This is in response to Kamal Siddiqi’s article titled ‘No fire in the belly’
KARACHI: This is in response to Kamal Siddiqi’s article titled ‘No fire in the belly’ published on Oct 9th. Mr Siddiqi has unfortunately missed the mark on the problem of dress-coding in universities in Pakistan, especially policing of female students.
The issue of implementing a dress code isn’t how it has been imposed, as Mr Siddiqi mentions or, in fact, killing one’s creativity or taking away the charm of being in an institution of higher education and depriving one of the right of dressing as they wish, but instead, dress-coding, policing of women’s body perpetuates rape culture. And that is more worrisome than killing the spark within students.
When institutions that are present to enlighten and broaden an individual’s perspectives of different aspects of life and instill in them the ability to question, subtly endorse the idea of policing women’s body by making them cover up so that boys aren’t enticed, lest we forget ‘boys will be boys’, it blatantly propagates the idea of sexually objectifying women’s bodies and placing the responsibility of staying safe on them.
Of course, men too have a set dress-code to adhere to but never are they asked to wear loosely-fitted clothes or, perhaps, a blazer (similar cover up to that of a woman’s dupatta) to maintain decorum. Beside, appropriateness of attire is truly subjective as what may be provocative for some wouldn’t be for another. In that case, who really decides appropriateness and on what basis?
The presence of rape culture only gives way to news reports on ‘honour killing’, ‘girl-child phenomenon’ and much more. In the wake of this, it becomes increasingly significant to address these issues effectively without ignoring where they stem from and where they lead to.
Ramsha Nasir
Published in The Express Tribune, October 13th, 2017.
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