You are a man, but not man enough!
You have soft hands, they are girly!
You have big eyes, that is girly!
You are cute, too girly!
Now stop crying! Heavens, so girly!
~Blasts from my past.
That- right there, I summed up pretty much of my adolescent life. Knowing that every day was a battle, knowing that every visitor was the janitor in for inspection. I spent much of my childhood wondering who is ‘a man’?
I had all the reasons to. Luckily, during my childhood, my parents never bossed me around to behave like a man. For them, it was my expression of colors, my experiments with fluidity. My mother fulfilled her desire of having a girl by dressing me up like one. My sister contented her own childish fantasies of having a little sister by pinning her hair clips on my tufts. But with the dawning of ‘Age 11,’ I barely realized I had crossed beyond the line of expressions. Then, there were just expectations. Of being this, of talking like this, of walking like this, of dressing like this, of laughing like this.
At the age of 12, I had my classmate from the backbenches stand proudly in front of my class teacher and declare to the class, “he doesn’t befriend any guys amongst us. He is not a man.”
That incident left me befuddled. I didn’t know what to say, didn’t know where to look. My cheeks flushed red with embarrassment and I tried to dig deeper into the novel that I was reading. I felt her eyes falling on the first bench. And then she replied to him, “why do you think he doesn’t befriend any of you?”
“He doesn’t like us, maybe he isn’t like us,” he shot back proudly, with others sneering from behind.
I felt searing gazes tearing me apart. A few chided him, “you gotta be kidding me, dude!”
“Well, have you given him a reason to like you?” she came ahead and asked.
All the sneering stopped. I slowly looked up at her standing right in front of me.
She continued, “have you tried to make him feel comfortable amongst you?”
Silence.
“Complain about this the day you really do, until then, you may sit down,” she concluded and turned around to clean the board.
She taught for the rest of the class as usual. Probably, it meant nothing for her. But that made me question myself- if I’d ever get ‘relatable’ like others?
Fast forward, at the age of 16, I tried validating my manliness to society. A scared, elusive teenager who had brutal escapist tendencies. Scared of standing in the class and answering, because there would always be a remark coming from behind. Scared of going up on the stage, because there would always be names going up in the air. Scared of facing anyone and everyone, because I will still be made fun of for not being ‘a man’.
I got into heterosexual relationships to make people believe in my manliness. Satisfactory for them, fiascos for me. I started uttering misogynist slurs (well, trust me, surprisingly that took me a long way). My father objected at me laughing cheerfully because that wasn’t manly. My mother got angry at me crying because that wasn’t manly. One of my teachers refused to act on my complaint of sexual harassment because for ‘a man,’ supposedly that shouldn’t matter.
And that is when I had to question, is being a man the ultimate privilege or rather an involuntary sacrifice? Something that we try to fit ourselves into? Something that we lose our identities into? Waste ourselves until we become emotionless, colorless, tasteless human beings?
When legendary Bollywood choreographer Mrs. Saroj Khan passed away, her daughter gave her statement to the press, “she was the man of the house.” Okay. Now, what is that supposed to mean? If it is about making autonomous decisions, being brave against the condemners, earning monies, building riches, managing a family- cannot a woman do that as well?
Why do her efforts need certification of 33% benchmark by calling her ‘a man’?
After all these years of scrutiny, I have come to realize that all that ‘being a man’ is, is hype. The most celebrated hyperbole that young boys are pushed into. A hollow shell built by those who were made the ambassadors of male domination. Those who created the vicious vortex of narcissism and patriarchy. A whirlpool governed by those who believe that being a man means being ‘the supreme.’ Loud and vocal beings who’d speak to bring down women and transgenders or anyone else who tries to gain empowerment. To them, that is ‘cool’.
Manliness doesn’t peek from the two open shirt buttons. Nor does it dance gracefully in the judgmental castles of hatred, misogyny, and discompassion. ‘Manliness’ doesn’t lie in suppressing women’s rights and LGBTQIA+ rights either. Something that is so vulnerable and feeble that it can be lost merely by other people coming to the same level, is already fictitious. ‘Manliness’ doesn’t ebb away with speaking politely. It is not dependent upon the criterion of ‘speaking this way, walking this way, and laughing this way.’ ‘Manliness’ doesn’t lie in pitching up the issues of men’s rights in reply to women’s rights, and it doesn’t reside in marrying a woman and have her aid your manliness grow.
‘Manliness’ is not an institution. Anybody who wants to express themselves as ‘a man’ can very well do so- freely, validly, and openly. Manliness lies in acceptance, harbors in inclusion. It is not an antithesis of feminism, so don’t fall prey to this notion. It is not an end to a race where you are made to charge and bolt towards a destination to prove who you are.
Being ‘a man’ does not, and must NOT, become your identity. Your identity flows from the kind of human that you are- your humbleness, kindness, understanding, and in your treatment of others.
So, lastly, what is a man? A person who is no different. A person just like a woman, a transgender, or any other human on the face of the Earth. A person who understands the shallowness of gender-ascribed role he/they were born with and feels the urge to break them for the benefit of all. A person who receives, a person who understands, a person who celebrates you, irrespective of where you come from, what you look like, and what you feel for.
And when you understand this, you just get- ‘relatable.’
This article has been curated by Mr. Nishant Tiwari, a fourth-year student of the Army Institute of Law, Mohali.