18. Time to Change

I was contemplating participating in a competition titled ‘Time to Change’ and was looking for avenues to write the article. My back ground study revealed that it was sponsored by a women’s product brand (Stayfree), and hence I thought it would be prudent to write some pro-woman or chic-flicky piece.

So here I was asking friends and peers about what I should write.

If there’s one thing you’d want to change what would it be???

“Traffic in the city” a friend who travels for more than an hour said

“Chennai’s summer” a vexed up Bangaloorean colleague complained

“Assignments given to doctoral students” a PYT neighbour said

“Assignments given to doctoral students” repeated her office going boyfriend, “am doing all her assignments…” he smiled sheepishly

Though all the suggestions were interesting, none of them seemed to strike me as something to write upon in depth. So out of desperation I asked a female colleague whom I rarely speak to other than for official purpose and spat came the reply ‘Men’s attitude towards women colleagues’

Taken aback I asked back ‘What about that? Can you be specific?’

“Just think of what you do and that’s enough” she replied

Though a bit offended I prodded her further “I thought I was ok with the way I deal with women colleagues, please enlighten me”

She just glared at me in expression of apathy and turned back to her computer.I knew I can’t be called chivalrous, but I honestly believed that I was more than ‘just ok’ in the way I engage with female colleagues.

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“I could be blunt in my conversations or a bit rude when correcting mistakes, but does that sound so chauvinistic?” I asked Lekha a much friendlier colleague “I treat guys the same way” I added a defence

“Women are not same as men” she replied “But that’s ok, we really like men who treat us as equals. It’s something else”

“What else ?”

Seeing that I won’t leave without a proper answer she pointed at another office colleague and asked “Do you know her ?”

“I’d like to..” I grinned (she was really hot), snapped back after a while and answered “Ya… Meghna, have seen her ‘pretty’ often, she sits near our cubicle”

“Do you know she got promoted last week?”

“Ya, Arjun said that her ‘perfume’ works wonders” I replied

“That’s where your problem lies, you never give credit to our talents, you blame it on something that’s feminine, never agree that we can win on equal footing” she said looking visibly upset with my comments.

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May be I ticked her off too much. After a while I saw her speaking with Meghna without even miniscule shades that she was upset just a while ago. Boy these women change moods so fast. She pointed at me and said something and I found both walking towards me.

Before I could come up with something to tell in my defence, she introduced herself “Hi, am Meghna”

Her smile was infectious like any pretty girl’s smile would be. Lekha had told her that I was making a survey on women employees and that I wanted Meghna’s help. Lekha spoke for a while on niceties and swinged ‘bye’ in the air and left. I knew I owe her a treat.

Meghna I learnt later was a geek in her college and did not have this glam girl image during her college days. She was one of those geeky types, and had been sleeping with books all those years. “So I was easily the topper of our batch and getting better appraisals in office was not all that difficult”

“But I never see you working late hours, and I have happened to see you in the lift when I scuffle into office late in the morning”

“What purpose does long hours serve in your job performance? And we have work to do at home unlike you guys”

“We too have to wash & clean our rooms and some of the guys even cook” I defended the bachelor life style

“Don’t call what you guys do as cooking. And you don’t have your mom and granny inspecting your work like in Master Chef Australia”

“You girls really have a lot of patience. I could never sit the whole day before the computer” I commented as if to acknowledge her hard work

She stopped for a while and said “Unbelievable, you still find excuses for our better performance, never could accept that a woman colleague has superior capabilities” She was never the same cheerful self again while speaking to me 

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“What did I do wrong? I thought I was just complimenting her” I asked Lekha who was enquiring me suspiciously about my conversation with Meghna.

“Why can’t you give an unqualified appreciation?”

“What does that mean?” I asked back

“You guys can never compliment women without acknowledging that we could do it only because  we get some other previleges which you don’t get. It always hurts your ego to accept defeat”

“But…”

“Shut up” she interrupted and continued, “What we hate in guys is that you are all very bad losers.”

“Come on… I have never seen any guy complain about losing a single mark in exam, or not able to get top performance ratings in a row” I tried to substantiate men’s case. Boy she was on a roll

“It’s not because you don’t care, but because you are too proud to show that you lost something you cared about.” She said

“So what. You want every guy to cry or make a scene for every miss he has made?” I was getting back on the driving seat

“That’d be a horror to watch. No girl has heart to see such stupidity. The problem is that you guys act as if what we have earned doesn’t matter at all. You never let us feel the success. Instead you make us feel guilty for it, acting as if we don’t deserve what we get”

I knew that I could argue more in defence of men, and give detailed descriptions of men being marginalised in the society I live in. But I also knew deep down that whatever Lekha was telling had some un-refutable truth. (Think the chance of winning an ipad also played a part in toning down my anti-feministic flavour)

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When I showed the completed article to another female friend of mine whom I believe to be unbiased by gender sensibilities, she commented “Don’t you think there’s an undertone of ‘objectivising women’ throughout the article?”

“Come on.. I am accepting that there might be some faults in the way men interact with women. Can’t you give me some leeway?” She was still not convinced, may be because I used the word ‘might’ in the previous sentence.

The blog is submitted for the following competition http://facebook.com/sftimetochange