I recently watched a talk show,where women demanded from their parents ,their supposedly rightful claim to monetary benefits under the pretence of marriage. It was utterly absurd to watch. This is the new,upgraded, millennia version of the dowry system ,where outsiders don’t blackmail the parents but your own children do.
Here were educated women, demanding that their parents write off at least half their assets to them or gift them with 50 sovereigns of gold or spend 50 lakhs on an ostentatious wedding. They seem to have channelised all their energy into conjuring up fool proof means of bankrupting their parents.
One girl had the audacity to suggest that her parents hire a helicopter for her grand entrance. Someone else wanted diamonds and three north Indian styled functions before the wedding. They wanted fully furnished apartments and lets not forget luxury cars. No blackmail is complete without demanding luxury cars. I think they all attended the same seminar on emotional black mail 101 and of course, no doubt made their parents pay for it.These women were in dire need of a reality check. They seemed woefully oblivious to the plight of their parents on succumbing to these demands. Here were women demanding entire life savings,coldly calculating the net worth of their parents and demanding that all be given to them. They were unmindful of even their own siblings.
Where did we get this notion that being a child to your parent,automatically entitled you to make outrageous demands? These women seemed clueless that they have undone decades of social progress in rightly rebuking dowry as a social evil. Apparently,their twisted logic dictates that children can squeeze their parents within an inch of their lives because they were entitled to do so. Monetary blackmail in the name of marriage is offensive no matter where it stems from.
What’s even more worrisome is that they were well educated! If someone despite being educated,fails to realise that an education is by far the most valuable asset you can be given, then that education has failed you. The education you received has failed to liberate you from the paltriness’ of a meagre mentality.
I suppose this issue is indicative of failure on the upbringing front too. Indian parents have a problem distinguishing between providing for your child versus pampering your child senseless. Instead of empowering these girls with values of self respect, ambition, a desire to be independent , self made, and the value of family, these women were brought up to believe that you could take the easy way out and bully your parents into paying the cost for your indecently extravagant lifestyle, that left on your own, you don’t have the gumption to achieve.
Some women confuse being liberated and strong willed with being ruthless. They confuse feminism with favouritism. They want equal rights without equal responsibility. Some women have gone from one end of the spectrum to the bang opposite, from being unnecessarily subservient to shamelessly self centred. And that is a dangerous trend.
No one is entitled to anything they did not earn. Men and women alike. No matter, the context. No. You don’t get it, you earn it.