By Jaya Dubey
I joined WhatsApp in 2015. Because my father insisted. It would be a more convenient way to stay in touch; it’s a lot of fun, he said.
Soon, I was added to existing groups of family and friends both in the US and India. The usual jokes, memes and feel-good mantras that ping and rebound across the world quickly followed. I learned new tricks, became savvier with each app update. It was fun to reconnect with old friends and cousins. Everyone looked amazing in the pictures they shared. The world had never seemed smaller. This thing was genius!
Then came the steady stream of sexist jokes about bitchy wives who oppressed their husbands, and how shaadi is barbaadi — for men.
It wasn’t only the men who were sharing these jokes; it was the women. And these jokes multiplied like blowflies.
Did you ever get the one about Americans calling their wives “honey” and Indians calling them “Bee-Bee” instead? Because they sting twice as hard. Or watch the video where the husband calls to complain to his mother-in-law that the product he got from her is a defective piece? Refund, please. The one in which a young girl asks a baba: Why do boys have all the freedom but girls are held back in their homes? Because boys are like iron and girls, gold. One keeps gold in a vault, that’s why.
Predictably, I began rebuking my friends and cousins — not my finest moment, I’ll admit. Everyone around me tried to tell me: “Be patient,” “don’t get so emotional,” “it’s just a joke, yaar!”
No, it’s not just a joke.
So many of the women in my NRI and Indian groups are sweet and kind, devout in their values and beliefs. But they put up with these jokes. Share them. Respond with thumbs up, clapping, and laughing emojis even.
These jokes do not offend them. I offend them more when I call out the sexism. “We respect women, yaar. This is just for fun,” was the universal defense.
I’m not so sure. They wouldn’t share maa-behen gaalis with such ease, then why such jokes? What is it about WhatsApp and our tone-deafness to the steady loop of misogynistic wisecracks? When will we become more aware of the cognitive dissonance between our well-meaning goals to empower betis amidst the daily contempt for bee-bees? At what point does the Lakshmi turn into a millstone?
It was hard to accept these jokes and their endorsements from friends and cousins who work hard at home and office, who love their moms, sisters, daughters, friends and co-workers. They are superwomen —hard working, raising wonderful, accomplished kids; they are kitchen queens who make the best food; they’ll make space in their lives in a second to help clean up, pick up kids from schools or parents from airports.
So how do these same women so easily dissociate the harpies in these jokes from their moms, sisters, friends, cousins, and colleagues when they cheer on painted shrew jokes? Did they know a single woman who behaved the way the joke-women did? Didn’t they actually know more men in real life, deaf and blind to working women, who won’t help wives with housekeeping or raising kids? Why didn’t they get upset when these jokes showed women as unwanted baggage dumped by the mayaka on the sasural? How could they be so comfortable and complicit with this daily bashing of women?
Or was I reading too much into the jokes themselves? Was I just being a feminist killjoy? Morphing into the strident joke-woman herself?
Nope. Or at least I hope not.
Humour is vital to social interaction. But I’m waiting for the day when jokes about Indian wives’ vanity, chattiness, jealousy, or pettiness won’t be amusing any more. I wait for the day when the husbands in these jokes will no longer get a free pass as victims.
Because this excusing of male entitlement and inexcusability of feminist outrage are one and the same, aren’t they? Such messages chip away at the work of feminism. If wives are already so powerful and men so meek then do we really need equal rights? And don’t tell me this is social satire. Satire punches up, not down. These jokes cluttering our notifications are adding up to some weaponised self-harm: Our unwitting forwarding of them shores up a mildly-bruised patriarchy.
This ever-advancing 21st century social media technology is managing to take us back to when it was normal to roast women on a daily basis. Growing up in India in the eighties, I had enough uncles who publicly made fun of their wives: “yeh to paagal hain!” “Don’t listen to her, yaar!” “Tum bewakoof ho.” Silently, their wives bore this everyday humiliation. Just as silently we kids watched this, almost coming to believe that this was normal marital expression. Fifteen years ago at a party thrown in my father-in-law’s honour an uncle introduced himself and his wife to my husband: “Main XXXX hoon.” Then he pointed at his wife and said, “aur yeh hain meri bimaari!”
