IT’S

FEMENISM,
NOT
MISANDRY
AZZA RASHID
To Sameer Uncle and
Riyas Uncle
“This is modern feminism talking. I expect to run the world in
shoes I cannot walk in.”
-Mean Girls
 Contents

1. What led me to write this book

2. Gender specific stereotypes and Traditions
3. Not Misandry
4. Male Superiority and toxic masculinity
5. Rape and Femicide
6. Victim Blame
7. Opportunities and Rights
8. Afterword
 1
What led me to write this
Book

(Ignore the huge text, my mum and dad can’t read small
text so I overdid it.) Growing up Indian, I have my fair
share of gender stereotypes. I always thought it was the
criterion until I became 10 when I started questioning my
traditions and cultural ideology.

It was always, “You’re a girl, close your legs, be more

mature, act like a woman, and don’t be loud or over-
expressive.”

My parents raised me with the impression that both

genders are equal but when going back to Kerala, my
aunts, elders and cousins implied otherwise.
 I developed a loathing for these traditions and realized
that if I wanted a change, I would have to work for it.
What pushed me over the edge was an argument I had
with 2 of my dad’s close friends.

I’m not sure how we came to it but we eventually had

ourselves arguing about gender equality. They claimed
that women were already receiving enough respect and
that women were mainly fit for household work and that
men were superior to women.

They kept repeating how women are already privileged

enough as well as respected and I realized how illiberal
they were because they were only thinking about what
happened around them and not worldwide.

One of them even went as far as to say that if his wife had
a source of income, she would suppress him and
disrespect him.

This argument left me crestfallen over the idiocrasy of

people. Over the upcoming days, this incident kept
bothering me and I felt I had to do something about it.
I wanted to do something once in for all. I’m so sick of
people being so under-motivated to even do something.
It’s always, ‘’ What’s the point?”, “You should stand for
gender equality, not feminism.”

I don’t think any of the people who say this stuff even
know what feminism is or how every girl has been
somehow harassed or made sexist comments.

I hate when people just assume that girls just live such a
fairytale life with only having to shop and dress up.

NO. And no, I’m not being vague, I’m not having an
emotional outburst, I’m not being overdramatic and I’m
not exaggerating because it’s a fact. It’s in the statistics,
Richard.

When there are girls that have to hear from people around
them who don’t know what they have been through that
rape is just all made-up stories by attention-seeking girls,
feminism is irrelevant or exaggerated, and it breaks them
to know how little the people they love would care if they
ever knew.

I also find that many females get uncomfortable while

talking about their own rights and often avoid such
conversations.

I love how men keep saying that women are so emotional

but forget that anger is very much an emotion.

I wrote this book because I want you to know that being a

female does not make you inferior and that you matter as
much as your male counterparts and do not let anyone tell
you otherwise.

And I want you to know that being a male does not

compel you to be masculine. You are allowed to express
your emotions in other ways than being angry and being
compassionate and empathetic does not make you any
less of a man.
A real man is someone who can understand the emotions
of others and can overcome and face their issues without
force and anger.

As a feminist, reading books about feminism was boring.

They would always talk about psychological factors and
stuff like that.

Do you think these Andrew Tate minions who don’t

understand the basic concept of feminism are going to
understand all the science stuff you’re telling them? Of
course not. So here is my version of Feminism for
dummies.
 2
Gender stereotypes and
traditions

In my family of 4, my sister and I were raised and taught

that everyone is equal, and we believed that was the way
it is worldwide since we live in a safe, secure and tolerant
country.

On the contrary, the circumstances in India were different.

It was always the little details that stood out to me.
It would be female relatives doing household work while
the men pursued their careers, most of my aunts didn’t
even know how to drive.

My female cousins were expected to have found their

husbands before their education is completed by the ages
of 19-21 and after marriage, most of them are expected to
serve their husbands and give up on their careers and if
they do otherwise, they are judged by everyone.
Meanwhile, my male cousins only get married after
completing their education and finding stable jobs.

