As I gaze upon society, I see man has once again made idols, this time not of clay or stone, but of culture, tradition, and, above all, honour. And in the name of these false gods, both women and men suffer alike, though their chains are forged differently.
Let us first speak of the woman, not as a victim or an object of pity, but as a living contradiction in a culture that both honours and suffocates her. The Pakistani woman is told that her virtue lies not in her will, but in her compliance. “You shall not question,” society says. “Thou shalt obey thy father, thy brother, thy husband.” But I ask who benefits from this obedience? Not the woman. Not the man. But the false clerics and elders.
Does it not seem absurd that a woman’s fall into love is seen as her family’s fall from grace? Is it not monstrous that her independence, her mere ‘yes’ or ‘no’ can summon the wrath of a thousand years? A father’s ego is bruised when his daughter defies fate, marries for love, or dares to live her own life. But instead of confronting that ego, he restores it with blood. This is not strength. It is resentment. It is the weakness of a man who has never confronted the abyss of his own insignificance, and yet clings to power as if it were virtue.
But do not mistake me, I do not write this for the emancipation of women alone. No! The man too is enslaved, enslaved in the illusion of power and control. But what kind of power is this, I ask? What kind of masculinity trembles at the idea of an independent woman, a woman thinking, choosing, and living? The Pakistani man is taught to rule, but never to understand. He is told to protect, but not why protection divorced from respect becomes tyranny.
The man is a victim of morality that corrupts the soul and calls it honour. He becomes not a man who creates value, but a man who enforces generational trauma. He is trapped in a tragic play where each act ends in violence, and worst of all, he believes the play is divine, that the script is written by God Himself, when in truth it was plotted by clerics and patriarchs hungry for control.
And so the story repeats, Nothing changes.
The next daughter will smile too freely. The next son will kill with trembling hands. And behind every act, the ghost of morality never questioned, only obeyed. These are not men, they are shadows acting in the name of shadows. These are not tragedies, they are rituals.
And I, a ghost myself, can only watch.
For in a land where the past rules the future, and death wears the mask of virtue, there is no awakening, only repetition. No justice, only spectacle. And no end, only silence.
Silence, deafening and eternal.
Guest Writer and Author:
I go by Muhammad Umer but in ink, I answer to Omar, an 18-year-old trying to question the world and its norms. My words aren’t answers; they’re mirrors. Look too long, and you might not like what you see.