Romantic doormats

Romantic doormats

Some of us friends were chatting and someone mentioned the film Parineeta. After the initial wows and ahs of approval about how beautiful Vidya looked and how lovely the songs were and the "charm" that invariably pervades stories from that milieu in that era, someone disapproved. She said she didn't like the way women like Lolita and Paro tolerated men treating them like doormats. She said all that doe eyed look and feminine wiles made her sick. According to her these women represented all that women "should not be".And it was a crime against women to romanticise such women.

While understanding her viewpoint, I could not help pointing out that the story belonged to an era when women were brought up to behave like that. There was nothing different about these heroines because all women behaved like that in that era and so the novelist could not be faulted for portraying his heroine so.Their strength lay in the patience with which they handled those spoilt brats parading as "men." And the social and legal system of the time was not very favourable to a single woman.

I find this tendency a little unfair - criticising historical and mythical characters by applying modern day standards to them - Sita's trail by fire or the treatment of ahalya or Nalayini. We debate the rights and wrongs of the way these women were treated and how patiently they endured these without protest and we blame them for the suppression of women down the ages. All this forgetting the social norms of the era they lived in. It is not always easy for suppressed individuals to rise up against society; even more difficult when they do not even see that they have been suppressed or denied some rights. Of course, ignorance has never stood up very well as an excuse, has it?

What I do agree with, however , is that it is pretty irrelevant to hold them up as role models for the woman of today in the name of "our cultural tradition" or "Bharathiya Nari"hood - romanticisation of Vrats where women starve for the life of their men or unequal male-female relationships where patient endurance of abuse is extolled as a virtue in a woman. Where women look so fragile and beautiful making women want to be like them and making men scream in sheer desperation "Why don't they make women like that anymore?"

Trying to superimpose the byproducts of one era on a totally different era in the name of tradition can only lead to confusion and rebellion. And every generation of youth face this but forget it when they become parents and do the same to their children. But Change happens and life goes on....