Whenever they were doing household work, my aunts

would only call the girls for assistance and never the
boys. We were expected to serve them, while they ate first
and we ate last and after they had left, we were told to
stay back and clean up after them.

I noticed that my aunts only taught their daughters

household chores. Whenever we went over to someone’s
house to have food, the men ate first while the women fed
the children and then ate after the men.

I recall a conversation I had with one of my cousins a few

months back. She was telling me about how her teacher
had to quit her job because she was pregnant and so her
husband told her to. I asked her,” Well is that what she
wanted to do?” She told me it didn’t matter since her
husband had asked her to do it and she had to obey him.
I asked her whether she thought that a wife must bow to
the orders of her husband and she replied by saying yes
because a wife must obey her husband.

I told her that it was absolute crap and no wife has to

comply with the orders of her husband because it is her
life not his and that I will never be complying with any
man’s orders.

She told me that at the end of the day I was anyway going
to have to cook and clean for my husband and I said no
because if he can’t cook then so can’t I and that I’m not
going to throw away my life for some man.

She was in shock and asked me whether I was ever going

to cook or clean for him. I replied that if he wasn’t going
to do it I won’t either because it’s so dumb when you
teach your sons all the nooks and crannies of business and
sale, but he can’t even cook for himself or do his laundry?
Now that’s pathetic.

She told me how her mom had always told her that she
could study all she wanted but, in the end, she was always
going to get married and serve her husband and she
believed it.

It upsets me to think that sexism has come to a point

where even little girls believe that they are inferior to
men.

It is also a very common tradition for a bride to adopt the

husband’s name as her last name and I find that this strips
the woman of her identity.

In western countries, the father walks the bride down the

aisle which makes it appear as if the bride is the property
that the father is selling away to the groom and that the
bride needs a man to survive in every aspect of her life.

Some people are quick to assume that teachers and nurses

are women while professors, doctors and engineers are
men.

Gender stereotypes exist in the belief that it is a woman's

job to stay home and take care of the family and that if a
woman would be offered an office job, she would be paid
less than her male colleagues.

Men consider women to be less adept at problem-solving.

Since men outnumber women in top job positions, this
stereotype dominates thinking and contributes to the fact
that women make up less than 2% of CEOs.

These assumptions that occur in workplaces all tie back to

the point that people, especially men, should change their
opinions about others to bring equality around us.

Gender stereotyping can also differ in gender personality

traits. Women are often expected to be quiet, while men
are usually expected to be powerful.

Every group has a stereotype made against them. Whether

it's about how males are aggressive and self-confident and
how they are "good at everything" or it's females and how
they are supposed to be emotional and vulnerable.
One assumption is that women are first assumed
incompetent until proven otherwise. Women are not
perceived as leaders but as a minority. If a woman is
successful it's because she's a hard worker, but if she fails,
she's incompetent.

The term’ Like a girl, is often used as an insult because

for centuries women have been regarded by the men who
run the world as “the weaker gender,” inferior, incapable,
and so on.

When people around me tell me ‘you swim like a girl, run

like a girl, talk like a girl, scream like a girl, etc.’, well I
will because I am a girl, and I don’t think it’s anything to
be ashamed of. To any of the girls out there who have
been told that they act like a girl as an insult, well you
keep doing whatever you’re doing cause you’re slaying it.

There are many common stereotypes as well like, a girl

must close her legs, boys don’t cry, real men are
masculine and never vulnerable, girls are weak, girls
should be shorter than boys to not intimidate them and the
list goes on.
Be a lady they said. Don’t be too fat. Don’t be too thin.
Don’t be too large. Don’t be too small. Eat up. Slim
down. Stop eating so much. Don’t eat too fast. Order a
salad. Don’t eat carbs. Skip dessert. You need to lose
weight. Fit into that dress. Go on a diet. Watch what you
eat. Eat celery. Chew gum. Drink lots of water. You have
to fit into those jeans. God, you look like a skeleton. Why
don’t you just eat? You look emaciated. You look sick.
Eat a burger.

