{"id":708,"date":"2016-07-06T00:18:08","date_gmt":"2016-07-06T00:18:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=708"},"modified":"2016-07-06T00:18:08","modified_gmt":"2016-07-06T00:18:08","slug":"karan-johar-birthday-bollywood-an-unsuitable-boy-book-ae-dil-hai-mushkil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=708","title":{"rendered":"Karan Johar and the Fight Against Femininity"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

M<\/span>ost boys don\u2019t want to be caught dead playing with a Barbie doll. Neither did Arjun.\n\nBack when I lived in Cochin as a fourth-grader, I would play with my tall, chubby, and immensely kind friend every evening. But Sunday afternoons were really special. Arjun would come over to play with my collection of dolls. By then, I\u2019d already lost my fascination for Barbies, but for Arjun, it was almost new. He\u2019d dress them up, give them names, and play with them like any little girl. And he made me promise that I would tell no one about it.\n\nOur little pact expired when I moved to Mumbai, and I\u2019ve often thought about Arjun. Since then, I\u2019ve met very few boys like him, who admit that they like to play with dolls or wear high heels, or engage in any activity which doesn\u2019t align with their prescribed gender identity. Those who manage to admit it, do it with a furtiveness reserved for a shameful peccadillo.\n\nI was reminded of my old friend while reading the opening chapters of Karan Johar\u2019s memoir <\/p>An Unsuitable Boy<\/em>. Johar writes with candour about how he was made to feel ashamed of his mannerisms, how people would \u201cadvise\u201d him to tone it down, that otherwise it would be difficult for him out in the world. In one instance, his public-speaking coach, whom he clearly looked up to, took him aside to let him know that his \u201cgestures were very feminine\u201d, and that his voice was too squeaky. He offered to give Johar classes to introduce a baritone in his voice.\n\nThere\u2019s been plenty of chatter around the book, but most of it has come to be centred on the question of his sexuality. Yet, what stood out for me was his description of how after each jibe or friendly counsel, he made an effort to gradually diminish his femininity. This rejection of a man\u2019s \u201cwoman-like\u201d qualities, his negation of what is accepted as femaleness, is treated like some sort of an improvement project to finally become more like a man.\n

I wonder whether Arjun was asked to improve too. Did someone discover his secret fascination with Barbies and tell him he ought to behave more like a dude?<\/blockquote>\nThis idea of improvement is premised on a basic fear of women and the qualities they supposedly engender. Some of these ideas were first reflected in the 1932 essay<\/a> \u201cThe Dread of Woman\u201d by Karen Horney. The psychoanalyst \u2013 discussing phallic narcissism, castration anxiety, and \u201cthe wish to be a woman, which younger boys utter without embarrassment\u201d \u2013 spoke about how, in her experience, \u201cthe dread of being rejected and derided is a typical ingredient in the analysis of every man.\u201d \u201cOne of the exigencies of the biological differences between the sexes is this: that the man is obliged to go on proving his manhood to the woman\u2026. The ideal of \u2018efficiency\u2019 is a typical masculine ideal.\u201d\n\nOf course, the essay was written nearly a hundred years ago, so some of its hypotheses should be taken with a pinch of salt. We have broken significantly away from the narrow gender definitions that existed in 1932. But this horror of supposedly weak, watered-down female qualities and of not being considered masculine\/efficient enough, seems to be stuck in a time-warp: An ancient demon that must be vanquished at all costs.\n\nJohar, who rearranged the way he speaks and gestures, conquered this threat to masculinity. At the time, the director didn\u2019t tell anyone about his voice classes. Gradually, his voice altered, and his hand gestures \u201cimproved\u201d. I wonder whether Arjun was asked to improve too. Did someone discover his secret fascination with Barbies and tell him he ought to behave more like a dude? I hope he never gave in.\n\nConnor Manning, a YouTuber who talks about mental health and sexuality, addressed <\/a>how he struggles with the idea that his voice, bisexuality, and the fear that the manner in which he conducts himself makes him less of a man. He admits that he, like Karan Johar, muted the parts of himself that made him feel less manly, out of fear that his \u201cman card\u201d would be snatched away. He was terrified that he \u2013 like the men Horney interviewed nearly 90 years ago \u2013 would no longer be taken seriously.\n\nUnlike Johar\u2019s efforts to flatten his female characteristics, Manning decided to sharpen them. He braved the waves of societal disapproval by wearing<\/a> crop tops in public. And while he might have drawn some confused looks from passers-by, being in Los Angeles, he was largely met with support.\n\nKaran Johar, I suspect won\u2019t be wearing a crop top any time soon but I derived great solace from Ae Dil Hai Mushkil.<\/em> Ranbir Kapoor\u2019s hennaed hands in \u201cChanna Mereya\u201d with his clean-shaven face and teary eyes stunned me into silence. It was as much as Bollywood would ever allow for femininity in a male character but it was enough. Even though it was wrought with emotion, not once was Ranbir\u2019s character ridiculed in the film\u2019s universe and there was no trace of insecurity about the way he carried himself during the song. From the man who was probably asked to stop dropping his wrists came a man who painted his. Maybe this was Johar\u2019s real growing up.\n\nThis is an updated version of an article published earlier. <\/em>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Happy birthday, Karan Johar, the man who was advised to tone down his \u201cfemale\u201d mannerisms and the man who finally grew up with Ae Dil Hai Mushkil.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":709,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[82],"tags":[888,1275,1276,141,1277,1278,1279,710,221,240,1280,420,1158],"class_list":["post-708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pop-culture","tag-ae-dil-hai-mushkil","tag-an-unsuitable-boy","tag-bisexuality","tag-bollywood","tag-channa-mereya","tag-connor-manning","tag-femininity","tag-feminism","tag-gay","tag-karan-johar","tag-karan-johar-birthday","tag-lgbtq","tag-ranbir-kapoor"],"yoast_head":"\nKaran Johar and the Fight Against Femininity<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Happy birthday, Karan Johar, the man who was advised to tone down his \u201cfemale\u201d 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