Public has a short memory and this has been proved time and again. "Irretrievable breakdown of marriage" was quite in discussion until some time ago and caught a high with the case of Smriti Shinde - daughter of ex-law minister, Sushil Kumar Shinde - filing a Public Interest Litigation to make the same as a ground of divorce as well but now the topic is completely out of discussion.
And further unfolding of the case revealed that it was actually a case of a "Mutual Consent" Divorce filed and one of the spouses refusing to abide by the mutual consent agreement even after a part of the agreement, based on which the consent was drawn, being fulfilled and thus divorce not being granted.
The performance of the judiciary in the society in general and in matrimonial cases in particular has not been something laudable. More often than not, the judges are driven by emotion and pre-defined stereotypic gender notions in arriving at their decisions leading to not only ignorance of evidence placed on record and the data available, but also at arriving upon socially harmful interpretations of law and at times overstepping their constitutional limitations and boundaries. It has also led to judges acting as "Social Workers" proving Harold Laski correct in the Grammar of Politics - "Judges do not deliver judgments; they only give decisions. They only decide which side argued better".
Shantanu - The King of oppressed men may be a mythological story of an oppressed man, but it is no farther from truth, as mythologies are also inspired from realities. Today’s oppression of men and the resulting skyrocketing suicides and nose-diving life-expectancy as explained in Male Disposability – Myth or Reality might seem like a recent development.
However, as they say, “Truth is stranger than fiction”, indeed truth is stranger than fiction. Victimization of men is neither a purely mythological concept, nor a recent social development. How to be a Spartan? Clearly explains the enormous amount of violence, physical torture and emotional castration that boys had to undergo in Ancient Greece in order to master their role of protector and unpaid bodyguard when they grow up as men.
I came across an interesting judgment by the Bombay High Court under the erstwhile British Raj in India. The judgment can be found at link. Highlights of the judgment,
Association for International Men's Rights Activism and Welfare (AIMRAW) is the first ever international conglomerate of men’s rights activists all over the world. This organization intends to create massive awareness about men’s issues all over the world and vouch for men’s rights in all areas of life. AIMRAW aims to create “Affiliate Chapters” to spread its awareness. AIMRAW is in touch with men’s rights activists from 60 countries all over the world, including India. The Indian Affiliate Chapter of AIMRAW is in Bangalore, India.
See the pictures below, these are the pictures of a man who was badly beaten up by his wife for no fault of his. While women have the Domestic Violence Act at their disposal which does not require any evidence on their part to claim relief under the Act and the courts are filled up with false cases of Domestic Violence filed against men, can anyone tell me where should this man go with all the evidence of violence he has that he has faced from his wife?
The Women's Reservation Bill has been at the center stage of debate since over a decade. Having introduced for the first time in 1996, the bill has undergone several layers of criticism. And in the last general elections, every political party promised the bill just to garner votes from the women lobby. But still, the political parties failed miserably in displaying integrity as no political party could cross the 10% "glass-ceiling" limit of fielding women candidates.
And now, in order to set record straight, the Govt. is headed to make the 81st Constitutional Amendment to make way for the bill. In layman words, the constitutional amendment reserves 1/3rd of Lok Sabha seats for women candidates and each constituency would be reserved once in every three election terms on a rotation basis.
Recently, the Women and Child Development Ministry (WCD) has been shouting a lot about female feticide. And they are engrossed in the noise-creation to such a level that they could not even distinguish between Indian and Pakistani army Chiefs and included one of Pakistani Army Chief’s photos in one of their ads on female feticide.
It caused such a national shame that the PMO had to issue apology which was indeed awkward. When the blunder was performed by the WCD, ideally the responsibility of failure should also have been owned up by them, but unfortunately in India, females are used to a lot of pampering, and so the Protector PMO covered up for the national shame caused by the WCD.
As if that wasn’t enough, recently the WCD is giving ad about female feticide on television, radio, etc, saying, “Is it not worth worrying that there are only 960 females for 1000 males”.
Now, that’s a new one; a misleading stunt to garner sympathy on women’s issues and gather funds. The Natural Human Sex Ratio is 1.1. That means,960 females (as reported by the WCD), there should have been 1056 males but there are only 1000 males. So can the WCD ministry tell, whether it’s a matter of concern for males or females?
Is it not time to shut down the misleading Women and Child Development Ministry?
