Entitlement from Indian Boys/Men in the News Recently

With Elliot Rodger's murder spree and this story in the news about a teen who threatened to kill the girls on his school's cheerleading team because they didn't give him nudes, I started thinking about how American culture and media tells boys that they deserve a girl's body and the girl herself as a "prize", never mind compatibility.

Then I started thinking about how that's rampant in India and arranged marriages are especially built for this. The ideals for the two sexes are so different; for males earning power comes first before looks and appearance and for females looks and household "skills" comes first, as well as how their demeanor should be (hint: mold able). Then it matters whether they are a doctor or not.

I read somewhere (can't find it now) of an old custom where the younger brother sleeps with the older brother's wife just to show him what carnality is like. Then his sister in law tells him, "If you study hard, you can have this too." This is implying that if he gets a good job then he will get a young pretty girl who will give him those pleasures each night, and those pleasures will give him the motivation to work hard.

On the other hand, no matter if a woman is a doctor or whatever, her earning power is seen as secondary to the husbands. This is anecdotal, but I have noticed that women who do become doctors are steered towards the more "gentler and flexible" positions such as general doctor or such.

What do you think?
Here is also another news article about how men are entitled to women's bodies, starting at a young age.

I Want to Learn.......how to be a Feminist Intellectual and Increase IQ

Any good feminist knows that education is important, because without education, you are just sprouting out theories without knowing them truly. The most important thing is to know how to hold a conversation, how to stay calm during an argument, and know if your opponent is lying or not and what types of lies they are. Also you have to know critical thinking, separating truth from fiction, thinking faster. articulating etc. Other related things are delayed gratification, etc. I will post an article on this in the second part.

Some activities you can do for your brain to become like this are:

• Chess
• Rubix Cube
• Lumosity (also a free app)...increases memory, faster thinking, etc.

Read authors such as

Shakespeare, Nietzsche, Frost, O'Connor, Kant, Pope, Locke, Oscar Wilde, and feminist historical books such as The Feminist Mystique, The Second Sex, etc. Authors such as Gloria Steinem and Simone de Beauvoir. 

Some of these can also be psychology/neuroscience books which will help you learn how YOU work and how others work. Examples of these are

The Marshmallow Test, etc. 

Also you can see intellectual and thought provoking speeches on TED TALKS. 

Learn about all the theories you can...this is a recommended website:
http://changingminds.org/explanations/theories/a_alphabetic.htm

Here are some other things you can learn about:

game theory
synthesia
rhetoric/fallacies/strawman/gaslighting (https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/)
capitalism,socialism,nihilism, marxism, freudian,
jungian
Lateral Thinking (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lateral_thinking)

Other good sites:
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Main_Page
http://lesswrong.com/

Links to read later

I haven't posted in a while, been busy with stuff.
Here are some links to read meanwhile on Youth Ki Awaaz. YKA is a really good website for Indian issues, made by young Indian youth. It goes to show how much our society is changing, because we wouldn't have had this kind of exposure and fervor for social issues even 5 years ago. Please check out not just these links but other ones. They have personal stories too, which is great at showing an unfiltered India.

http://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2015/07/exposing-mens-rights-activism/
http://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2015/07/forced-sterilization-of-women-in-india/
http://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2014/09/racism-in-india/

I will be back soon!

"Men Eat Before Women", or Customs that Protect Male Entitlement

Even in urban India, there are still families who follow the custom of men eating before women. The women hover over the men, serving them, after having cooked for them, and the men lavishly eat. It is considered shameful if a woman lets the man get his own food, as he shouldn't have to do that.
What is this sense of male entitlement? And if one were to happen across on it, would she stay silent because it is a custom and their way of doing things, or would she speak out, even as a guest?

Even Swami Vivekananda said in his speech that,

"Then again, eating and drinking is all in the same category. We do not eat before superiors. Our women never eat before men, except they be the children or inferiors. The wife would die rather than, as she says, "munch" before her husband. Sometimes, for instance, brothers and sisters may eat together; and if I and my sister are eating, and the husband comes to the door, my sister stops, and the poor husband flies out."

http://www.ramakrishnavivekananda.info/vivekananda/volume_8/lectures_and_discourses/women_of_india.htm

                                               CLICK TO MAKE BIGGER
Here are some literary opinions on "male entitlement".

Endangered Daughters: Discrimination and Development in Asia (Page 127)

 By Elizabeth Croll

CLICK TO MAKE BIGGER

The Culture of Morality: Social Development, Context, and Conflict

 By Elliot Turiel

Bobby Jindal is running for President...here's what Indians have to say about it

http://thefederalist.com/2015/06/24/why-bobby-jindal-is-very-problematic/

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/bobby-jindal-enters-presidential-race-with-support-of-just-one-likely-gop-voter-new-poll-finds/

http://www.indolink.com/Living/America/a91.php

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/from-piyush-to-bobby-how-does-jindal-feel-about-his-familys-past/2015/06/22/7d45a3da-18ec-11e5-ab92-c75ae6ab94b5_story.html

http://blogs.theadvocate.com/politicsblog/2014/11/25/bobby-jindal-shares-family-hunting-photos-on-social-media/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmNM0oj79t8

http://www.firstpost.com/world/bobby-jindals-us-presidential-bid-five-reasons-hes-never-going-win-2310188.html

Does it feel like no matter what we achieve, we will always be judged on our attractiveness and "Femaleness" by men?

