After many years, our world still resides in the boundaries of a patriarchal society. Men hold the authority in politics and society and morality and the females were expected to serve them in order to meet these demands. This dynamic that has been socially accepted and tolerated without question, up until today.
However, during periods of political tension, this dynamic is brought to the forefront. Often this male power is abused, taken advantage of, and results in violence against women. Sexual assault rates significantly increase, yet history books never seem to comment on this nature. Why? As we all know, history is written by the victors, who in turn, are also male. All historians talk about the casualties, injuries and the valiant men who died a martyr. The voice of the women who suffered during this war period due to the atrocities committed by men, are unheard of and strayed away as insignificant. This lack of voice, and inability to defend themselves is a direct representation of how the power of a patriarchal society is abused.
To provide further context, in World War II, there was a systematic occurrence of wartime sexual assault across the globe. Japan had created 2,000 centers where almost 200,000 Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Filipino, Taiwanese, Burmese, Indonesian, Dutch and Australian women were raped and used as sex slaves. The Soviet Army was as far as, encouraged, by the local Chinese governent, to the raping of civilians as a method to avenge the Japanese. In the India- Pakistan partition of 1947, it is estimated that 75,000-100,000 women were abducted, tortured and raped. In the unlawful atmosphere, women became a prime target, as a method of revenge and punishment. These young girls were stripped of their dignity, labelling them as incompetent and permanently destroying their livelihood- due to the actions of men. Unfortunately, these are a minor statistic, in comparison to the centuries worth of unreported cases, in many more war/ revolution periods.
These perpetrators typically remained unconstrained of legal action, as the patriarchal society acknowledges male requisite before those of a female. Recent knowledge suggests that there is indeed a direct link between this male- dominated society, and female oppression. Every suppressed voice of a woman during war periods, is a result of a man’s contribution to rape culture.However, our method of thinking has indeed evolved. Starting with the suffragette movement fighting for feminine rights has spilled into the 21rst century and is now being exercised on a regular. Despite several attempts to bring gender roles to par, men in power still hold the authority to decide what to do with a woman’s body, (abortion laws for instance), and the patriarchy prevails.
In order to sustain an ideal society men and women must learn to co-exist peacefully to compliment each other, rather than inhabit within the confining walls of a patriarchal society. As activists constantly work toward limiting the gender gap, it is futile if we do not change our overall outlook. It's time equality prevails.
Reference for statistics:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wartime_sexual_violence
