Have you ever wondered what makes a Man, a ‘Man’ and a Woman, a ‘Woman’?
We came on this earth as two beings with slight biological differences that differentiated us from each other. These differences didn’t stop there and had spread like an epidemic, creeping in all walks of life. In other words, I mean to say that we were not born Women but were made one! It was not very recently that I as a Woman Entrepreneur and Business Person went through this sudden epiphany and realized that this entire gender setup and the concept of Manhood and Womanhood is no better than a well developed and executed strategy by those in power. According to some theorists, meaning always emerges out of opposites what some call as Binary Opposition. For instance, Edward Said explains the west-east conflict as an ideology developed by Europeans who associated west with terms like Rationality, Order and Civilized and anything or any country weaker than them in terms of power assumed the position of ‘Other’ which means those countries assumed the adjectives which were opposite to those of west and they became what west was not and became associated with terms like Irrationality, Savagery and Chaos. All this was done single handedly by the Whites who had spread this ideology through Dialogue, Literature, Music and other forms of expression. This political execution is a matter of much research nowadays and is termed as ‘Orientalism’.
My aim is not in the least to sound like a Feminist or blaming men like some radicals but on the contrary I aim of releasing people, both men and women from this ideological framework of manhood and womanhood. It can be assumed that our biological differences must have initiated this power dynamics when our ancestral men developed this cultural ideology, associating themselves with adjectives like ambitious, vocal, intellectual and so on, while women being biologically different assumed the position of ‘other’, associating with all qualities which makes them different or opposites of men like receptivity, emotional and subdued. This ideological framework was later reinforced by our ancestral men through Arts, Literature, Music and other means of expression till the time it became a part of our unconscious and is directing life of both men and women. Though many women are no longer subjugated and are physically free from men’s domination but the ideology of men being 'Superior' is deeply rooted in our psychology and has become the cause of our low self esteem.
The reality is that we are always looking for some kind of Dichotomy, where we centralize one and decentralize the other and this is how men became the center of our universe.
Many radical feminists believe that things should have been the opposite way but even if women were the Ideological Framers, they would have definitely enjoyed being the center of our universe but the question is would we have been able to come out this structure of binary opposites because if we make one the center, there will surely be an 'Other', whether man or woman.
True freedom is not to play see-saw with this dichotomy but to De-center the world, by not creating binary opposites, not making the process of association so specific, not running after a definite meaning of who a man is or who a woman is, let the meaning change with time. Let us give ourselves this freedom today that if today I define myself as an ambitious workaholic person then no one should question me when tomorrow I define myself as a passionate mother. Let us De-center the world, let us say goodbye to HE-ISM and SHE-ISM!!!
If ‘evolution’ is the word of the day, so can we afford to live in a world of Definiteness? Whether we talk in terms of technology or new ideas, we are constantly growing then why limit the world in fixed opposites? The world that we live in is in a state of Flux, always moving, never Static. The meaning that we give to the things around us is merely just another explanation among the universe of explanations. Same goes for Branding, the Label we got today is just a convenient explanation to our behavior at that time for there is no absolute meaning, no absolute definition that can describe our ever growing self! So, we must always try becoming but never become!!