In continuation with my article, "Allow Daughters to take Responsibility legally" and in response to 24 Million Chinese Men Will Remain "Bachelors" by 2020gender roles are being revisited here. While feminists have always argued for concessions for women, often at the expense of men, citing skewed gender-ratio against girls and have been successful in getting them as well, but men at the same time have been facing tougher and tougher times.
Selective sex abortions and male-preference has been viciously twisted by feminists to unleash male-hatred and piggyback their sinister agenda onto it. As a result boys and men have to live a life without "FREEDOM of CHOICES" and they are forced to don the role of a PROTECTOR and a PROVIDER popularly known as the FREE ATM MACHINE and the UNPAID BODYGUARD.
At the same time, the most risky, menial and dangerous jobs are heaped on to men and the burden of responsibilities of maintaining the family - parents, siblings, wife, children, in-laws, etc. has also been thrust onto men leading to ever increasing and skyrocketing expectations from them and nose-diving acceptance levels for their shortcomings and weaknesses.
And it is because of this skewed balance of responsibilities between men and women, that the society prefers male children over female children. After all, everyone wants someone to take care of in the dusky days and why to have an offspring that cannot be imposed upon with responsibilities. It is not because of some over-flowing extra love for men that male children are preferred.
I also involve in a lot of social research on men and attitudes of society, in general, towards men. And my interactions with the world around me form a crucial part of it. It so happened that a couple of days back, one of my female friends (ex-colleague) pinged me and told me, "You seem to have become a misogynist (woman-hater)", to which I asked, "Why so?". She replied that she has been following my blogs for quite some time and that she agrees to some part of it but everything cannot be completely right and completely wrong. So I told, "I am fighting for men's rights and if that appears as misogyny, then so be it." The chat ended.
Sub: Announcing severe protest against mutilation of the Indian Constitution in the name of Women Empowerment.
About AIMRAW:
Association of International Men's Rights Activism and Welfare (AIMRAW) is the first ever international conglomerate of men's rights activists all over the world. This organization intends to create massive awareness about men's issues all over the world and vouch for men's rights in all areas of life. AIMRAW aims to create "Affiliate Chapters" to spread its awareness. AIMRAW is in touch with men's rights activists from 60 countries all over the world, including India. The Indian Affiliate Chapter of AIMRAW is in Bangalore, India.
The Indian Affiliate Chapter of AIMRAW is conducting this press conference in order to voice its protest against the proposed implementation of the proposed 81st Constitutional Amendment popularly known as the Women's Reservation Bill. Terming it as the next big step of "Women Empowerment", this amendment calls for reserving one-third of Lok Sabha Constituencies for women on a rotating basis once in three years per Constituency.
Notwithstanding the political Tsunami to be brought about by the passage and implementation of this "Constitutional Amendment", AIMRAW's Indian Affiliate Chapter strongly objects to the infringement of Constitutional Rights conferred to men in India as explained below :-
Reserving the constituencies for women as enshrined in the proposed Constitutional Amendment will lead to,
1. Infringement on choice of citizens to elect their representative.
2. Infringement on choice of men to contest elections (either as a political party member or an independent) in their own constituency.
As I think about the today's theme - it reminds me of Thomas Edison, the man who invented the electric bulb. He had made a famous statement "Things are 99% perspiration, 1% inspiration"
Same applies to men's rights movement as well. It is a matter of constant awareness campaign and hitting at our opponents and proponents of male abuse. Contrary to popular belief, it is 3 times easier to abuse a male than a female because males have no support structure and male abuse is accepted by the society as social service.
As I have repeatedly mentioned in my articles that cultures have deceived men, acting as vultures. Men have been used as the FREE ATM MACHINE, the UNPAID BODYGUARD, the de-facto PROTECTOR and PROVIDER, etc.by cultures and in the process have been reduced to disposable entities. Their abuse is considered a social service now.
And men, the way they are, are in a great way responsible for this. They rarely challenge or question conventions, traditions, histrionics and stereotypes thrust upon them. They do not feel the need to fight for their rights - only a handful of them are doing though scores are getting victimized. They do not demand for their space in the society and accept things as offered to them.
To this effect, today I take the example of Skandagupta - the great emperor of India. His stepmother has him sent to Ujjain so that her son can be made the emperor. He obeys her. But then the Huns attack India under the leadership of Attila the Hun. The army of Skandagupta calls him back as they needed his expertise.
