Be a Man Virus

Who doesn't remember the famous dialog by aamir khan in dil chahata hai when he says:
“Usne teri mardaangi ko lalkaara hai, kya kar raha hai yaar, Mard ban! Be a Man!”
Well I am laughing just by remembering it right now. I mean it suite saif’s situation, in the movie but my blog is not about praising how awesome dil chahata hai was. But it’s rather about what does it actually means to be a ‘Man’ in this 21st century.

Being a man myself, scientifically at least, I was trying to nail my curiosity against this question and what I figured out was so helpful to me personally that I thought of sharing it with my fellow inmates. Now, the reason I say inmates is because it’s a psychological cage, a built up jail that we men live in or rather incarcerated in while growing up. Living in a confine space, physically or psychologically, is not only harmful but also dangerous as we are all social animals. Freedom is something we all respect and are always consciously or unconsciously working on. In our chase of expanding the horizon of freedom we are bound to interact with each other, thus helping the ‘be a man’ virus to spread with great ease, although unwilling and indirectly.

The atrocities of this virus are horrendous when it reaches its peak and devour its victim psyche. History is full of hundreds of examples to bail out my point. Few words that will bang in your ears and might serve as a hint: Hitler, North Korea, Rapes, Social Violence, Corruptions, Murders and Wars etc. Disagree? Let’s dig in a little bit…

Here is the list of common phrases I came up with, that ‘be a man’ virus feeds on or a list of phrases that defines manhood in other words:
                   ‘being responsible’,      ‘to plan future’, ‘to not to be emotional’,
                   ‘to not to CRY’,            ‘to take control’, ‘to not to feel lost’,
                   ‘to be a leader’,           ‘to keep fighting’, ‘to have kids’ etc.

Each of these phrases is inherently flawed. They completely ignore the law of reality namely impermanence. Life is fundamentally unpredictable, uncertain, unimaginable etc. So any work done ignoring this fact is bound to turn wasteful. Men’s are trained to ignore this reality from a very young age in our society, which ultimately brings chaos in one form or another, in not only their lives, but also in the life of one’s surrounding them. Being a man has nothing to do with responsibility, planning, suppressing emotions, fighting or having ‘x’ number of kids. These are all built up cages and we men must free ourselves from it. And if we don’t then chaos is obvious. Survival of the fittest is an insane game to begin with. The nature been the fittest leave us no chance.

Now do you agree? Just try to see the bigger picture I am depicting and you will end up seeing the virus breathing and spreading all over our society, in everything we do, in every problems we are facing, in every success we preach and especially within you.

What’s the solution? To this vastly spread, thus, extremely urgent to tackle with, virus. The only solution seems to be education and awareness. Education will keep this virus in control, as virus can’t be eradicated. Men needs to be taught what it means to be one, and obviously age 10-16 serve the best. Now the catch 22 here is who is eligible to initiate this teaching? I will leave that up to you to decide, good luck with the consequent ripples of brain storming!!