What a Woman Wants

Catcalls, humiliating words, and rape, how much can we take? Women are violated in every possible way, every possible day. This isn’t a trend that has recently started. Discrimination of women is something that has taken place since the beginning of time. Instead of respecting the gender that gave birth to them, men tend to take advantage of, abuse, and violate women.  It’s not only the men though, women have begun to undermine and contravene their own kind. Brainwashed by society, women have begun to think less of the gender in which they belong.  
 Discrimination is a word often used. It’s usually used for the minority, the misfits. However, discrimination is the correct term for women even though they happen to be equal or more in population than men. No matter how many women there are, if there’s a man, the man is thought to be automatically better. This is shown from the gender determined obstacles that women have to face from the day they are born. The problem begins there because if the zygote is known to be a female it is usually aborted. Many girls don’t get the chance to be discriminated later in life, as they are never given a life to live. The gender preference of the society is blatantly evident. When an elder in the family gives their blessing to a newly married couple, they will almost always say that they’re hoping they produce a male child. Even before the zygote is formed, many people are praying that their child is a male.

In the work place, generally a man is preferred over a woman. For the same work done, men get paid more than women do. Discrimination and bias is evident everywhere. Hypothetically, there is a pair of journalists. They both write about politics on the daily paper. The woman is evidently more experienced and skilled, while the man makes silly grammatical mistakes. It’s obvious that of the two, the woman is a better journalist. If this is the case, why is the man still getting the higher pay? Shouldn’t the amount of money a person makes depend on the quality of their work, instead of the gender they belong to?

What happens when the child is born as a female? Well, they’re discriminated even further. In many places in Asia, when there are more than one children of more than one gender, the male is always favored.  They are provided with the best form of education and their nutrition needs are met, no matter what the cost. However, if the child is a female, the education they may receive may not be of the best quality, as their food. If the need of the family is grave, then the girl is sold. Another example is when a girl marries a boy; the girl takes his last name. Why not the other way around? Why doesn’t the boy change is last name? A girl changing her maiden name after marriage is so common, we don’t give it a second thought. However, it is a form of discrimination.

Human trafficking is one of the biggest forms of discrimination. Have you ever heard about trafficking boys? This may take place, but it is not common. However, the trafficking of girls? That’s one of the most common places for a poverty-struck young woman to end up. When a girl is sold, she usually doesn’t know that she will end up becoming a prostitute. She usually has big dreams, dreams that will help her family abundantly. She wants to go to the big city to live a noble, respected life. She, in the changing of events, ends up in a prostitution house. There, she’s is treated not like the graceful woman she wants to be. No, she’s treated like an object. That girl becomes an object men can buy, use, and then throw. It is in such houses that an abundance of torn self-esteems, broken dreams, and the lack of humanity are seen. The girl with the big dreams ends up in a place where only nightmares flourish. That is the most disgusting irony.

Most of us are aware of the trafficking of women, yet we do nothing to create a change. We turn our heads, not seeing the nightmarish-reality that takes place right in front of us. We preach, yet we do not practice. That is the reason that trafficking still exists, the reason that these girls must go through torturous daily activities. This girls literally live a life that’s always somewhere between life and death.

Today, most countries believe in human rights. They believe that every person should be treated equally. They believe that everybody should have the same rights.  These rights include the right to life, the right to free speech, and the right to information. If these rights were practiced in respect to every human being, we’d live in a partially positive world. However, these rights are usually practiced in respect to males. Women aren’t even considered human, as they’re not given their human rights. Some females don’t have the right to live as they are aborted, as soon as they come into existence. Most females aren’t allowed to say what they think or feel, most are just scared. Females also are not given enough education to know what their right are, thus they lack the right to information. Without these basic human rights, women are no longer even considered human.  The quality of the education that a woman receives is usually not the best. Since they lack quality education, they are taken advantage of. The lack of education along with the lack of respect on the part of men, are the main reasons that violence against women exists. Women are teased, raped, and abused (emotionally and physically) on a daily basis.

 Society, even though it consists of women, is against them. A woman is told to be perfect. She must have a portioned acne-free face, shiny pearly whites, and a personality as bright as the sun. If she is missing any of this, she’s considered imperfect. She’s considered a flaw in the society, a horrible misfit. That decreases the esteem of women and increases those of men. This leads to men thinking they are better than women, and this kind of thinking results in horrible actions being taken towards women.  