Be small. Be light. Be little. Be petite. Be feminine. Be a

size zero. Be a double zero. Be nothing. Be less than
nothing.

Be a lady they said. Don’t talk too loud. Don’t talk too
much. Don’t take up space. Don’t sit like that. Don’t
stand like that. Don’t be intimidating. Why are you so
miserable? Don’t be so bossy. Don’t be assertive. Don’t
overact. Don’t be so emotional. Don’t cry. Don’t yell. Be
passive. Be obedient. Endure the pain. Be pleasing. Don’t
complain. Let him down easy. Boost his ego. Men want
what they can’t have.
Don’t give yourself away. Fold his clothes. Cook his
dinner. Keep him happy. That’s a woman’s job. You’ll
make a good wife someday.

Take his last name. You hyphenated your name? Crazy

feminist. Give him children. You don’t want children?
You will someday. You’ll change your mind.(By Camille
Rainville)

Absolute crap I tell you. Women should be able to go out

into the world, work, make decisions for themselves and
live safely and men should be able to express their
emotions without being shamed for it.
 3
Not misandry

People often confuse feminism with misandry and female

domination. This is untrue because feminism is the belief
that both genders are equal and have the same rights.
Being a feminist does not mean you hate men and in the
words of Emma Watson, “The more I have spoken about
feminism, the more I have realized that fighting for
women’s rights has too often become synonymous with
man-hating. If there is one thing I know for certain, it is
that this has to stop. For the record feminism by definition
is the belief that both men and women should have equal
rights and opportunities. It is the theory of political,
economic and social equality of genders.”

Being a feminist does not mean you have to be a woman.

Anyone who supports gender equality is a feminist.

When a man is argued with about abuse, they say, “Not

all men.” Alright then tell me why nearly 99% of rapists
are men, why 86% of domestic abuse is conducted by
men?

Not all men but enough men for a female to fear for her
life when walking alone at night, it’s enough men to give
a girl a trauma that haunts her for the rest of her life. It’s
enough men that a woman in a room full of men fears for
her life but a man in a room of women is ecstatic.
And just because I’m saying this does not mean I am not
aware of men being raped or that I do not care. But I just
find it funny that the only time most men care to bring up
their rights is when a woman speaks up about her own.

1 in every 4 women gets raped and 86% of the time, the

perpetrators are people they are acquainted with.

The world needs to understand that feminists don’t want

to bring down men but rather establish a balance between
the rights given to both men and women.

I recall that when I was 8, I had read the word feminism

in a book and did not know the meaning so I searched it
up and saw a website that said, ‘feminism is the belief that
women are superior to men.’

And so I believed it as a naïve 8-year-old and it was not

until I was 10 that I began to notice the little things that
separated and favored one gender over the other which
made me realize that what I had read all those years ago
was just a load of crap on the internet and so this time I
went back and searched on a more reliable source and my
entire view on feminism had changed.

In the words of a Bangladeshi feminist, “One of the

reasons people make this mistake of confusing feminism
and misandry is rooted in the fact that feminism
challenges gender norms.
Because it aims to establish a world in which everyone
will enjoy equal rights regardless of gender, people who
benefit from the patriarchy are reluctant to support the
movement and end up confusing it with misandry. Some
people even think that feminists, instead of demanding
equality, want a social structure in which men will be
suppressed by women.”

Unlike what people think, feminists don’t intend to

establish female dominance and subjugate men.

The movement aims to remove patriarchy, an oppressive

social system that has shackled and oppressed women,
men refusing to conform to gender norms and anyone else
who has dared to oppose it for millennia.
A question may arise: If feminism is anti-patriarchy and
not anti-men then why is it that feminists often tend to
criticize men and their actions?

The answer is simple. As patriarchy automatically places

men in a position superior to women, countless people
have opposed women from time, knowingly or
unknowingly, creating barriers or obstacles on their path
to success.

The fact that feminists criticize the patriarchy and

everything it imposed on women does not sit well with
many people.