This was before WhatsApp.
WhatsApp connects us, it’s fun and interactive, but its convenience enables a drip-feed of soft misogyny that is inoculating new and old generations, men and women. Every morning, the jokes tell us that women are never enough, and the thinnest possibility of feminist rage is always too much.
WhatsApp facilitates this recrudescence: It aids and abets a bimaar misogyny on an industrial scale. Old chauvinism is new again. We take one step forward and two back. Sure, this app has made women vocal, connected, empowered, and witty. Even safe when it comes to crowdsourcing vital information. But at the same time, this fun app re-animates and legitimises sexist snark in the name of bringing us closer.
And then it drives us further away. I feel the fraying of my bonds with friends and cousins that WhatsApp had first reunited me with. Two cousin sisters in India dropped out of a group right after I objected to the anti-women message in one of the jokes they’d sent. A friend let our chats languish because I could not see that these jokes were harmless. “C’mon yaar, they’re just jokes and if they make someone smile then they’re worth it.”
It was becoming clear: I couldn’t take a joke. I was breaking the invisible WhatsApp code of conduct: Shut up and forward.
Here’s one WhatsApp exchange in our group of about 15 Indian-American friends that became a low-grade screaming match about women and social media. The joke that started it was a video in which a wife after 30 years of marriage gets mad at her husband as she remembers the sacrifices she’s made all these years — she’s been having the lower half of the muffin and giving away the better half, to her husband. On their 30th anniversary, she’s a tad miffed about this unequal arrangement. The video ends with the husband lovingly telling her that “hutt pagli,” he knew all along of all her sacrifices and was letting her sacrifice the top half because she would loathe herself if she didn’t.
That there are people actually investing in producing such videos was just part of my irritation (a cottage industry of biwi videos has been created for the forward-loving-backward-looking on WhatsApp). I may have said nothing, but then many women in the group sent out “awws” and clapping, and prayer emojis. I commented that here was a perfect example of how men had conned women into being doormats and that this self-sacrificing tendency explained why women worked double shifts at home and office while silently accepting a 78 cents to a dollar.
My NRI friend, a working woman who runs her own business, told me that earning 78 cents to a dollar is perfectly fine because women don’t work as hard as men.
A few working women in the group demurred. No, women have to work twice as hard at work and at home, they shot back.
Sure, she said, but that’s exactly why women can’t give work a 100 percent. Because they have to work at home too. They’re stretched thin.
She had a point there. So I gave her an example of my husband complaining about Indian women in the American workplace. When I asked him why he was muttering to himself in anger at an email he said, “these Indian women are always asking for leave and days off for doctor appointments, school activities and kids’ illnesses. This wrecks our deliverables—”
“Do the white, black or Asian American women who have kids do the same?” I asked.
“No.”
Exactly. Could Indian husbands not chip in once in a while for doctor or school duty?
But see, speaking up works. Sometimes. That same friend who said that women don’t work as hard wrote back saying, “Oh yeah, Indian husbands! Inka hum kya karein! Why don’t they help out?” I felt I’d scored a small victory that afternoon.
But she still sends out similar jokes.
And right then someone sent out another video in which a family (son, husband and father-in-law) is giving the woman suggestions for dinner. “I don’t know what to make,” she whines. “I’ll make whatever you say.”
“Rajma bana lo.” No, she says. They just had it a few days ago. “Kadhi?” And on it goes. She rejects them all, one by one. The male trifecta looks on, helpless.
That’s the joke.
Get it?
Yeah, me neither.
February 7, 2017 at 5:39 pm
Thankfully, someone else! I get a round of sexist jokes more or less everyday as well and usually ignore or rage to my friends. ‘Well meaning’ forwards about how betis are candies and need to be kept safe in wrappers. ‘Jokes’ about how a husband is divorcing his wife because of their religious differences (she thinks she’s God – geddit?)
This reminds me a lot of AIB’s harassment through the ages video. Social media, as with any other media, colour our image of what women are / should be. ‘Strong’ women are Gods, women are indecisive, daughters should be protected as property, etc, etc, etc.
