Mangalore, Sep 12: "Women's empowerment has to be coupled with change in mindset of men," said Mumbai based independent journalist, columnist and writer Kalpana Sharma.
Delivering the inaugural address at the two-day national conference on'Education and Women Empowerment' organised by St Ann's College of Education (Autonomous), Mangalore and Department of Women and Child Development, Government of Karnataka, here on Thursday, the writer said that women were still considered as a commodity in our society.
A recent UN survey among men in south and east Asia showed that the rate of incidents of physical violence on women was very high. However, the most worrying thing that came out from the survey was the reasons that they gave for having committed rape. By far the most common reason for committing a rape was sexual entitlement; that the men thought they were entitled to rape, she said, questioning this mindset among men to inflict violence on women.
Speaking on the role of families and the media in developing notions of masculinity and manhood among men and boys, she said that despite high literacy levels, the mindset of entitlement to sex among men had not changed.
“How much of it has to do with the content in education, and how girls and boys are treated in a family? Apart from the technical and legal aspects, we have to think about how boys are being brought up by families. The media is constantly reinforcing the negative qualities of feminism and machoism in both women and men. It is a challenge for educators, families and media which need to play important roles in changing this mindset in the society,” she said, adding that imparting gender education in schools would go a long way in bringing this change.
In her keynote address, Bangalore-based independent journalist and author Ammu Joseph said that education did not necessarily and automatically lead to empowerment of women.
A recent study conducted across the country showed that although violence does decrease with education, the magnitude of domestic violence was still fairly high among women with higher literacy and education. Globally, only 13 percent of news stories focus centrally on women, while in India, only 12 percent of new stories have women as the central focus.
News reports about moral policing over the past few years suggest that patriarchal mindsets were very much evident in Dakshina Kannada, with various groups presuming to enforce their out-dated notions concerning appropriate behaviour for young people, and especially young women, she said.
Talking about women and the media, she said,” Both globally and in India, many aspects of news coverage need to change if the society is to be realistically and accurately portrayed, and if women are to be proportionately and fairly represented in the media.”
Principal of the College Dr Sr Leonilla Menezes presided over the inaugural ceremony.
Deputy Director of Women and Child Welfare Department Gertrude Veigas, joint secretary of St Ann's College of Education Sr M Shalini and co-ordinator of the conference Dr A Shashikala were present on the occasion. Dr Padmavathi welcomed the gathering.
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