It is not uncommon to see people wondering why women

need to be so aggressive because when we raise our
voices against equality.

When it comes to activism, we women are expected to be

timid and respect the gender roles that have been placed
upon us. Rage and outspokenness is something that is not
considered feminine and so when women chose to defend
their rights and the violence inflicted by the numerous
men on women, the accusations of misandry are brought
up.
 4
Male Superiority and Toxic
Masculinity

For centuries men have been tormenting, controlling and

suppressing women. In countries like Saudi Arabia, as a
woman, you will never make a decision for yourself.

Many monarchies still continue the need for a male heir.

A female in a royal family is treated as much less as she is
expected to be married off and will never have a role in
her own life.

When you’re a kid, your father is your guardian, when

your married, your husband and when your husband dies
your son will be your guardian. Even when your 60 you
must have a male guardian or you will be disregarded or
executed. This is a common heinous tradition in many
countries around the world.

It will surprise many people to know how misogynist

Ancient Greek were. We have Pythagoras who stated that
“There is a good principle creating order, light and man
and an evil principle creating chaos, darkness and
women.”

Then Socrates who claims that “The pursuits of man are

the pursuits of women also but in all of them, women are
inferior to men.” And finally , we have Aristotle who
believed that women were mutilated men and that the
female character was of natural deficiency.

At first it feels funny because all of these are old and

beyond a time of our own but then you realize how much
this has affected the education and living of women all
around the globe and suddenly, not so funny. Also the fact
that these are the people who have been idolized by
countless people for centuries just makes it even worse.
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, the author of the book ‘We
should all be feminists’ has said, “Because human beings
lived then in a world in which physical strength was the
most important attribute for survival; the physically
stronger person was more likely to lead. And men in
general are physically stronger. (There are of course
countless exceptions.)

Today, we live in a vastly different world. The person

more qualified to lead is not the physically stronger
person. It is the more intelligent, the more knowledgeable,
the more creative, more innovative. And there are no
hormones for those attributes. We have evolved. But our
ideas of gender have not evolved very much.”

Emasculation is one of the most misogynist terms out

there. Toxic masculinity causes men to think that if a
woman earns as much as them or even has the same
amount of power as them it means they are being
emasculated.

Emasculate by definition is to deprive a man out of his

male role or identity. And what may I ask is this male
role? Depriving women of their normal human rights?
Suppressing women and disregarding the importance of
their safety, wellbeing, freedom and education.

Most people think that being a man is to have physical

strength, dominate, show aggression, be sexist, racist and
overall rough character.

This idea that men need to act tough and avoid showing
all emotions can be harmful to their mental health and can
have serious consequences for society, which is how it
became known as toxic masculinity.

This idea of being a man leads to many cases of domestic

abuse, rape and murder. When someone is scared or
feeling weak, people tell them to ‘man up’ as though
being a male complies you to feel full of yourself and be
strong all the time and not express your emotions.

When these men build up their negative emotions due to

the pressure of society’s view of masculinity they end up
releasing it all with aggression which often end up hurting
people.
The reason for men having the higher suicide rate is also
because of toxic masculinity and feeling the need to hide
emotions and follow the footsteps of their fathers and be a
“man”.

And what is a “man”? Is it someone who hides their

emotions and is rough and always dominant but at the end
never truly happy? Or is it someone who cares and
respects others, listens to others and does not feel the need
to oppress and rather live in equality and exist happily?

Men should be able to express themselves and be able to

feel naïve and weak when they are not up to it. Men are
often not shown love or are judged when they do because
people think it will make him less of a man.

Countless people prefer to have a funny person as a

partner. When interviewed about this, women said that
they want someone who makes good jokes while men
said that they wanted someone who would laugh at their
jokes. Men are also rarely comfortable around women
who are smarter than them and prefer a less
knowledgeable woman.
This shows how emasculated men feel without their every
action being validated and at this point it’s just left society
eating at their feet. Also when women talk about how
often they are abused a lot of men tend to react in a
manner as such,” I know that there are a lot of men out
there who harass, abuse and oppress you but I’m not one
of them so if you depend on me to protect you from male
violence then you’ll be good.”

