Feminism In India and Impact of Movie 'My Choice'
By: Aakash Tripathi and Siddharth Raina
By: Aakash Tripathi and Siddharth Raina
Introduction:
The official definition of feminism as defined by Wikipedia states that feminism is a collection of
movements and ideologies that share a common goal: to define, establish, and
achieve equal political, economic, cultural,
personal, and social rights for women. This includes seeking to establish equal
opportunities for women in education and employment. A feminist advocates or supports the rights and equality of women.
Feminist movements
have campaigned and continue to campaign for women's rights,
including the right to vote, to hold
public office, to work, to fair wages or equal pay, to own property, to education, to enter contracts, to
have equal rights within marriage, and to have maternity leave etc. Feminists have also worked to promote bodily autonomy and integrity, and to
protect women and girls from rape, sexual harassment, and domestic violence.
However in the
modern times, it is very important to see if feminism is heading in the right
direction and is actually working towards empowering women and providing them
with equal rights and opportunities in all aspects of life including political,
economic, cultural, personal, and social rights for women.
Feminism and
feminist movements must be aimed at achieving these equal rights for both men
and women. It must be recognised by our society that both men and women must be
treated equally and be given equal rights in all aspects.
Motivation:
The idea of feminism essentially promotes equality for both men and women.
However it is very important for people to understand the true meaning of the
word and what feminist movements aim to achieve.
The first step to do so is to understand what kind of picture is created
in the minds of people when they hear the word feminism. Hence we thought that
a comprehensive survey would be a big step in understanding what people really
understand by the word feminism
Approach:
A comprehensive
questionnaire was created to understand what people think about feminism and
feminist movements. This questionnaire involved a series of questions ranging
from basic questions such as the interpretation of the word feminism by people
to several pin pointed questions related to the recently viral video “My
Choice”. The idea behind this survey was to get an idea of people’s approach to
feminism.
Results:
We raised certain cutting edge questions along with some other similar questions. The results to these questions are summarized below:
What is your idea of feminism?
Option A: Equal political, economic, cultural, and social rights for men and women.
Option B: Women proving their strength by feminist movements.
Option C: Freedom for a woman to do whatever they wish to do within the framework of national law.
Option A is the Wikipedia definition of feminism while the other two are extream options for psuedo feminist and anti feminist mindsets. Most people went with option A.
Are feminist movements demonizing men?
The inner circle is for females and the outer is for the males. This shows a sharp contrast in the number of people agreeing. We can clearly see how same quanta of change is perceived by a group which feels power is slipping as completely different to the other which feels they are at gain.
Who needs feminism the most?
While people say that rural uneducated women are the ones needing a rise in feminism, Vogue is targeting upper middle class women. This looks like a psychological attempt on these upper middle class women to tap the growing Indian market.
What are your views on the video “My Choice”?
Option A (Blue): The idea behind the movie is good and the message is precise and well delivered.
Option B (Red): The movie is good, but the message delivered is exaggerated and wrong.
Option C (Green): The idea behind the movie is flawed.
Lot more females saw the movie as perfectly alright as compared to males.
How well Feminism is portrayed in movie ‘My Choice’ on a scale of 1 to 10?
The utility of the movie is rated on a increasing level from left to right.
Many more women are on the right side as compared to men while many more men are on the left. Though most of the people are in the middle section and find the movie partially effective. The psychology behind is the same as discussed before.
Conclusion:
The results of the
survey led to various conclusions. While answering the basic question on the
definition of feminism, majority voted that feminism aims at equality between
men and women. The survey asked if people believed that feminist movements
demonize men, to which the answers differed between men and women. It explains
how people look at things from different point of views. Some specific
questions were asked to people taking the example of the recently viral video 'My Choice', to which answers were mostly same by majority of men and women
however some people had opinions on extreme ends. The results can be concluded by saying that male and female are taking the mediums of spreading feminism differently and the movie 'My Choice' is not targeting the people who actually need feminism but is only taping the Indian markets.
References:
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