Broken

I've been raking my brain to make some sense of why people keep secrets. Important, short-lived secrets on state matters, to save lives, for a cause, those I understand, those are probably worth dying for. But I don’t understand those personal, reckless, emotional, fearful, resentful, regretful secrets. In my observation these secrets just make  all matters awful in the lives of all people concerned. To a point that living with these secrets becomes terribly hard.

Is surviving at the cost of loosing everything about yourself, truly surviving?
At that point, where you can't even live with yourself, is surviving truly living?

I'm not saying shout out your business to the world. That'd be hardly a sensible thing! But trust people you love, share it with them. If you ever get the instinct that you should share something with someone, trust yourself and follow through. For your own sake and for the sake of everyone.

I know this is probably the most intense and preachy thing I've shared, but…
I'm just simply tired. utterly, inexplicably tired of hearing about abuse, torture, rape happening and the culprits not even being pursued let alone prosecuted.

Something must change within us to change the world.

We're all so concerned about terrorism that comes from extremists of various kinds that we forget their are far fewer crimes by them compared to the crimes being committed in our homes and back alleys. So much so that the more open criminals no longer remain in shadows and openly chose their victims in broad daylight.
I dare you, combine the crimes of all terrorist attacks within past five years and compare them with all the rapes that occurred in same time frame around the world and prove that terrorists committed more crimes. I'd be incredibly happy if you could do that. But you can't. And the tragedy is, all terrorism related crimes are accounted by media, very noisily. What % of rapes does the media cover? A very small percentage. I know  because I know stories that were never told, shared, acknowledged. I know you know them too. For the world hasn’t provided an accepting place for someone to even be able to tell such a thing to their loved ones. By no means do I diminish the crimes of any terrorist, simply putting the unacknowledged reality of women's terror in perspective.

A fear she grows up with as a girl and passes down to daughters as a woman. A fear instilled so deep it has become an instinct. The risk we have to take, and try our best to protect ourselves from, when we decide to create a change in society, to add positive value. The fear and risks that make feminism necessary and all the more relevant. It is a surprise that I am hurt when pop culture diminishes feminism to squat at times. With a long history of bloodshed, war and endurance, there happens to be a long history of women's suffering. And a longer one of us trying to fight for not just our rights but for what actually is right.

It is right to keep someone’s secret, while helping them break their silence. It is also right to fight against the reason so many women we know have secrets. May all women be supported to pierce through oppression and stand up strong against the oppressor. I know I would. My kirpaan is not an ornament and it never will be.