  As a member of the female gender, I will not tolerate the explicit discrimination and injustice practiced against women in our society. I would like to take a stand for the women that cannot stand for themselves. I would love to make sure these women become independent, outspoken, and worthy individuals in which our gender can take pride. This is why I would love to intern or volunteer in the Alliance Against Trafficking in Women and Children in Nepal (AATWIN Nepal). This organization gives us, the people, a say and allows us to take a stand for what we believe in. As a feminist, I would love to do all I can to make this country and world a safer, more women-friendly place.  With my passion for the subject and my driven attitude, I would love to take part in this organization. This is because it’s time for a change to come. It’s time women are treated equally and respectfully. 

Things You've Never Thought

            As a teenager and a person, I know how much one can think. I can only imagine the number of thoughts that cross our mind in a second. We think so much, so frequently, we can’t keep track of everything we’ve ever thought. Even if you write down everything you think you are thinking, you miss a lot. However this fact of the universe is peculiar as who we are is directly proportional to the thoughts we’ve thought and the happenings we’ve experience.  The bizarre thing is that we can never know exactly what we are thinking during every single moment of the day. Thus, we can never exactly know who we are. There is only one reason that every single person is different from another; no two people can ever think the exact same things.

            There are a lot of different types of thoughts that our minds form. We contemplate just about everything in between the existence of god to whether our neighbor thinks we’re a noisy household. Thoughts are very judgmental things. With thoughts, one tends to critic oneself and all of one’s surroundings. This means we judge and examine everything from our pimply faces to Miley Cyrus’s new haircut. We give our opinions on things we shouldn’t have an opinion on in the first place. Through the currently famous book “The Secret”, many of us have found that to get what you want out of life, you must control your thoughts. This is easy to say but hard to do. Initially it seems like a good idea. However, every yin must have its yang.
            There are many things we think unconsciously. These thoughts make us who we are. If we were to control and shape our every thought, would we ever be able to be our selves? Our minds think such weird, complex thoughts. If we changed those thoughts into thoughts of the happy, driven person we want to be, will be ever be ourselves? Is controlling our thoughts like performing plastic surgery to our brains?

            There are many things that you’ve never thought of, that I have. There are many things I’ve never thought of, that you have. You and your mother will never have ever thought the exact same things. However, the thoughts of you and your brother may have more common thoughts. Your thoughts and your dog’s thoughts will be less common than you and your brother’s. You and your friends will most likely a majority of your thoughts in common. However, the thoughts of two organisms can never be the same.  By never, I mean never as in never, ever. I’m not Justin Bieber; sometimes the saying ‘Never Say Never’ is utterly false.

            Have you realized that a book is just a long, complicated thought of the author? The things you’ve got to memorize for your next history test are just the thoughts of somebody who lived not so long ago. The idea of beauty and the things that are considered ‘facts’ are just thoughts. Everything the human kind thinks or has thought it knows, is just the compilation of all the thoughts that a human has ever thought to pursue. Therefore, education is just a long thought process. If a person acted upon every thought a brain has ever thought, human kind would have so much more knowledge.
            The thing is that thoughts create everything and anything we’ve every known. However, in today’s world, instead of thinking one is simply told to memorize another’s thoughts. That is a horrible, horrible form of education. We should have the right to think and question everything and anything around us. Our freedom of thought is almost non-existent at one point. In school, they say they’ll teach us everything we’ll ever need to know. That’s a lie. Sure, teachers teach us of the French people’s fight to freedom, they teach us why the sky is blue, how a rainbow is formed, and why stars twinkle. However, they never teach us the single most important lesson that we need in life: how to think. That however, isn’t exactly an entirely true statement. They teach us to think in a certain way. They teach us that you have to add in order to multiply. They teach us how to think and then problem solve. However, they never encourage us to question what we supposedly learn or memorize. They never tell us why a certain type of person is ‘beautiful’ while another is ‘ugly’. They don’t tell us how a person’s beauty level is decided. They don’t teach us to disagree with something that is already stated true. They encourage questions, but discourage the search for answers. For example, if I ask why ‘red’ is called ‘red’ and not ‘blue’, ‘orange’, or ‘filiw’, I will not get an answer. If is ask what color the sky is the answer will be blue, but that’s a lie. The sky can be many different colors during many different time frames. However, we teach our children to accept answers that are unacceptable. Why?