I’ve decided to be content with influencing the people I actually care about. My brother, my parents, my close friends – I’ve long given up trying to convince my external family. I’m too busy trying to earn the same wages as a man.
February 7, 2017 at 8:45 pm
You said it! I am with you on being drive crazy by these forwards. No one else seems to get why I do.
February 8, 2017 at 2:44 am
Log bhi kitne chutye hote hai. Jokes ko leke pura page likh diya bc! Go, get a life yaar!
February 8, 2017 at 8:47 am
I HAD to comment… can I just say that I am in 100% agreement Word to word with what you said… I gave up one of my groups for the exact same thing, got into an argument with family members in one and neighbors in another.
But, when I spoke up, the frequency of these jokes decreased. I am sure I changed no minds in this process, but at least I asserted my beliefs, and I will take that small victory. The same rage when I see a Tamil hero slap a heroine to great applause is the rage I feel with these jokes… loved your article, thanks for sharing your thoughts!!
February 8, 2017 at 9:28 am
From where you got this much energy to write this post.
February 8, 2017 at 9:55 am
Very well written
I too agree with u here. These jokes build an image or change our behavior toward females in subconscious mind. When I tried to stop circulation of such jokes in groups similar instances occurred.
February 8, 2017 at 10:56 am
So it’s not just me! These jokes doing the rounds are so offensive and like you said, are forwarded by both family and friends. Bachelors or not, they take shelter in these stupid jokes! My only question to them every time they send a joke is “Why do you feel the need to get married then? Who forced you into it?” These are the exact same boys who will bow their head down and do whatever their parents ask them to do, marriage included, and then send such sexist jokes. What appalls me is the women taking it in their stride :-/
I’m probably tagged as the fun spoiler now, but I really don’t care. It is offensive and boils me up!
February 8, 2017 at 11:13 am
Seriously… U nailed it…. But if we cry foul we are ignored in the forwards but the message still goes on… Forwarded diligently… Applauded and entertained by all the foolish lots…. And the Saga goes on….
February 8, 2017 at 11:29 am
You feminists talk about oppression and use a mechanical evaluation of jokes as a means for that, disregarding the fact that there are husbands who are Impatient to see their wives when they are at work, fathers crying alone when their daughters are away, brothers missing the sibling rivalry without a cool sister. Maybe you didn’t see that at your home because you are too busy finding patterns of sexsism in everything. Women lead our lives every day, surely there is a bias in some people’s ways, but that’s not with the humans alone. What you should take positively are those men around you, not the whole world. A joke is a joke for those who are endearing, who love to make fun and being made fun of, but the thinking you have is bad. You feminists talk about equality and yet you only shout and march rather being equal actually. Men didn’t set the rules in the ancient times. It was a mutual consent. That doesn’t mean anyone is stopping you to be a General of an army and fight wars to save us. Even girls use sexism to treat guys often, you conservative girls call them bad things, often character less and hide their existence. They exist, they are just rare, should we take their ways as retaliation? You don’t need to stop people from joking, meet some real women who are the leading ladies, who make a life of a father, a brother, a husband a friend and a lover worth having, clearly you have never met one.
February 8, 2017 at 11:41 am
I agree completely. More of us need to speak up and call it out for what it is. Sexism and misogyny.
I wrote about such jokes on my blog some moths ago
https://thatwhichiam.wordpress.com/2016/10/01/hey-thats-not-funny/
February 8, 2017 at 1:19 pm
Whenever a person cracks a racist/sexist/homophobic/… ‘joke’, I pretend I didn’t get it, and have a good laugh watching her/him struggle to explain why Blacks/females/homosexuals/… are subhuman! 😀
February 8, 2017 at 2:28 pm
Superbly written. Ironically, the people who share such jokes are the first ones to advice young people to get married!
People have made fun of me for objecting to such jokes. I am a male and I am supposed to enjoy such jokes you see!
February 9, 2017 at 8:42 am
Very well written. I agree. But it’s not just the WhatsApp jokes, it’s actually the typical Indian thought process. That’s the root which has to be removed. The answer for ‘what do I make for dinner today?’ can be sometimes rarely though, u relax I’ll cook something or let’s order something.