Honestly the mansplaining is just tiring. We women don’t

need you to protect us. We wouldn’t even need protecting
if you would just stop abusing, harassing, oppressing and
raping us.
 5
Rape and Femicide

TW: Rape, Assault and Femicide.

I know what a lot of you are thinking. She’s only a kid, so
why is she speaking about all this? Yeah, me too to be
honest but guess what? The sexism has come to such a
point where instead of adults protecting the kids, its them
who hurt us.

So, I’m going to start this chapter off with controversy.

Let’s talk about Mahatma Gandhi. Father of the Nation,
Freedom fighter, Hero, Social activist, Politician, Indian
Lawyer… the list goes on. This here is what he is known
for, what he is held up and idolized for. But why not talk
about the dark side?

This man was a disgusting misogynist rapist and

pedophile. I can hear all the desi aunties and uncles out
there gasping and shaking their heads saying,” She’s
talking about the father of her own nation like that??”
*gasps in desi aunty and uncle again*. Though I doubt
any of them would even read a book with a topic like
mine.

He shared uncomfortably close and likely exploitative

relationships with the pairs of young girls he kept around.
Throughout much of his adult life, Gandhi kept plenty of
young female companions close to him and allowed these
relationships to take several different dark turns.

For starters, he often kept pairs of girls as his daily

companions to address his needs right down to basic
movement, with Gandhi referring to them, as his "walking
sticks."
What's worse, even if we can believe that these teenage
girls had the ability to consent to any of this, it's not clear
that there was any consent in the first place. Gandhi first
met one of his most famous companions, Sushila Nayar,
when she was just six and was brought to him by her
mother. There, with the girl on his lap, Gandhi asked her
mother to gift her to him.

He argued that women should be responsible for sexual

assaults carried out upon them; contended that fathers are
justified in killing daughters that have been sexually
assaulted in order to preserve family honor and once
chopped off the hair of two female followers who were
being harassed so that the perpetrators would stop.

Bet a lot of you still think that we should respect him for
bringing independence for our country. Respect a
groomer? A rapist? Would you still feel the same if it
were your spouse, your child or your sibling who was
assaulted like this?

Why do we need to be related or close to a person to show

them basic human compassion? Bet most of you who
think like this are full grown adults. It’s straight up
pathetic. It’s not just me. It’s the word of NPR, THE
GUARDIAN, OFMI and many other trusted news sites.
Just because he brought freedom doesn’t change the fact
that he was still a groomer.

Now that’s done with, let’s talk about the US justice

system because it’s a joke. 14-year-old white boy rapes
and murders an innocent girl and gets only 7 years.

Kraigen Grooms from Iowa admitted to raping a 2-year-

old girl in April 2013, when he was 16 years old, while
another man in New Orleans watched and recorded the
abuse. He served 45 days. Now I could go on forever
about cases like these because trust me they are endless.

Let’s talk statistics. Here are a few for you:

 82% of all juvenile sexual assault victims are female.

 90% of adult rape victims are female.
 41% of sexual assaults against Native Indians are
committed by a stranger.
 Adolescents aged 14‐17 were by far the most likely to
be sexually victimized; nearly one in six (16.3%) was
sexually victimized in the past year.
 Nearly 80% of female sexual assault victims
experience their first assault before the age of 25.
 Around 20% of American males have been the victim
of sexual violence.
 A quarter of male victims of sexual assault were under
10 years of age.
 Women and men with disabilities face twice the risk of
sexual assault than able-bodied individuals.
 Over 80% of rapes are committed by acquaintances.
 Almost 95% of child victims knew their perpetrator.

While I was researching statistics, I only came across

victim statistics and none of perpetrators, We talk about
how many were raped last year and not half as enough
about how many people raped others last year. We talk
about how many kids were harassed in the school district
and not about how many people harassed these kids in the
school district.