            If thoughts are the reason we are who we are, and questions are thoughts, and if we are not taught to form either creative or correct questions, does that mean we’ve become people we aren’t supposed to be? Does that mean that we’ve already been tricked into doing plastic surgery in our minds? It’s a known ‘fact’ that the mind is the one place in which we have complete freedom. Is that a lie, because our minds are already so much influenced by other minds that they can never truly be free? These are questions I cannot answer. These are questions I may never be able to answer. These are questions I was taught not to answer.

            Times are changing though. In classrooms today, it’s more about thinking and less about mugging up. My parents were told to write and write and write the same words of a language in order to be fluent in it. Today, I am told to understand the roots of words in order to learn a language. It’s more about understanding everything around and about you, instead of memorizing the thoughts of people that are probably currently dead. Therefore, I can rightly state that human kind is indeed advancing.

            Sometimes I wish I were born later in time. I would have more opportunities to become myself. There would be a more correct, moral form of education. I would be able to think my own thoughts more fluently than I currently am. All in all, it’s hard to think thoughts that you really think. It’s hard to become yourself when everybody else is telling you not to. However, you must. You must because as Oscar Wilde once said, “Be yourself; everybody else is already taken”. Therefore, you must work your hardest to be yourself. As easy as that sounds, it never is. 

Barbie, Baby!

I grew up in a 'Barbie' world. When I was growing up I had a whole range of dolls, but most of them were Barbies. Back then, I used to adore creating story lines that went along with certain dolls. I loved changing clothes and hairstyles of these dolls. I used to own a large doll house and a few too-tall Kens.  I used to have tiny teacups that I would make tea in. I had picnics with these 'folks' and ended up eating all of their food. They were some of my best friends, as sad as that sounds.  I still have an abundance of dolls leftover from the days where frolicking and dancing with these fake humans was the norm. I look at them now, and I don't see the people I used to see in them. No, I see a controversy.

There are good things about Barbies. They are the first friends of little girls. They teach them how to socialize and dress up. They allow children to flourish their imagination by creating stories. They let tiny feminine females learn all about fashion. Most little girls that played with Barbies have a keen sense of style when they mature. I, of course, happen to be an exception. I used to mix match my doll's clothes. The tiny dolls that nobody's heard of used to be wearing the large, beautiful gowns of my barbies. My barbie's attire would consist of torn, too-short dresses. I was never a fasionista. I still am not. Barbies teach little girls to be classy, feminine little ladies.

There's a down side to Barbies as well. Little girls who play only with Barbies, expect real life woman to be just like them. They think that real 'woman' have to be tall, blonde, and beautiful. They begin to get conscious about their appearance at a very early age.  They begin to think that if they don't look like Barbie, they're ugly. In reality, this is not true. Young minds, who have always played with perfect girls think differently. They might not be as skinny as Barbie. They might have muddy-brown eyes instead of clear-blue ones. They might be on the short side. They might have a darker skin tone (However, this might not be the case now-days as they have 'multi-racial' Barbies). They probably don't have never ending legs. They  hopefully do not have D-cups. Once they notice that, they unconsciously begin to think of themselves as ugly. They believe they're not good-looking because they don't look like Barbie. This later affects them even more so. This might be the beginning of an eating disorder. This thought might leading to bulimia or anorexia. That is the downside to Barbies. They are so flawless and full that they make little girls conscious of how unlike them Barbie is.

Being a girl with dark eyes, dark hair, a normal amount of zits, and being on the short side of the scale, I understand this. If you flip through magazine, look at the models. Most of the models are as tall as the Empire State Building. They all have flawless, pimple-less skin. They are scary skinny and have ocean colored eyes. I on the other hand, don't have any of that. However, I do have a brain. My brain tells me that even though I might not be as gorgeous as those photo-shopped models, I'm not ugly either. That is fine with me. There are many more things to a person than looks. Barbie disagrees with this, and so do little girls. Society brainwashes girls into thinking they have to be super skinny, but not anorexic skinny. They must be smart, but not boring smart. They are required to be pretty, but if they're too pretty they'll get picked on. They should talk, but not too much. Girls today, can not catch a break. Barbies just blindly nod at this. The thing with Barbie, is that she does not encourage smartness. Her large, clear eyes do not have an intellectual glint. I'm not saying that pretty girls can't be smart, they can. They should be. However, I am saying that parents should think again before buying their 3 year old daughter a Barbie doll. 

