Trying to fit into the 21st century society as a girl with her own voice
The general concept of freedom and equality might have become mainstream but its all gibberish when it comes to implementing it. All the freedom to speech or equality in gender sounds good as a topic of the social studies book but looking around, its was never taken as what it is.
As a young girl, I was always told the classic, “One day you’re gonna be married off to other family, you gotta learn how to handle your actual family. You gotta learn how to do the household chores and make them happy.” It never made sense to at least my little brain how I am ever going to be able to manage some random stranger’s life . But with the atmosphere going on of equality and stuffs, there was little change to the perception of ‘girls’ in the society. But am I even actually taken as equal or given to speak up?
Just letting me acquire education and do jobs doesn’t mean you have given me the ‘equality’ you think I require. I am given the education to be bright and smart yes, but everyone has the perception to not let me the freedom to use it. You might argue upon what I stated but I’ve heard it myself. “A girl’s dream should always be keeping her family happy in life”, my mom used to tell me. I always criticized her for it but later realized she was indeed criticizing the thought put into her as a child. Everyone has dreams, everyone wants to be something but this world has become so one-sided to male gender that whatever females think of is shoved and pushed aside.
I might’ve been brought up in such society that judged girls that want to be themselves over whatever ‘others’ perception was but I am not the girl that took it all as truth and implemented it. I have been provided with great opportunities to learn and develop myself through the years that made me realize I am no lesser than other ‘male’ and that I might even be more than what they are. 21st century might feel like an era of change but nothing has changed so far. We all might’ve changed how we think ourselves but we are not working on changing others perception.
I was given opportunities but was much more criticized for wanting to participate or compete in programs that misogynists think are not ‘for females’. Any other person that ‘listens’ to the society’s perceptions are nothing but cowards that want to lie under the ‘good person’ of the society rather than proving them how wrong it is to generalize one’s capability over something they didn’t choose, their gender. I have always tried my best to prove all those people that try to shove me that they can never be able to do so, and trust me that works with a strong will. I never fit into the description of what a ‘girl’ is to the society, I build my own perception on what a ‘person’ should be and how one has their own way around life.
I try my best to speak up my mind, I don’t care about what people will think if I said so, but yet I am still thrown aside for trying to raise my voice. “You should not be speaking that as a girl”, “Girls aren’t meant to interfere on men talking” all these crappy lines need to take a break and go away. Being a girl, I am not given a different mind that is dull than of others, I was also formed the same way any man was formed, so no, I am not trying to get above anybody as a bright female, I just want to be acknowledged as nothing but just another person. Like any other person, I also have thoughts and perceptions, I wasn’t made dumb to not be able to process information or take in any external knowledge. I am human after all, so trying to fit in as a person with my own voice is very challenging, but it isn’t impossible either.
Still today, I am given this little freedom to acquire knowledge and let my words out of my mouth, but nobody takes anything I say seriously. My thoughts and ideas are degraded by a simple, “You are a girl, you do not understand the worldly values like you think you do.” How am I supposed to know those stuffs if noone is willing to teach me? How am I supposed to deal with obstacles in my life if you shove all my curiosities to learn problem solving? Asking any about to be parents right now, “Do you want a boy or a girl?” ; they will come under the ‘changed’ mindset and say they do not mind the gender, but ask me the happiness I have witnessed in the eyes of a parent to find out its a boy and the concern in their face to find it was a girl. The society has created this unsafe place for a female to survive. We need to think thrice before stepping out of the house alone. Why so? Why is the difference brought about by the birth of a human being?
People out there still act as if a person chose what gender they want to be, as if one was given a specific form to fill up before being born. And the classic thinking of the ‘mother chooses the gender of the baby’ boils my blood. It just shows to me how illiterate people are and how bad their mindset is. Gender is something one cannot choose nor can decide. It is a 50–50 chance always no matter what so stop trying to put is all upon a female that went through so much to give birth to a new life. Females are way more stronger with an ability to create new life within them, and they are acknowledged as nothing but a caregiver. I wish that in my future I find a partner, a family that agrees with my concept of what a happy and managed family is, how there are no gender specific roles and how each individual has equal contribution to create a managed lovable environment.
I get talked about a lot if I might tell you. “She doesn’t know how to cook”, “She spoke back to an elderly” and the classic “You don’t act like a girl” are screwed in so deep into my mind that I can start quoting people on what they will say next. It isn’t written anywhere that I should cook because I am a girl, I do not find any interest towards cooking food then why should I be forced into learning it? I don’t care what your age group is or how experienced in life you are, when your thought process doesn’t match mine I am not staying silent into letting you think you are all right. I speak up about what I perceived and thus I have my own voice. No matter how many scoldings I get, I do not let go of the conversation unless I am heard. And dear people of the society we live in, would you care to describe what a girl should be and why I don’t fit into it? I am like any other normal human being with my own free will and I menstruate every month, so how am I not a girl? Is there a special quality I should’ve had acquired or a form I should’ve had filled to be known as a ‘girl’ in this 21st century society?
