If you have been following the “top news” of the country today, I am sure you would have come across the headline ‘Priyanka Chopra attacked for ‘showing legs’ to Indian PM Modi’.
‘Showing legs’?
Priyanka Chopra was in Berlin and happened to meet our Prime Minister, sadly that was not the focus of the story. What in fact caught everyone’s attention was what Priyanka wore for the meeting and how she ‘sat’. Yes, social media was flooded with irate comments calling PC out for what she wore and how ‘she wasn’t properly dressed to meet a national leader’.
This is a complicated topic. So, I’ll break it down and we shall go over it, one thing at a time.
So, Priyanka Chopra who?
Miss World 2000. National Award winning actor. Padma Shri awardee. One of the 100 most influential people in the world. But most importantly, legs it seems.
Moving to the next bit of this very very complicated topic.
Legs.
Men and women around the world use their legs for various activities.
Walking.
Running.
And sometimes, to kick someone’s ass.
Legs are very useful and they come in different shapes and sizes.
They may look something like this.
Or this.
So here’s where things get all confusing.
This is okay.
This is also okay.
This is okay, maybe sometimes.
THIS IS VERY BAD. This is a sign of bad upbringing, loose character and showing disrespect.
It’s funny that having legs is a bad thing and you have to hide the fact that you have them. But if they are visible, these very useful organs are suddenly seen in a bad light.
I am just majorly confused, because it is okay to show our faces, hands but not our legs? It is okay to show man legs but not okay to show woman legs.
I’m wish I were born with man legs. But I was born with woman legs and now I have to hide them my whole life.
I still don’t get it. They look the same.
But apparently it isn’t.
Apparently, this is what millions of Indians see when they’re looking at a woman’s leg.
Why?
Have you ever asked yourself why?
Why do only women have to cover their legs to be seen as someone respectful?
And this isn’t just about Priyanka Chopra, it is about you and I and every woman out there who is made to feel like an object. Why are we so anal about our cultural sensibilities? Why do we place honour in a woman’s vagina or her legs? What Priyanka chose to wear, should never really have mattered in the first place. The mansplaining on Twitter over as trivial an issue as this, reeks of sexism and misogyny. Mindsets, that refuse to change, with women always at the receiving end.