The other day I was heading to work and listening to NPR, and I heard a cool story, which I want to share with our readers. I also want to use it as a source of exhortation. India was the locale of this particular story. Basically, some hard-line Hindus were protesting the celebration of the “very Western” Valentine’s day. Well, it was really more about Westernization and the role of women more than it was simply about Valentine’s day, but it found its most natural expression through the holiday. Last year, a radical group went so far as to go into bars and harass and beat women who were there (despite some of our perceived problems here, our ladies are lucky!).
This year wasn’t any better with the same treatment being promised. There was even the threat of finding courting couples and forcing them to marry. Really, the issue at hand was a matter of gender roles in an ever-changing world. Women who drank at pubs or consorted with men were seen as “loose.” One woman (a journalist) decided to fight back by raising awareness and encouraging women to send in their pink unmentionables in order to make something and send it to the leader of the right-wing movement. She called the group the ”Consortium of Pub-Going, Loose and Forward Women.” What an interesting name.
As you might have guessed, my interest is with the Pub-going part. As a means of social protest and of defiance, the women were also encouraged to drink a pint in the pub on Valentine’s Day. What a profoundly simple act. We take for granted that any of us (of proper age) can walk into a pub and enjoy a beer. Yet, here is a circumstance where having a beer can be a perilous affair. It almost seems absurd that this could be the case anywhere, but here is another instance where the pub is playing an important role in the shaping (or re-shaping) of cultural ideas and ideals.
So, let me encourage you to appreciate your freedom and your pint when you are at the bar. Remember that even in this country, various people groups (including women) had to fight for the same social rights that we are so easily afforded today. I just hope that the words of Thomas Paine are not prophetic for our time: “What we attain too cheaply, we esteem too lightly.” This is my way of encouraging all of us to enjoy our freedom to appreciate a good brew.
[...] The fact that she wants her punishment to be carried out publicly is an interesting facet of this story. For one, the act was done publicly. For a public act that is supposedly unbecoming of a Muslim woman, she wants others to determine whether it’s more unbecoming to be beaten for the said act. Ladies and gentleman, this is social protest. Notice that she did not plead “not guilty.” Unlike many of the slick Ricks who avoid acceptance and consequence in our country, she accepted the “guilt” of her actions. Call it what you want, but I see this as a brave act of social protest. This is not the only one we’ve written about this year. [...]