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The female body is, once again, in the limelight.
Just a while ago, celebrities like Fatima Sana Sheikh and Amala Paul were verbally abused and shamed, ironically, by self-proclaimed guardians of religion and ‘sanskar’. This time around, topless protests are making headlines, sparked off by a Kerala professor’s comments about Muslim women students not wearing their hijabs ‘properly’. He claimed that they were deliberately exposing their chests “like how we slice a small part of a melon to see if it’s ripe”.
This month, the photo of a model breastfeeding a baby, on the cover of Malayalam magazine Grihalakshmi, caught the attention of the country. After this, the professor’s comments caused quite a stir too. All of this led me to address the issue staring us in the face – the hypersexualisation of the female body, which is in no way restricted to a specific community or religion.
Sadly, a woman is, first and foremost, considered an object of sexual pleasure. This overshadows all other priorities like her talent, comfort and personality. Every other identifier comes next.
Everything she does is viewed through this lens and any threat to her (future) husband’s ownership of her body is vehemently eliminated. The woman’s body, as proven time and again, is rarely hers to have autonomy over.
I uphold gender equality when it comes to bodily autonomy. A woman should have as much right over her body as a man has over his in any given situation.
The problem is hypocrisy and separate standards for men and women.
The Channar revolt of the 19th century had Nadar climber women in Travancore kingdom fight for the right to wear upper-body clothes to cover their breasts. The right was earlier reserved for only higher-class women. Between then and now, the looming concept of ‘choice’ still prevails. A woman’s right to choose what she wants. (That being said, the bare-chested protests do not cancel out or undermine the Channar revolt, which was primarily centred around caste.)
Once again, I reiterate that this is not about nudism. Or exhibitionism. It is about being able to choose according to your convenience, according to what your body needs. It is the patriarchal denial of these rights that can be termed extremism, not, as social conditioning would have us believe, the call for equality.
What matters to me is body positivity. Nothing should matter to you as long as you are happy with your body. You choose what you want to do with you body or its images. Let’s please normalise the female figure!
That being said, there were a lot of reactions that were extremely encouraging. There are numerous men and women who are seeking a positive change, but are sometimes restricted by their circumstances.
I can only hope I ignited a spark. The movement is gaining momentum and perhaps this is the first step in this direction from a country like ours. Change is on its way.
(Arathy is a Kerala-based activist who’s been involved in gender-related issues for quite some time now. )
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