The Little Engine That Could, But Wouldn't

Everyone's heard of the little engine that could, right? Well, if you haven't you should Google the little guy right now. This little guy is an inspiration to all. He thought he could, so he did. He succeeded too. If we believe in ourselves, we can do anything we want. This seems easy enough right? It would be, if it wasn't for the pressure of society and of those that surround us.

We are being judged. We've been judged before, and we will be judged forever more. Even though it happens all the time, it is not easy. Being judged is hard. Not feeling as if you are good enough is even harder. People talk, and it's hard for them to stop. Usually they talk without thinking. When they talk about you then, it's no use paying any attention. They're silly people who don't have anything better to do. Now, there are the other talkers. The sadists. They talk with a cunning purpose, without meaning a word. They twist and churn words as if they are making butter. These are the over-dramatic ones who should have aimed to be the writers of gossip columns. They insist they hate drama and gossip, but secretly thrive on them. These are the ones to look out for, and avoid.

Many people tell you're not good enough to do what you want. They tell you, you're too lazy. You're too small. You're too skinny. You're not strong enough. You have a weak stomach. Thus, you can't do this. You can't do that. You can't do anything. You're considered a liability in the world of economics. Well, obviously if they say that, sooner or later you're going to think you can't do anything. You won't think you're strong, smart, and healthy. If everybody tells you, you're never going to be enough; sooner or later you will believe it. You will believe all of the lies people put into your head. The truth is, you can do anything. And so can I. If we work hard and focus, none of our flaws will hinder us. If we listen to those foolish creatures we subconsciously surround ourselves with, we are done for. Words hurt more than anything, even though it does not feel like it. Rise above these negative figures. Find some friends, and stay close only to the ones that prove worthy enough.  This doesn't be mean to those who are mean. Let them be mean, but you stay nice. Don't be the little engine that could but wouldn't because of the negativity surrounding him.

When I Grow Up, I Want To Be A Child

There will always be people who appreciate dried leaves and crooked smiles. The people who love starry nights and the clear blue sky more than the average. The folks who sing songs long forgotten by the rest. The girls who dance randomly and don't care if they're different. The ones who will eat as much as they want because they're hungry. The ones who run because they want to, and paint because their hearts desire so. The girls who leave their nail polish on until it becomes tiny specks on the clean nail. The same people who are more comfortable in hoodies and jeans. The ones that read too much, too fast. The ones who dream and think beyond the capacity of today's world.

It might seem as if the people who 'dig' new cars and plastic smiles are taking over. The ones who adore majestic mansions and everything new. The people who adore the smell of air conditioner and the sound of high, high heels. The ones that count calories before consuming. The ones who don't read for fun because they are 'waiting for the movie'. The ones who prefer perfect skin and long, flawless hair. The people whispering about the same old people and the same old drama. The ones that are silently becoming the people they used to hate. The folks who tried to impress society, but failed to drastically.  They didn't understand that society never lets anybody win. Ever.

Thought it seems that these plastic people are taking over, that is not the case.
The folks who adore the small things will always be there, hidden beneath the shadows. They don't need to talk too much or too loud. They don't need to wear too-short shorts and plaster their faces with face paint (also known as make-up, but what is it really?). They don't need to pretend to be dumb to make friends. They'll figure out who they are and who they want to be soon enough. People will go through stages where they become "plastic"; and long to be included in the pretty committee. That phase will end one day. We are who we always were, children.

Children do not judge or point fingers. Instead they ask questions and laugh. They smile when they want and hug because it's nice. The aren't afraid of the truth. They make friends quicker than instant noodles, and are kinder than time. They like what they like, and don't try to conform. That soon changes when you become ten, though. You suddenly HAVE to fit in. Wearing long, flowery dresses are out; you've got to buy something cooler. You spend hours begging your mother to buy you the new 'in' clothes. This goes on, and on, and on. However, it is all put an end soon enough. We'll all get a similar epiphany sooner or later. We're not who we really are, we are society. Somewhere in there, we're aiming to be who we once were; who we might never be again. Children.