I have a friend who was harassed in school by an older

boy while on student council duty. When she and her
mother brought this up with the principal, she said that
these things happen in life. EXACTLY. It shouldn’t. If we
have come to a point where students aren’t safe in their
own schools we should do something. But instead we
have ignorant adults. It’s pathetic.
 It shifts the focus of the perpetrators onto the victims.
Even the terms violence against women is problematic. It
makes it seem like there is no one to blame and such
violence just happens as it is. It has a passive
construction, and you can see how much of an effect
passive statements can make in politics.

I realize that when bringing up a topic as big as rape, I

must talk about the downsides of the justice given. Many
innocent men are wrongly accused of assault by countless
women. Because of these false accusations, the lives of
these men are ruined and when genuine cases are brought
up, people hesitate to believe. It’s like the folktale of The
Boy Who cried Wolf. Its unnecessary and ends up in
disaster.

Femicide is another shushed hate crime against women

which is the most extreme form of gender-based violence
and is defined as the "intentional murder of women
because they are women." Many times, women are killed
because of being raped and thus to preserve family honor.

Sati which used to be a very common tradition among

Indians was when a widowed wife was burned to death
just because her husband had died and thus, she was of no
importance. This act was then later made punishable by
Sir William Bentick during the British Raj.

Female infanticide was also very common as female

babies were considered to be a face of shame and of no
importance and were often killed off or buried alive. This
was also made illegal during the British Raj.

But things dint stop there and people kept killing female
babies and it came to such a point that doctors did not
parents the gender of the baby.

And you would have thought that the British may have
toned down the misogyny in our country but the so called
father of our nation himself was a major misogynist.
Women are still being raped every 16 minutes and killed
every 11 minutes but there is hope because there are
people out there fighting and trying to bring a change.

It not just India though. It’s very global. From Honduras

to Bangladesh, women are constantly victimized.
 6
Victim blame
No matter how many hate crimes we have committed
against us, we women are still blamed. People keep
saying that it is because of what she was wearing but
come on cut the crap because new- born babies and
corpses are raped. Huge shocker.

No matter what happens people will always try to take the

blame off men. “What were you wearing?” “You had to
know what was going to happen if you went up to that
person.” “You must have sent mixed messages.” “Was
your door even locked?” “How hard did you try to stop
it?” “Why didn’t you come forward sooner?” “Did you
say no?”

You think they dint say no? Trust me they did. A lot of
people apparently don’t seem to be able to comprehend
the meaning of a simple word like no.

Even in court where justice is supposed to take place, rape

victims are often asked what they were wearing and will
blame them for tempting it. What they were wearing is no
excuse for rape and I can say that for all the newborn
babies and kids and corpses. Is a baby’s attire that
tempting?

Do men have that less amount of control over themselves

as to bring themselves to harm a mere child.

Parents warn their daughters to be safe and dress modest

but never teach their sons to respect a woman and her
space. To get hot milk you need to heat the milk, not the
glass(Go figure.)

They can keep teaching us to be safe, but it will never

protect us. Is it that hard to respect a woman? Is it so hard
to leave her alone? Why is that? Why do you think it is
that us women are seen so lowly? I want you to think
about it and come to realize that there is not a rationable
reason to not treat a woman as well as a man.

When victims of rape come out people often say ‘You

were asking for it.’ I’ll ask you, if a biker is not wearing a
helmet would you agree to the fact that he was asking for
his skull to be hit with a hammer?
Women are often viewed as objects instead of actual
human beings. Thus why we are objectified and
sexualized at a very early age and often viewed as
property. Well whad’ya know, we aren’t. We are our own
human beings and none of you own us. Might as well get
that through your thick skulls.

7
Opportunities and rights

At this point it has to be obvious that women do not have

the same amount of opportunities and rights as men do.
We never did. Education is a luxury for many people.
Some parents who cannot afford education for all their
children prefer to send their sons to school rather than
their daughters because they presume that the money will
be wasted on them as they can be married off. This is
straight up sexist and backward thinking.

