Speak now or forever hold your peace
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New Year’s resolutions – an interesting concept. It gives us the opportunity to start anew…clean slate/new beginning/starting over…there are many ways of elaborating on what it means to each person individually. For me personally, it has meant all of the above. Over the years, it has mentally given me the impetus and inspiration to put into practice something I have been hoping to do for some time, but never quite got round to doing…to help push that word we love to use, but hate to employ – procrastination – firmly back into the box and gently but surely close the lid.With the dawning of the Sri Lankan Traditional New Year, it is inevitable that there is a focus, once again, on issues and efforts that have, over the years, gone unfulfilled. On the lighter side: worrying about career advancement; weight loss/gain; reaching goals, furthering success; the Fountain of Youth; taking that course in voice modulation or the other one, on relaxation. Nothing wrong with any of them, especially if they carry personal importance and the Resolution gives one that little bit of determination and inspiration to follow through with it. But what if, this year it were something less tangible? That instead of wondering how to improve one’s voice, tone and modulation, one endeavors instead to just use it more and be more vocal in general. To make a conscious thought to speak out about things that unconsciously bother us.
Why are we afraid to speak up? When something is said or done, that offends our sensibilities or our principles, or affects us on a deeper level emotionally, why do we hesitate to speak out about it? I watch in fascination how children never hesitate to tell one that the other has wronged them; I listen intently during political debates when one candidate vehemently opposes the other’s suggestions because it goes against their own beliefs; I observe the beauty of a learned individual gently correcting another less well informed person when something contravenes social equality and I marvel at the eloquent manner in which a peer of society stands up for natural justice. Yet despite so many advances we make as a society, we still find it hard to speak out when something is wrong.
Right and wrong is often a subjective matter unless it belongs to that certain rare breed that is universally accepted as being one or the other. By and large society tries to keep within certain accepted norms of socially acceptable behaviour. It is a day and age where being politically correct has become very important to us, not merely because it is fashionable to give the impression that we are aware, but also because it is essential that every day is a day we strive to be socially responsible. We speak out loud about global warming, world poverty, racial equality, religious responsibility and our freedoms amongst other things, and yet, we find it hard to stand up when something less ‘global’ affects us on a personal level. When someone does actually pluck up the courage to do so, and says that something offends them, the reaction it receives spans a spectrum of emotions ranging from incredulity, to disbelief, to surprise and sometimes very, very disappointingly, to a sexist comment or joke.
How is it so surprising that women too have strong opinions? How is it that in the year 2016, women are still expected to keep their own counsel, to ‘hold their tongues’ and to not speak out, because to do so, would somehow be unladylike…or uncultured…and not very genteel. Of course there is a stark difference between speaking your mind in an appropriate manner and employing conversational skills better suited amongst less enlightened folk. Yet, if a woman were to speak her mind without constantly tempering her words and checking her manner, there is usually a raised eyebrow. From other men and sometimes, even other women. If it were a laughing matter, I might suggest carrying a placard around at the same time which states that to say what one actually thinks, does not mean we women are merely opinionated/overly forward/masculine/crazy/outspoken/pushy/assertive/being hormonal or suffering from a monthly ‘condition’. It seems ironic that even in this day and age, it surprises people when a woman does something she has every right to do – and actually speaks her mind. However it is certainly no laughing matter that often when a woman speaks out in a manner that offends certain masculine sensibilities, she is attacked. Usually verbally, sometimes insidiously and often mentally, but attacked nevertheless.
Hannah Furness from the Telegraph reported that Professor Mary Beard, the classicist, said there are “hard-wired cultural conventions” seeking to “deprive the woman’s voice of its authority”, going back thousands of years.
In a lecture for the London Review of Books, delivered to an audience at the British Museum, she argued women had been portrayed as “freakish androgynes” for seeking a public voice, with a long history of being silenced.
Unless women speak up and speak out, they will never be heard. The message will never carry further than the recesses of her mind and there will be no opportunity to address it. Speaking at a reception to honour Women’s History Month at the White House earlier this year, President Obama, elaborated on the importance of women speaking out and continuing to do so: “Every day, women of all ages and all backgrounds and walks of life are speaking out. And by telling their stories, by you telling your stories, women are lifting others out of the shadows and raising our collective consciousness about a problem that affects all of us”.
Perhaps then this New Year should be about stepping out and raising each individual voice to form a resounding chorus. To speak now, and never hold your peace about something that truly affects you.
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Please email: KJWVoiceforWomen@gmail.com