Emotions are, perhaps, a crucial if not inseparable part of human lives. Whether romanticized by many Urdu poets or cherished by 18th-century romantics, they certainly provide an enthralling inspiration to artists of different realms in different times. However, like every idea and concept, the popular notion of sentiments is based upon societal constructs and that’s where gender strikingly marks its presence. Owing to the entrenched patriarchal conditioning of white male colonial scholars, the association of women with raw and ‘uncivilized’ emotions is deep-rooted in psychological and philosophical literature. Stalwarts of Psychology (yes, Sigmund Freud I mean!) have restricted women’s lives around the fulfilment of sexual desires. By introducing prejudiced concepts like ‘penis-envy’ (read up on this gory thing, pal) and by associating the same with ‘frustrated’ emotional expression by women, they have further neglected non-sexual aspirations of women on mere assumptions. The result was the association of women with the expression of, often unreasonable emotions and men, of course, as the flag bearers of rationality. This presumed notion has dominated our understanding of gender for a long time.
Interestingly, women too have conditioned themselves on the same lines. Nonetheless, emotional facets of a woman’s personality do exist. As a result of conditioning or nature, many women identify themselves with a strong existence of these emotions. They, after all, add charisma and a tinge of distinctiveness to one’s personality. To associate rationality with valor and emotions with frailty is a feudal concept that has no place in a modern and progressive world. But, what if these emotions hinder reforming thoughts? How do we resolve the dilemma that arises between emotions and reforming thoughts? How do we tackle a strange emotional attachment with elements of an oppressing system?
Women throughout history have been grappling with these questions and I am not sure if the modern women of today, representing empowerment and liberation, have got a satisfactory answer to them. Popular culture and literature have beautifully captured this dilemma. In one of Lynn Povich’s novels, she captures the painful beauty of this quandary in a captivating plot. Three exceedingly different American women, working in an editorial house struggle to ensure equal working conditions, swayed by the first wave of feminism in the US. Contentions arise when these women discover the need to sue their love interests in the process to achieve equal pay and prestige. After a great deal of internal discourse, they finally try to condone the cause and neglect their immediate emotional urges. Being a feminist novel, I thought the women would feel liberated after performing this deed of courage but to my utter shock, they felt miserable and despised themselves. Such was the moving dichotomy between the cause of equality and the obligation to stay faithful in a romantic relationship. But, isn’t the reforming cause worth the emotions and sentiments of a person? Why do emotions always need to be viewed in the context of other beings and not a cause? Passion too is an emotion. Every revolutionary idea is emotionally driven. For every Renaissance, an impulse-driven artist is darkening his nights to brighten the world. Supporting an ideology that promises to make the world more just and equal is as emotional as being invested in a romantic or any other relationship and it would be a grave mistake to consider the investment in one more than the other.
What is strange and regressive is the emotional attachment with elements of oppression. As urban women, we claim to be detached and liberal in our approach but the connection with several oppressing symbols cannot be ignored. Many women bear subtle signs of patriarchy only to go with their ‘emotions’ most commonly, of ‘love’. Instances of toxic relationships are innumerable and gender dynamics play a very crucial role in them. This emotional attachment not only hinders the personal growth of women but also restricts fundamental changes to take place. The same emotions which mark the distinctiveness of humankind are in, various indirect ways, responsible for the sustenance of an oppressive system in perpetuity. The world appears to be a woman, captured in an ‘emotional’ relationship, unable to break the shackles of unfair treatment and bring a positive change in the state of affairs only and only because of her sentiments. Then, what is the way out? There are no certain answers. All I know for sure is that change has to come up with a realization that the struggle for reforms is a huge battle. To win this, actions must be taken on both personal and social levels. Women need to discern the world beyond a man’s idea of a world.
And of course, as Angela Davis remarks: “It is in collectivities that we find reservoirs of hope and optimism.” Only women’s solidarity can break this beautiful vulgarity of oppression in the form of a persistent emotional saga.