These are a few examples below: 

Here is an example of a subreddit where the members agreed that they clicked on it b/c of the girl, then stayed b/c of the cool thing. http://www.reddit.com/r/UNBGBBIIVCHIDCTIICBG/

Here a female rocket scientist was lauded for how well she could cook:http://www.salon.com/2013/04/01/ground_breaking_female_rocket_scientist_sure_could_cook/

And a goodie about girls doing math from xkcd:http://news.sciencemag.org/sites/default/files/styles/thumb_article_l/public/sn-stereotypes.jpg?itok=4PyeahZP

_________________________________________

It feels like before we are even given a chance to explain ourselves, we are automatically seen as FEMALE or WOMAN instead of human by men. This is the exact same reason female infanticide is so prevalent: they are seen as female first and foremost instead of human. It makes me so made because when we are born, we don't have a fucking clue what we are! We just "exist". I didn't know I was female when I was born, I was a baby.

 It sucks that people dump all these connotations, previously held beliefs and their own biases on someone that is like a blank slate and hasn't even figured out who THEY are. And this continues as we grow up.

I don't think of myself as female. I just see "me" in the mirror. I feel sorry for men who don't...who don't think of women as having rich interior lives that rival their own and only think of them as stereotypes (nurturing mother, slut), accessories, or sex objects. (Example given here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Esa3R-YzTmo&t=0m24s) This dude clearly says, when seeing a woman, he sees her as a sex object first. And that is clear BS, don't give me crap about it being male hormones or testosterone. That goes into dangerous territory about men not being able to "control" themselves.

It reminds me of what my english teacher said about how men didn't know what went on in women's minds until the mid 1900's, they didn't even know if women could think or not. They thought it was "buzzing" like a bumblebee's hive. That's probably not true, but gives insight on how men thought of women.

The clitoris was not explored until recently, while the penis has been glorified for ages. Even in medical trials, most don't know how a trial will affect women because almost all involve male test subjects and how it affects men. Women are othered, feared and thought of as inferior in regards to femininity. And it's sad because I didn't have a choice in whether to be female or not. If I could pick, don't you think I would've chosen the "higher" masculinity? No one wants to be inferior.

Reminds me of this article where if there's a shortage of men, some women "become" men and are allowed to do masculine activities that women aren't, proving that women CAN do these things. It seems like women NEED to be thought of as delicate and fragile for the hierarchy to be maintained. Patriarchy would be obsolete if these "truths" were shown to be false.

Some of those "men" said they chose to live this way because they would have more freedom. Sucks when you have to identify as a man to be "whole", allowed to do things, and deserving of human rights.

And it's not just in backwards societies. This Tedx talk talks about masculinity and at a certain point, Tony Porter says that when he asked a football player how he would react if someone told him he was playing like a girl, the football player said, "It would DESTROY me". Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=td1PbsV6B80&t=5m5s

Transcript Excerpt:

 I come to also look at this as this fear that we have as men, this fear that just has us paralyzed, holding us hostage to this man box. I can remember speaking to a 12-year-old boy, a football player, and I asked him, I said, "How would you feel if, in front of all the players, your coach told you you were playing like a girl?" Now I expected him to say something like, I'd be sad; I'd be mad; I'd be angry, or something like that. No, the boy said to me -- the boy said to me, "It would destroy me." And I said to myself, "God, if it would destroy him to be called a girl, what are we then teaching him about girls?"

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This is the problem with being a woman, why it's so much easier to be a man. We're shoved into this bubble of "what men think we are". The worst thing about being a woman is how men define women. __ Other good things to watch: Missrepresentation (the documentary)

You will "Grow into" Your Partner and Your Marriage

One advantage of being in an Indian marriage (arranged) mindset is that there is no such thing as soulmates. I don't believe in soulmates, and I think that is just the one thing that the West's ideas of love and marriage have gotten wrong. I think that instead of soulmates, there are many people that you can be compatible with and live your life with, some more compatible than others.
 
However, one disadvantage of not believing in soulmates is that your parents think you can just settle with anyone, even if you don't love them. Isn't that what the whole idea of arranged marriage is about? That you find a girl or boy, ask them a few questions, and if your values/beliefs match, then there is no need to sweat the small stuff, such as likes and dislikes. There is some truth to this, but at the same time you have to be similar enough where you can understand each other.

One good analogy for this is niceness. Most people are nice, that is a fact, or maybe something I choose to believe in. Also, most people want a partner who is also nice. With that logic, people would be compatible with almost everyone they meet, however we know that's not the case. There has to be that something that makes you feel like you click on a different level than you click with most people you meet.

But it seems that Indian parents vehemently want to believe in this logic. When they find someone your age with the same mindsets as them, they think that at first you won't mix but "theere theere love ho jayega". They think if you live with someone for a long time, love will automatically form. That is why in their main criteria, they look for how much money a boy earns and if he is from a "respectable" family, or how educated, religious and homely a girl is, instead of looking at how they fit with their child.

That is why if there is a very eligible bachelor in town, and all the girls' families want him, girls are told that they would be lucky to have him, even if they have nothing in common and radically different ideas. It is almost like the guy/girl has to make the parents' checklist before making it into the child's checklist, even though it is the child that has to spend their life with that person.

If a marriage isn't working out, then elders tell the couple it will 'take some time' and to 'adjust'. And the girl is especially supposed to mold herself seamlessly into her husband's family. You are told you will "grow into" the marriage. But does that really happen?

That's why the comment below from this thread on Reddit really stuck me (especially the underlined part).

It depends. If the girl is from the same mindset as your parents(traditional, religious), you probably won't 'grow into it' because the two of you are so ideologically different.

Your parents probably don't understand the complete situation from your point of view. They probably think you just have a few different lifestyle choices and tastes, and it's a passing phase which you will grow out of, but both you and I know it's more than that.

If you are really lucky, your parents will find a girl with a similar mindset as yours. But otherwise, you will not settle down with a girl who is radically different from you.