I recently saw this video of a known celebrity, Jordan

Peterson. It was an interview and the interviewer had
brought up male dominance in our society and as a
response this man made up everything but said is very
confidently as to why so many people believed him.

This is what he said, ”A huge proportion of people who

are seriously disaffected are men, most people in prison
are men most people on the street are men, most victims
of violent crime are men, most people who commit
suicide are men, most people who die in wars are men,
people who do worse in school are men, it’s like where is
the dominance here precisely?”

I’ll tell you where it is. Most people in prison are men
because most people who commit crimes are men. Many
of his facts are wrong and only seem right because of
confidence. 56 percent of people living in poverty are
women. Do the math. 35 percent of women are victims of
domestic abuse compared to only 5 percent of men. And
most of the times these perpetrators are also men(I said
most of the time not always.)

And men are more likely to commit suicide due to toxic

masculinity that stops men from showing emotion and
toxic masculinity is a trait developed by men themselves
and not forced by women and most people who die in
wars are men because until now the female population
was considered weak and not allowed in war and it was
men who started and carried out these wars.

Most people who do bad in school are men well I don’t

even know where he got that one from because most
women dint even get education till recent times and if you
aren’t doing well in school it has nothing to do with male
dominance in this world. This is why you think before
you talk kids.

There have been many debates on women’s clothing.

Most of these debates by men. You don’t get a say in
what we wear. There has been so many issues
surrounding our clothing and especially religious
clothing.

Women are often forced to wear hijabs or forced to

remove them. You cannot force hijab on any woman. This
is common in countries like Afghanistan, Iran. That
defeats the purpose of a hijab. Islam itself says that there
must be no compulsion in Islam. Then you have no right
to be compulsive.

It also goes the other way around. These are countries

that have banned the hijab:
 Austria
 Bosnia and Herzegovina
 Canada(in Quebec)
 France
 India(in Karnataka)
 Kazakhstan
 Kosovo
 Russia
 Uzbekistan
The fact that most of these bans are on hijabs in schools
shows that world countries with weaponry and militias are
threatened by school girls wearing headscarves is
pathetic. A lot of these countries think that by banning
hijabs they bring forth equality between the genders.
News flash: You don’t. You don’t give women the
freedom to dress?? Equality, yeah sure.

A recent study shows that 32 countries have

decriminalized marital rape. Besides India, this list
includes Bangladesh, China, Haiti, Laos, Mali, Myanmar,
Senegal, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Lebanon, Malaysia,
Singapore, Egypt, Libya, Oman, Yemen and Kuwait.
Things like these makes me disgusted and disappointed.
This is the kind of world that adults have created so much
hope for.

Knowing that even you motherland is part of such

violations of human rights is disheartening, especially for
the young people only beginning to start their lives in this
pitiful excuse for a world.
 8
Afterword

Writing this book was a rollercoaster but I know it’s

worth it. I’ve been a personal victim of sexism and so
have most people I know.

I’ve felt the urge to write a book for a long while. I found
it hard to get a topic that I was fully passionate about. I’ve
found it now. I’m just a kid but I hope I’ve done
something.

I don’t know if people will take me seriously but I hope to

have some sort of positive affect on other victims. I hope
to make them feel that they are heard because they are. I
hope I’ve taught someone something that makes a
positive change in their life.
I know that a lot of people, especially adults, are
uncomfortable with me talking about such topics. Its nice
how quick you are to judge when you sit there and do
nothing as each day you fail to protect us time and time
again.

It is YOU adults who have made it such an unsafe world

for your kids to live in. You have no right to judge us
when we speak up for our own basic human rights of
being safe.

Tell me, what are YOU doing? Are you doing something?
Are you educating your children? Are you teaching them
that they should never be ashamed to stand up for
themselves and the topics they believe in? If you are, then
I applaud you. If you aren’t, then start. Start because your
children have the right to be safe and to make sure that
people around them are safe.

I’m just a kid but I’ve tried. I will keep trying. I believe in
equality fully and will keep trying to make efforts. I hope
you liked it. Have a great day.