Hello lovelies, I hope you’re in good health and keeping safe?
Today, I have an interesting topic for you, also a broad one but sadly I’ll only talk about a small part of it. You might be wondering what’s so special about ‘being female in the North’ right? Well, it is more challenging than it is special. I know many ladies will agree with me on that.
Right from birth we are being treated differently, raised with more caution and modelled in to an ideal ‘wife’ from a tender age. It is as though being that ideal wife is the sole purpose of your existence. Don’t get me wrong, being an ideal wife is a big achievement but one can be an ideal wife and a successful something else career wise. I don’t like limitations. Simply being an ideal wife is like clipping off a bird’s wings. It can reach many places had its wings still been intact. Yet it runs deeper than you can imagine. It isn’t just about being the ideal ‘Mrs’, it stems in to being responsible for almost everything that goes wrong in a relationship whether you are to be blamed or not. You’re essentially a maker, I’d have said a home maker but you become a maker even before you have your own home.
I’ll tell you a little story, a couple of years ago I was having boy trouble (Yes I know what you’re thinking, take your microscopic eyes off me lols) and I confided in two people. The first one was a guy who thought I was being dramatic, he didn’t say it in those words though and he hadn’t even heard the full story yet. The second was a lady older, she said to me “You know you have to be patient in these situations.”
None of them asked me for the full story but already it sounded like I was in the wrong. They both had a point but did any of them get ‘the’ point? Don’t get me wrong I’m glad none of them blindly supported me but it scared me that they both thought I was being extra. I still have that fear to date. Had I been a young lady with a misguided Cinderella notion on relationships I wouldn’t have been afraid but I have always been a realist and I know without a single shred of doubt that there is no perfect, flawless guy on the face of the earth. I am a mess myself so I can’t expect perfection that’s just unrealistic.
In your twenties I guess there’s a little room for being unrealistic though for me it’s been quite different. From the moment I learned how unrealistic fairy tales are, I lowered my expectations. Despite lowering my expectations I still believe there should be a limit to things. There are things that are plainly wrong and disrespectful. Those shouldn’t be compromised as they are the foundation for any solid, healthy relationship. Instead of my confidants to hear the full story they jumped the gun on me. It made me wonder what if it was a marriage and I needed them to understand my viewpoint? Is that how they would have blamed it all on me? That would make any normal person pause for a bit.
Looking at the bigger picture, I realize that it’s kind of always been like that except in few cases. If you’re wronged, society expects you to sit and quietly take it. You could choose to complain about it but the responses you’d get would make you wish you hadn’t opened your mouth in the first place. At the end of it all, you’re left helpless in the face of possible oppression. It’s quite ironic since Islam greatly protects women and all that concerns them. So where does this blame it all on her theory come from?
The answer is a tie between culture and society. Culturally, you’re to be blamed if you can’t ‘keep a man’ completely ignoring the fact that only a man who wants to be kept can be kept. A man can be as reckless as he so wishes and everyone will turn a deaf ear but nonce it’s a girl everyone rallies round to bash her and question the morality of her upbringing. While the ones who have a good reputation are used as rehabilitation centers for badly raised men which really is just sentencing them to a life of heartbreaks and torture.
As a female you are expected to take care of everyone, while having little of that reciprocated. Even in a marital setting, it is culturally frowned upon for a husband to help out his wife. Even the men feel it is demeaning of them to help out. Yes, that is a Sunnah many people turn a deaf ear to you. I mean who wants to be called a ‘mijin Hajiya’? so you see even society doesn’t encourage even the closest person to a woman to help her out. It is seen as a weakness on his part, so you see how doomed we really are? Sometimes I wonder how we, as a religious people let culture gnaw at our core Islamic values. Take a look at our Holy prophet’s attitude towards women and I assure you,you will tumble and fall helplessly in love. Sadly, despite all our claims of wokeness our reality today is very different.
I am a very traditional person who respects her core values but mehn! It breaks my heart to see how every blame falls on a woman’s shoulder. I am not saying all women are saints, God knows some women will make the devil feel like an amateur but on a general note, the expectations are insanely high. If you look at it in another light, I might just be a naïve twenty something year old who thinks she understands it all. I lack the strength to argue if that’s your view point but I like to express my opinion whenever I can, also I am open to updating them as I am still just a child learning about life. It gives me great pleasure to speak my mind as I rarely do that in real life.
My dearest readers, I have to pause my naivety here while I patiently await your views on today’s controversial topic. Please do not forget to follow me on my social media pages and share this post if it interests you. Till next time, xx.
