Gender Biasness and Youth Exploitation – By: Majreeha Wadood
Youth is future of a nation, a way towards success or failure of a country. There was a time when the only form of worrisome thing present among parents was education and careers of their children. With the world being a global village and expansion of notions through social media has made damages of its own. One of the major issues nowadays faced by youth is the acceptance of who they are and how they perceive themselves. The advocacy of body positivity/ acceptance has made derailing affects. With youth identifying themselves as Bisexual, pansexual, asexual, queer and the list goes on.
It is sad to see how the LGBTQ+ rights demands have completely overshadowed that of intersexes. Although we look upto the West about different aspects of life, we idolise them and make sure we mould into their ways, this way we shall be called a civilized society. Sadly this is the root cause of our major problems. For instance, it is very in trend about the right and demands of LGBTQ+ community and their efforts are being paid off but do we need to follow this lead of the West as a Muslim Nation? Pakistan faces a lot of issues when it comes to obliging to fulfil human rights. One major community that is crushed in this realm is intersex community. They are the ones who have been degraded and deprived of their basic rights and will be never be treated equally as a normal man or woman. In addition to today’s youth acting queer and identifying themselves as different gender there seems to be no sign of light shining in their end of the tunnel. As seen in our society we do not consider them as part of our society and treat them inhumanly. Even though many acts are on the go in order to get them their basic rights but the goal doesn’t get achieved due to ethical/ religious set backs. Those claiming rights for trans community have irrational demands in the name of body freedom and that is why intersex community is lagging behind in achieving their due rights.
In order to solve this issue it is necessary to have a wide spectrum on certain matters. Initially what needs to be done is take a profound analysis of what our roots, culture religious values are, rather than taking notes from a completely different culture and region. Masses need to be educated on these topics and gender study should be part of high school curriculum. Kids in school need to be taught the importance of sex identification and gender prominence. In addition to that kids should be told that they are as equal part of community as men and women are. In order to tackle the problem that arise among youth being dubious about their identity should have Islamic education through a proper scholars not just a radical Islamic personal. They need to be told how the nature works and nothing goes right when done against the nature. A man who is born a man shall die a man and there should be no doubts in his identity, a man will be always identify as a man who will be attracted to a woman and vice versa. This should be made crystal clear to the youth and made them believe that there is more to life than a sexual identity.
Furthermore, the intersex community who is looked down upon and never taken seriously because of the means of work they do, it is ingrained in their minds that they are not capable of being part of the civilised society. The reason is very basic, it is education. Once the community is given equal opportunities and acceptance as other male and female students they would understand the wide horizon of life. With proper education and awareness they’ll be capable of understanding their worth and how can they give back to the community. They need to be realised that they are as capable of doing white collar jobs as the two sexes. Their mind could work as equal as their fellow men and women. They don’t need to beg in front of others or showcase their body in order to entertain them and earn a meal. Grooming schools should be opened for them and let them know the how to be taken seriously and what kind of outfits are taken seriously. As there are already more NGOs working for them but government needs to be diligent when it comes to their rights as their votes matter but their existence doesn’t .
In the final analysis, it is very important to have a vivid distinction between transgender and intersex community. Moreover, in a country where differences are always on the verge, male and female are always given superiority and the rights of intersex community is hardly put into consideration; the debate of LGBTQ + rights really should be off the table as it is not only exploiting the youth in the name freedom of expression but a call for moral havoc in the future.