February 9, 2017 at 9:01 am
I usually allow such messages to pass, just because picking my battles.. however, one message I just had to fight about started “if women were pilots” and went on to say that they’d wait for ground staff to understand their problems automatically without themselves explaining. I just … “If” woken were pilots??!! It’s 2017!
We need to reclaim online space just like we did in the physical world. Men will only stop talking like that when surrounded by strong women everywhere.
February 9, 2017 at 3:06 pm
For those saying jokes are jokes: Yeah, they’re hilarious! Like the jokes about women drivers. Right down to the point where a male driver blocked my moms car (she was driving), threatened to slap her and told her to go home and make chapatis.
I have a different suggestion. Let’s circulate the husband jokes- you know the ones where marriage is the natural calamity that ruins a woman’s life and so on…
February 9, 2017 at 8:35 pm
There are caring and loving male relatives and that does not take anything away from the sexism of the jokes forwarded on WhatsApp. So so happy that someone has said it. Nowadays I am analysing sexist jokes and spelling out their assumptions and how they are offensive to me. Sometimes people need to be shown that they are silently consuming attittudes passed on from generations.
To those who claim they are ‘just jokes’ or they don’t represent all men – I know some men who have a greater understanding of equality than me. Your gender does not relate to the sexism you’ve internalised
February 10, 2017 at 12:37 pm
Thank you for writing this! It feels like I’ve spent forever trying to explain this to people. As a young married woman enjoying her married life with her husband (yes! “enjoying”, there I said it) I usually get surprised responses when I claim to like my married life. The predictable reaction is to turn to my husband for confirmation and laughingly say ‘But I bet he doesn’t feel this way’. Why would you do that? Why is the idea that the husband must be unhappy in a marriage if his spouse is happy, so entrenched in our society? Why are perfectly happily married men expected to “jokingly” refer to themselves as ‘whipped’ or ‘restrained’ in public? I’ll never understand this sexist double standard.
February 11, 2017 at 10:26 am
Thanks so much for your comments, everyone! I am so grateful to you for engaging with my views and taking the time to reply. So many of you are already doing the great work of speaking up and calling out sexism and misogyny – so proud to be in the same company!
February 14, 2017 at 6:09 pm
I quit such sexist groups outright. I’m not part of any WhatsApp groups for the same reason, save for one of our close college friends.
Even there they share sexist content, or used to, until I started intervening every time. I think they’ve created a separate group just to avoid me.
Doesn’t matter.
If only more men started doing the same, maybe we’ll have made our point. Perhaps then they’d keep their sexist jokes to themselves and don’t pollute the entire digital landscape.
February 22, 2017 at 10:02 am
I get such jokes too and my blood pressure shoots up every single time. These days I don’t react because it is absolutely no use other than portray myself as being militant. I am forced to be in such groups because I need some school type information from them.
Every time I resolve never to read such “jokes”, but I can’t resist to see how low we have swooped this time.
February 25, 2017 at 10:57 pm
Well said – jokes are great but the reality is that in Indian culture boys are not taught to be men – they remain their Mom’s boys – so when they marry they want a mother and not a wife. This will change once we start raising boys to be men –
August 16, 2017 at 5:32 pm
I always get irritated reading the so-called jokes on how men “suffer” because of their wives after marriage. What the hell do these men think? Why do even marry? Its not funny at all! This is a very good post and I am sharing it!
December 3, 2017 at 11:40 am
Reading above comments im feeling overwhelmed that there are some people who are up against this soft misogyny. We live in a country where Our honourable Miss World says that Mother deserves to be worlds most repected profession and at same time these sexist/misogynistic jokes make rounds in our every family and friends Whatsapp grps-And people who share or forward such jokes shud know by doing so who they are disrespecting-their wives/mothers who make sacrifices their everything to make them what they are tday.Otherwise men shud stop getting married if they suffer so much(literally)and leave all women free to pursue their lives the way they want.
January 13, 2018 at 11:15 pm
Thanks, Payas! I agree with everything you said here. Yes, the comments here give me so much hope that we’ve had enough of misogyny and will make some noise to change people around us.