Modern Day Khaps

On Saturday, the Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) confirmed women will no longer escort male players to the stage after talks with broadcasters.^[1]

Formula 1 has announced that it will no longer use grid girls as the practice of having scantily clad women standing in front of cars before Grands Prix “does not resonate with our brand values and clearly is at odds with modern-day societal norms”.^[2]

The Women’s Sport Trust has called for the end of female models across the world of sport. The Women’s Sport Trust says its issue with the use of models in sport as “walk-on girls, grid girls, and ring girls is the message it gives about how women are valued in society”. ^[3]

Having checked on the present, let's take a trip to the past now. 

It's the 1960s in the USA. Women can't serve on the jury. The main reason women are kept out of jury pools is that they are considered the center of the home, which is their primary responsibility as caregivers. They are also thought to be too fragile to hear the grisly details of crimes and too sympathetic by nature to be able to remain objective about those accused of offenses. ^[4]

Come to the19th century India. Women aren't allowed to attain formal education. Working outside home seems a utopian dream. Savitribai Phule starts the first school for girls in India, Tarabai Shinde writes India's first feminist text. ^[5] Kamini Roy earns a bachelor of arts degree with Sanskrit honors from Bethune College of the University of Calcutta in 1886 and starts teaching there in the same year. She is the first woman honors graduate in India. ^[6]

The past wasn't rosy for women, majorly because societal norms had taken predominance over an individual woman's choice. Society as a whole mattered. The individual was just a replaceable cog in the system. In this context, it took years of movements across the world for women to be allowed to make her own choice, to be allowed to do what she wanted to do, to be able to wear what she wanted to wear. 

Emma Watson, a feminist icon, says "Feminism is about giving women choice."^[7] Rachel Kadish says "Feminism means having a choice. And feminism doesn't care which choices you make, either. Just that you have them. The point has never been to establish some principled refusal to give yourself to another human being. The point is to make sure you can give yourself- or not give yourself- of your free will."^[8]

Choice!

This is the vital part - the right to make one's own choice. When we talk about women empowerment, what do we mean? If World Bank is any authority, in its broadest sense, empowerment is the expansion of freedom of choice and action. It means increasing one’s authority and control over the resources and decisions that affect one’s life. ^[9] How the negative list of occupations women can't opt for, gives them the freedom of choice is beyond me.

Politics has become a big part of our lives. Right, and Left have two different visions for the society, each with a sizable number of adherents to their vision. Both look at marginal groups and minorities in a different way. However, in the current dichotomy of right vs. left, it's the individual who is the ultimate minority. Society had taken primacy over the individual in the past and it's on its way to do it again. It was Khaps/ Churches/ Imams earlier. Today, it is different political ideologies. 

At this point, it's also important to remember that the last time society decided what women should do, they played second fiddle in the lives of men. Do we want to let society decide what women should do again?