{"id":2650,"date":"2016-06-25T01:45:04","date_gmt":"2016-06-24T20:15:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=2650"},"modified":"2016-06-25T01:45:04","modified_gmt":"2016-06-24T20:15:04","slug":"is-marriage-where-feminist-dreams-go-to-die","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=2650","title":{"rendered":"Is Marriage Where Feminist Dreams Go To Die?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

W<\/span><\/p><\/div>

hen you watch <\/span>Veere Di Wedding<\/span><\/i><\/a> this weekend, you will meet Kareena Kapoor as Kalindi Puri, an Urban Indian Woman who doesn\u2019t view <\/span>commitment<\/span><\/a> through the prism of a marriage. The very fashionable and intensely independent Puri balks at the prospect of becoming the Great Indian Sacrificial Wife, fully aware that her individuality and independence are both at risk. <\/span>\n\n\nKareena Kapoor in this progressive avatar is enjoyable if you can forget the fact that a few weeks ago, she had done a U-turn on her character\u2019s seemingly feminist stance. Kapoor had declared that she is \u201cproud to be known as <\/span>Saif Ali Khan\u2019s wife<\/span><\/a>\u201d. She also topped it up by the most tone-deaf statement of the year: \u201cI believe in equality, I\u2019m not a feminist.\u201d At this point, it becomes clear that the eugenics of Taimur Ali Khan are not in safe hands.<\/span>\n\n\nWhat\u2019s most striking about Kapoor disowning feminism is the fact that she\u2019s actually been one of Bollywood\u2019s female trailblazers. She\u2019s come from a deeply patriarchal filmi family and became an actress even while her family was against it. She\u2019s acted in films that are both critical and <\/span>commercial<\/span><\/a> successes and has been the role-model for countless younger actresses, if not younger women. Kapoor is possibly India\u2019s first <\/span>mommy<\/span><\/a> IRL who has no qualms with onscreen sexuality and doesn\u2019t think that she needs to prove her maternal instincts. Most importantly, in an industry that thrives on pairing 50-year-old male actors with women half their age, Kapoor is one of the rare actresses who has managed to bridge the age bias and be cast opposite younger men.<\/span>\n\nIt\u2019s interesting to note that while Kareena Kapoor behaves like a feminist, she insists she\u2019s not one and her costar, the newly-minted Sonam K Ahuja, insists she\u2019s a feminist but doesn\u2019t behave like one. In the past couple of week, she\u2019s gotten <\/span>a lot of flak<\/span><\/a> for being an outspoken feminist who took her husband\u2019s name. While Sonam defended her decision by pointing out that her husband has also taken her name, other actresses have not been quite as cogent. <\/span>Lisa Haydon<\/span><\/a>, of <\/span>Queen<\/span><\/i> fame, who refreshed the nation with her almost manly sexual appetite, thinks her desire to cook for her husband and son bars her from the feminist club. <\/span>\n\n\nWhat happens to these women after marriage? Indeed, what happens to all feminists after marriage?<\/span>\n\n\nThe question is not an idle one for me. As a woman in her mid-20\u2019s, I have \u00a0arrived at that familiar point where the idea of marriage is being gently <\/span>shoved down my throat<\/span><\/a> on a daily basis through a newsfeed filled with kneeling men proposing to \u201csurprised\u201d women as the world celebrates them with terrible emojis. Does one diamond ring do all this damage?<\/span>\n\nAccording to the truth of Nicki Minaj\u2019s gospel, girls do fall like dominoes. Women who had <\/span>dreams<\/span><\/a> of being entrepreneurs give up their hard-earned businesses to have babies. Others who have spent the past decade <\/span>slogging<\/span><\/a> through college and grad school quit work so as not to cause friction with their in-laws. My friend, who before being presented with the diamond, followed a Columbia Law degree with an exciting job at a Mumbai tech startup, decided to fuck it all and become a housewife in Surat. <\/span>\n\nAll this for a married life that, according to <\/span>Time<\/span><\/i><\/a> magazine and me is actually quite a <\/span>miserable<\/span><\/a> thing. Especially for young, independent and educated women like me who are still trying to figure out what we\u2019re getting in return for everything we\u2019re giving up. Marriage can mean no more living in your own home, no jobs except those in the family business, no surname of your own, no mini skirts or daaru-sutta, and no carefree evenings without household responsibilities. Through each of these forced choices comes a paring down of women’s once-unique identities, <\/span>chipping<\/span><\/a> away at who they are, just to fit with someone who never has to change at all \u2014 their husbands. <\/span>\n\n

As a woman in her mid-20\u2019s, I have arrived at that familiar point where the idea of marriage is being gently shoved down my throat on a daily basis through a newsfeed filled with kneeling men proposing to \u201csurprised\u201d women as the world celebrates them with terrible emojis. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\nThere\u2019s no taking away from the fact that despite marriage, Kareena and her peers, have managed to retain their identity. They\u2019ve continued taking on meaty roles that don\u2019t shy away from portraying <\/span>realistic<\/span><\/a> womanhood. They speak out for girls\u2019 rights as they challenge their male counterparts at the box office, but they don\u2019t like \u201cspeaking feminism\u201d. Apparently, there\u2019s a reasonable explanation for this bizarre and widespread phenomenon. According to <\/span>Quartz<\/span><\/i><\/a>, <\/span><\/i>\u201c<\/span><\/i>Bollywood celebrities avoid being called feminist so that they can maintain a vague pro-women stance without scaring away fans \u2026. they\u2019re strong, independent women, for the fans who like that sort of thing, and completely nonthreatening for those who don\u2019t.\u201d In other words, their feminism is alive and kicking, except they just don\u2019t want to put it in your face. <\/span>\n\nIt\u2019s this same reasoning that leads many a modern woman into a strange purgatory between finding love eternal and losing themselves in the impossible ideal of what a married woman is supposed to be. They bend over backwards to fit into this limbo, paradoxically hoping to find an equitable life partnership in the process. As for all the Bollywood fans, potential suitors, and in-laws who can\u2019t fathom the idea of a woman living by herself? Let them eat rotis – just as long as they agree to wield the belan themselves.<\/span>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kareena Kapoor in her progressive Veere Di Wedding avatar is enjoyable if you can forget the fact that a few weeks ago, the actress did a U-turn on her character\u2019s seemingly feminist stance. What happens to feminists after marriage?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":208,"featured_media":2651,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[710,4670,2592,1204,21,3095,2596,283,5356],"class_list":["post-2650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pov","tag-feminism","tag-feminist","tag-gender","tag-kareena-kapoor","tag-marriage","tag-sanskaar","tag-sexism","tag-sonam-kapoor","tag-veere-di-wedding"],"yoast_head":"\nIs Marriage Where Feminist Dreams Go To Die?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Kareena Kapoor in her progressive Veere Di Wedding avatar is enjoyable if you can forget the fact that a few weeks ago, the actress did a U-turn on her character\u2019s seemingly feminist stance. 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