Red Flags Exist Not Just in the Man You Plan to Marry, But the Family You Plan to Join – and Misogyny Cuts Deep When It Comes from A Woman
Misogyny Thy Name Is Woman
Doctor Bahu is not just about a young doctor married into a family who wanted a doctor as their daughter in-law, that’s just the icing on the cake – the cherry on top is the internalized misogyny that rules the female characters, starting with Saniya’s mom, spreading like a virus to Saniya’s mother in-law with glimpses reflected off of Dr. Amber when she faces-off with Minna. And of course – with so many females endorsing his point of view – all Dr. Shahnwaz has to do is roll the die – the rest will be fall into place as the women of the household do their thing.
When Saniya’s mother tells Saeeda phoppo, “I did it too, I sacrificed everything to save my family” her words echo the mantra of many women; mothers, mothers in-law all over the desi diaspora, who ensure their daughters and daughters in-law KNOW their place in society – always one step behind (or more) than the men.
When Dr. Farheen tells Saniya, “You must give attention to your husband, my son, see how I do it with my husband” she’s giving espression to the unsaid yet quietly acknowledged rule book most desi households adhere by – you can be a professional, a career woman, even a doctor whose first job is to save lives, but in this house, your husband takes priority over everything else – your wants, your career goals, your sense of right and wrong and most certainly, your sense of self. If he’s happy, consider your work done, your success rides on your ability to keep him happy, not how many lives you save.
The Lab Experiment that Works Every Time
When Minna tells Dr. Farheen that she has been trained by her husband, Dr. Shahnawaz, to dance to his tune, he taps his fork and she responds instantly to his beck and call, isn’t that what one does in the laboratory with guinea pigs? Dr. Farheen gave us, just for an instant, a fleeting expression of realization, puzzlement and then defeat – so trained was she in her conditioned reflexes ( just like the guinea pig in the lab) that she’d already lost any sense of acting independently, using her mind, her sense of right and wrong to figure out the right thing to do – just like the guinea pig that is trained to walk a certain path by repeatedly following a maze over and over again, till, almost robot-like, it submits. The lab technician has won and here we have a successful experiment in Dr. Farheen. Not just that, but now she’s trained enough to train others in her domain – Dr. Minna and Dr. Saniya. While Minna was certainly a work in progress, only to be undone by Faizaan’s reckless behaviour, Saniya seemed to rebel. The guinea pig theory was about to be flipped on its head but then, along came Dr. Shahnawaz, the lab technician, to direct a new maze towards Saniya and ensure she submits, eventually.
Doctor Bahu might be about one man’s shrewd and corrupt nature – Dr. Shahnawaz’s will to have his will. It might be about narcissism and bad parenting – I mean, just look at Faizaan and Salman – one, unable to own up to his actions, the other, unable to keep his temper under control. But at the heart of it all is a parallel narrative, perhaps a more significant one, one that enables the oppressor to oppress – yes, you guessed it – it is the women in Doctor Bahu.
When Women Fail to Stand Up for their Own
Dr. Saniya needed just one woman by her side, to support her stance, speak up for her rights as a member of the Shahnawaz household and to value her professional worth. Imagine if Dr. Farheen stood up to her husband and made sure Saniya didn’t work two departments in the hospital (as punishment for speaking her mind), imagine if Zainab, Saniya’s mom, disregarded Shahnawaz’s complaints about their daughter and instead of blaming Saniya, acknowledged her courage to stand up against her father in-law, and a system that awarded submission over truth and self respect. Or at least, imagine if these women stayed silent rather than blame Saniya for standing up for herself. Each time they clip her wings, she takes one step closer to becoming the perfected lab version, a version that feeds into her soul – the soul of every woman who was told to take a step back, young girls once, who had goals – dreams to become what they were made to believe they could. Then imagine if women were not told to stay silent, tend to the kitchen, make a cup of chai or coffee – these chores employed discreetly as a tool of submission, to rein them in, tame them and make sure that no young girl ever dreamt of becoming an independent, self reliant adult – because, the women who control them have the last say – women who had been in the same position themselves once, like Saniya, but who now seem to perpetrate the same horrors on the younger lot – aha, remember the phrase – “We did it too, to keep the family together.” And just like that, they whitewash every terror tactic they use to make her bend, obey, submit and eventually, become, a reflection of themselves – the version they were made to become.
We’re breeding a race here. And what’s scary is that we manage to make educated, proffessional career women submit to our will as well. The anti-empowerment campaign that gives women higher education, makes her into a self reliant, independent, thinking individual, with tools to reach out and touch the stars, and then, just like that, you pull it all from right under her feet – even her degree means nothing if she fails to serve her husband, and in-laws – that’s her win, her single win, and the only one that should matter.
The Feminist Agenda?
Now imagine if Dr. Farheen would let the domestic help make coffee for her husband, or better still, ask him to make a cup himself, and for her. Imagine if Dr. Farheen would ask her son Salman to prepare breakfast for his wife. I can see a few women shaking their heads at that one, and others labelling this feminist agenda as a ‘qayamat ki nishaani.’ The enemies we have within us are not always the men, sometimes, and very often in fact, they are the women themselves, who strike the first blow, and then the very next one, and often, even the last. Women have become so conditioned into believing they are the lesser species, that they are meant to serve, tend to, pamper, prioritize the men in their lives, that they not only fall into a pattern but also teach the younger lot – their daughters and daughters in-law to fall into line – lest they are unaware of the rules.
Yes its misogyny at its most powerful, and its happening in practically every desi household under the guise of breeding super-trained bahus who ‘keep the family together.’ Yeah, heard that one before? “She will keep the family together, she will blend in, she will adjust, – (whisper) – she can be made to learn our ways.” That’s a tall order, you don’t want a living breathing human being, but, surprise, surprise, a guinea pig who proves the findings to be true, and who follows the pre-set maze, not a wrong turn left or right.
And the men? They’re watching the game play out as they sip a cup of coffee, brewed just right by the women they marry.
Yes, red flags exist. But perhaps it’s not just the person you plan to marry, but the household you marry in, the women who reside in those households, that hide them as invisible banners before the wedding, only to reveal themselves after you tie the knot. And the misogyny that is upheld by a family is often manifested by the people who can flip it all, not your husband, but perhaps – the women who inhabit it.
Change begins at home, in this case, from the women we are, to the women we force others to become.
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Doctor Bahu is written by Sanam Mehdi Zaryab and directed by Mehreen Jabbar. It is produced by Six Sigma Productions, and airs on ARY DIgital. It stars Kubra Khan, Shuja Asad, Saba Hamid, Hajra Yamin, Adeel Husain, Shahzad Nawaz, Mohammed Ahmed, Mira Sethi, Marina Khan and more.
