough for him to realize that his boasting about a loaded office was actually a fact at home too. He, and in fact, the whole family was completely reliant on Mom for every small or big thing at home. That day onward, Dad promised to bring a big change at home and #ShareTheLoad with Mom in every house chore. There’s been no looking back, ever since.

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I am taking part in the #ShareTheLoad Challenge with Ariel and Akshara at BlogAdda.

Being The Change, To #ShareTheLoad...

The task is to inculcate the message in the next generation. The message is about breaking the walls of inequality between the genders and sharing the load of life and house chores equally. For years, it has been about the woman of the house owning the responsibility encompassing all responsibilities within the four walls of the house. It has been all rooted in our senses, heart, blood, and mind that a man is not supposed to contribute in house work right since our childhood. That is what we are observing for last generations.

Prevalent thought, men will become women if they do laundry, or cleaning of the house. And those who have guts to defy this thought have had to face taunts within the family, society, office, and where not about performing feminine tasks.

Nobody bothered to break these barriers created around women. On one hand, the load of responsibilities kept weighing in on women. They were allowed to step outside, join office, earn, contribute to family income, work full time; but still the responsibilities inside the house remained with them. They had to manage it on their own without any help from men of the house. And it went on silently. Women never raised a voice against it. Those who dared to, were silenced. Even when kids of the house raised their voice against it they were silenced with a reason that it is what it is supposed to be like.

Probably it had to be absorbed in the minds of those who felt it to be wrong. But for how long? Gradually the demon of inequality had been raised so high to a level that it became difficult to resist the abolition of gender inequality by people on the other side who were favoring this notion rather than opposing it.

Being a teacher, I knew that the easiest way of doing a thing is 'doing' rather than preaching about it and wasting time. I started this chain of inculcating the message from my school, to my students itself. The benefit of starting from school was that at the same time, this thought-provoking message will reach many homes together. Even if it creates and impact in half of those homes, it will mean a lot.

I started teaching my students about why they should not tolerate gender inequality at home and how to overcome it so subtly and positively that the tides are forced to change their direction on their own. The students understood it faster than my male colleagues at school. A number of relevant posters were made by my students to spread the word around. They even started this mission at their respective homes in their own small ways.

These students started sharing their stories in school with me, on how they gradually offloaded this jinx out of their parent's minds. Raghu, my student in Class 7 told me that he helped his mother in washing the utensils last night. Vidya, my student in Class 9 told me how her brother amazed their parents the last evening and forced them to start thinking about breaking all the barriers when her father called her to clean the table and her brother did it despite her father telling him that it is not the job of the boys or men of the house. The impact was invincible when her father declared that now onward the laundry of the house was on him to #ShareTheLoad with her working mother.

So many stories started pouring in day after day. Each one was accompanied by unique and amazing realizations. The ripple was strong enough to reach and impact the male colleagues who also ended up supporting the notion to #ShareTheLoad.

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I am taking part in the #ShareTheLoad Challenge with Ariel and Akshara at BlogAdda. 

Why Only The Woman Has To Pay The Price ----- WHY?

          Why is it that our society is so insensitive towards the fairer sex? On one hand, religion and culture prevalent in our society worship Goddesses and on the other hand, females have to bear such abuses in their life that being born as a girl is thought to be a curse by them.

          Not just one but at numerous stages of her life, she has to pay the price of being a woman. WHY?

           Be it -------- even before her birth i.e. female infanticide to child abuse (either sexual or child labor or child marriage or gender discrimination among siblings for that matter) to eve teasing in her youth to dowry harassment after marriage to being asked to keep on ' adjusting & compromising ' to keep the marriage alive whether for her own sake or for her family's pride or for her children (being a concerned mother) to bear the brunt of the in-laws if she gives birth to a girl child -------- at every stage, she curses herself as to WHY! -------- WHY only she has to bear the brunt while at all the above stages it is the man who is responsible too (or perhaps he is the only one responsible).

          Let's review all the above stages to strengthen my point :-

• Before Birth -- The female infanticide -- girl child being killed for no fault of hers -- Who was responsible for it -- the Father (male) -- His X Chromosome instead of Y decided the whole thing -- then why is she being killed! Why does not the responsible Father get the rebuke of all (if at all someone has to be killed for this stupid reason).
• After Birth -- Child abuse -- innocent child unaware of this wild forest and carnivorous beasts roaming around -- bears the brunt -- WHY? -- Why should not these beasts be burnt?
• Child Labor -- Missing her right to education and bearing with elderly chores -- Why should the child suffer -- Why not the Employer?
• Child Marriage -- The girl who wishes to study and make her career -- being thrown in front of a male  in the form of a bride to bear the brunt of this ridiculous tradition at a tender age -- Why should not the parents of both the boy and the girl be punished?
• Gender Discrimination Among Siblings -- Girls directed by the parents to be docile and boys allowed to do anything they wish to with full elan -- it is this discrimination right from childhood which later on leads to eve teasing and other abuses hurled by boys in their youth.
• Dowry Harassment -- One of the prime evils of all times -- The girl completes the boy after marriage -- and bears his children -- then what for is she paying the dowry to him and his family? 
• After Marriage -- The wife and husband are the two pans of a  scale which should be proportionately balanced at all times -- then how come our society always expects girls to adjust to keep everything alive in their life? Why all the calmness is expected from her (and that also rewardless) and all the aggression is the birth right of the male? -- Why do men feel elated after venting out their frustration on women -- What is it that holds back men from accepting their misdeeds and correcting them gracefully?

WHY can't this gender inequality vanish in thin air for PEACE to prevail at both the ends and proper balance  be maintained in the society?

There is an urgent need to RingTheBell for all the above causes...
To guide the would - be parents not to imbalance the sex ratio and parent their boys in such a manner that they value gender equality with applause.