Women's anger is valid, but aggression is bad marketing

An aggression-oriented society

Muzamil opens by welcoming back a guest viewers keep asking for. He wants to talk about anger. He sees a society that talks about problems and never about solutions. When Pakistan sends a satellite into space, the comments say other countries have reached Mars. When Elon Musk builds something new, the comments say Pakistanis are busy with sectarian fights. Muzamil calls this an apples and oranges comparison. Pakistan has scientists and extremists, and so does America.

Within that frustration, he sees women as very angry. He knows many young men who no longer know how to act, what to say or what to think. He wants this episode to help them understand what women’s grievances are and why they are angry.

Why women are angry

Humna starts with exhaustion. “A lot of the people have had enough,” she says. “When you are fed up and worn out, you speak in anger.” People who are tired also lose the patience to explain themselves.

Her second reason is power. Women have always been kept lower in the power dynamic. Now they have to shout to take that power back. Humna does not defend this fully. She says that unless women explain their issues, the world cannot understand them. They need the right platforms and the right tone. “At the end of the day, screaming will not help until someone understands it,” she says.

Anger as bad marketing

Muzamil puts the problem in political terms. A politician who wants power never alienates the voters who will put him there. He does not tell them they are useless and that the country is ruined because of them. He first makes them feel good, earns their trust, and then slowly works to change their thinking. Muzamil says the anger has become bad marketing for the cause.

Humna agrees. She says she came to this late. She used to react aggressively to topics about women’s empowerment and feminism. Then she saw that this hurt the cause. She compares it to a preacher who only lists your faults: you drift further from the faith. She still believes that some noise is needed to get attention, so the task is to find a balance. Aggression also drowns out the calm voices in the middle. Many of those people stop speaking, because they fear being attacked or shunned for saying the wrong thing.

Muzamil adds that change is incremental. A man who now holds progressive views took 10 to 15 years to get there, through school, travel, media and watching his own sisters go to college. No one switches overnight. He describes a centrist who keeps 90 of his 100 old ideas and is ready to give up 10. Shouting at him has the opposite effect. “I was ready to let go of 10, but now because you screamed at me and you pushed me away, now I am going back to the 100 camp,” Muzamil says, speaking as that man.

A system both genders keep alive

Muzamil warns against identity politics. The easiest camp to build is men against women, in the same way that naming India or Pakistan as the enemy unites a crowd. Once there is an enemy, he says, people stop solving problems and start scoring points. He points out that many of the problems women face after marriage come from mothers-in-law and sisters-in-law. Women who were treated that way often came to see it as normal, and they pass it on.

Humna agrees that many women do not see men as their enemies, though it is coming across that way. She describes the husband who fails to stand up for his wife when she is mistreated by his family. He tells her this is how things are, and that she must accept whatever his family does. The words she hears are compromise and sacrifice: be nice, fit in, give things up for him and his family.

Muzamil agrees and then gives the other side. The husband is caught in the middle. His mother, his sister and his wife each say the same thing to him: you did not stand by me. Humna says he fails to act because of a lack of awareness. Society taught him that wives should compromise.

They land on the system itself. Humna calls it patriarchy. It gives one gender power by default, and it shows up in small things, such as names and opening bank accounts. In a fair system, she says, both partners would leave their parents’ homes when they marry. Muzamil notes that a wife taking her husband’s name is a Western idea, and that living with the husband’s family is a custom of the subcontinent. Many families take pride in the joint family system, yet it brings mental health and social problems of its own.

Consent, boundaries and harassment

Muzamil says Pakistani society raised its sons on Bollywood, where a hero chases a woman who keeps saying no, as if her refusal means yes. Humna says these films glamorised that behaviour and made consent look unserious. Everyone, men and women alike, clapped and danced to those songs.

Boundaries also differ from place to place. Muzamil says that even between sectors of Islamabad, women expect different greetings. Some expect a hug, some a handshake, and some want distance. He keeps his hands behind his back and does not hug. Some people find that rude, and others are offended by an offered hand. He wishes a national conference could set standards for how men and women communicate and mix.

Humna gives the objective definition. Harassment is when someone persistently irritates another person or makes them uncomfortable. Muzamil says many young men raised to respect women now worry that someone may one day say they made her uncomfortable. He calls that worry a good sign. Humna says the noise women have made is what forced men to think about it. Growing up, she and other girls tried to state their boundaries and were not taken seriously. At A levels and university, boys would ask for her number or offer her a lift, and when she refused they would keep pushing until she felt something was wrong with her. Her rule is short. “Just take no for a no,” she says. “She is not your responsibility.”

Safety versus empowerment

Muzamil builds a test case. A woman is walking alone at night. A man wants her to get home safely and does not want to make her uncomfortable. He was raised to protect her. She fears the worst about him. Both have good intentions. Humna’s answer is that if she is not asking for help, he does not need to help.

Muzamil calls this idealistic. When something like the motorway incident happens, he says, a sense of protection follows. Humna disagrees. A woman alone is frightened of the man who comes to help, because experience has taught her that help can be a mask. “If I am walking alone somewhere, I’d rather be alone than have men around me,” she says. The kind thing, she suggests, is to ask once whether she needs help. If she says no, go on your way.

Muzamil asks why men are expected to be chivalrous if the goal is pure equality. Humna replies that pure equality is the goal. Men have to treat women as equals, and no one should be saving anyone. “There is a big difference between saving someone and empowering them,” she says.

Why women are not heard

Humna says many mothers shout at home, react quickly and nag. That is not their nature. Women are often not heard until they raise their voice, so they have learned a more demanding tone. Muzamil offers a view he calls anecdotal and not based on data. In his experience, women raise many more requests than men, and the most important ones get lost in the volume. Humna holds her ground. Women repeat themselves because they are not taken seriously the first time.

Muzamil agrees on one point. At a bank, he says, a woman’s query is taken less seriously than a man’s, and he sees this difference more in Pakistan than in America. Humna adds that the issue is weight as well as being heard. Girls are taught to speak to their husbands with a certain respect and to accept his no. Muzamil says many homes give women control over large areas of family life, from groceries to marriages. Humna replies that this is fine where both partners feel equally empowered. Her point is about society. A woman’s behaviour is judged where a man’s is not. She describes staying patient for a long time, then snapping once, and having her character attacked for it. Women may be angry at home, she suggests, because no one listens to them outside it.

Listen first, then talk

Humna brings both sides together. “If a woman is aggressive about her issues, they are valid. Listen to them,” she says. “She’s aggressive for a reason.” She also tells women that aggression will not get them their solution. She asks them not to shut men out of the conversation and to set their emotions aside when they want a resolution. She says aside, not suppress.

Muzamil sums up. Gender issues have always existed and always will, and the work is to build a better society anyway. Women can learn from marketing and speak to different men differently, because men’s experiences vary. Men should stop painting the picture with one brush. Most people hold their ideals because they were taught them, and many would listen if those ideals were unpacked and culture was separated from religion. “There are 7 billion people in this world and 7 billion different stories,” he says. He asks men not to take a woman’s story personally, and he recommends therapy to anyone carrying heavy emotions. “Therapy is not for people who are crazy,” he says.

Humna closes the point. “We could use better marketing, better communication,” she says, “and on the other end, we need more empathy and more willingness to understand.” Muzamil ends by announcing that Humna’s own podcast is starting soon, and that she will go deeper into these topics there.