Greatest thoughts come at weirdest moments. While waiting in a line to be frisked through, I suddenly got struck with an awkward idea, if it may be called so.

I am an observationalist. That means, I observe things. I like to observe things AND of course People. And so, I was observing other people in the queue with me. There were girls, there were boys, and all were waiting for their turn to be frisked and given entry into the examination hall. It was a national-level entrance exam that day, so naturally enough, strict arrangements had been made so that no foul play happens.

As it happens, I was watching a sample of our insensitivity towards the natural right to privacy of every human being. I was one of the many witnesses of a shameful gender discrimination.

No, it was not as if only one gender was being frisked and the other was not. No, not that. Something worse, and, it wasn’t happening with girls, instead boys were being discriminated against and poor they, they weren’t even lifting a finger!

The scene was something like this-

There were two lines, one for girls and one for boys. The girls’ line terminated into a three-sided chamber made up of cloth. A lady guard was standing there and using a metal detector, she was checking us. After that she was hand-frisking us.

The boys’ line however terminated into nothing! Two guards were simply standing there and metal detecting them and another one was there hand-frisking them. As what was happening was public, I could see that they were being hand-frisked exactly like us. There was no any leniency.

But what was troubling me to death was that, I wouldn’t have allowed anyone, be it a man or a woman, to press my boobs and asses publicly like they were doing hadn’t there been any shelter.

But the boys? The boys were being frisked exactly like us without even any shelter? How could those boys allow such a humiliation?

If public touching can be psychologically stressful to girls, it can be exactly same for boys as well. I mean, notions of self-respect can’t depend upon genitals after all? If nudity can be embarrassing for girls, it can be so for boys as well.

But why didn’t any single of them protest this body-shaming?

Do they have no notions of it? Or do they consider it “manly” to show their body publicly?

Moving without t-shirts, urinating in public on roads, enjoy being touched in their bodies in public. All these have sadly been made a symbol of manliness by our mentally-retarded society.

Is manliness all about- “men don’t cry”, “men don’t feel pain”, more comical in Hindi, “mard ko dard nahin hota”.

Why man, don’t you have lacrimal glands in your body? Or don’t you have pain receptors?

Or you think that testosterone production is hampered by lacrimation?

Boys are bluffed up with ridicules like, “you should respect girls” “give up your seat if you see a girl”. Why? Why should a boy respect girl? Why shouldn’t we all respect each other? Why should a boy give up his seat for a girl? Why shouldn’t any person give up their seat to anyone more needy? Be it a girl or a boy or anyone else.

But on the second thought, is it really those boys’ mistake?

Can they help what the society has filled in their heads so much that it has now become a part of their very gene?

We have to take the blame upon ourselves. It is we who have made them like this.

Every time we teach them that you shouldn’t cry, we’re depriving them of a very natural right of expressing oneself.

Each time we allow them or encourage them to urinate in the open we’re actually exposing them to the grim dangers of UTI.

Every time you buy a blue chair for your boy and a pink chair for your girl, you’re but sowing the seeds of discrimination deep in their conscience.

Dear parents and teachers, you’re NOT helping children, you’re just passing on your illness to them. And because we all have it our genes by now, they are extremely vulnerable to a distortion in their personality.

Teach them to be sensitive. Train them such that they cry when they hear of human slaughter in any part of the world. Teach them to talk out their fears about ejaculation and mensuration freely among ALL.

WE ALL ARE HUMANS AFTER ALL.

The day we do this, there will be no more incidents of anger outbursts, there will be no more incidents of human slaughter. There will be peace.

Treat them equally when they excel in something. Punish them equally when they commit a mistake. Indulge them equally in sports and arts.

Tell them about both-their RIGHTS and DUTIES.

No one can touch anyone without their permission- whether it’s a boy or a girl.

We have to be vigilant regarding the harassment of not only girls but also boys.

Unless we do that, we will be passing on this anomaly of ours into the young and fragile minds of the coming generation. That would be the biggest genetical disorder.

Every girl or boy is entitled to privacy, basic amenities (like, a CLEAN toilet) and security against body shaming. Every individual has the right to demand them if denied.

We are raising a breed of individuals who have been denied the right to express their worries simply because they have testes! If girls have the right to display their anger and to indulge in sports, boys also have a right to express their sorrow and indulge in arts.

They have the right to cry after seeing an emotional movie. They have the right to wear pink. They have the right to wear skirts as well.

It’s our duty to see that no boy or girl is denied any of these natural rights.

But sadly, we prefer “men” who don’t cry over those who do, but happily accept those who beat up someone blind in their anger.

Sadly, we prefer “men” who don’t shy off walking and dancing shirtless over those who feel embarrassed being nude but celebrate those who confine their wives and daughters to dresses.

We accept that as natural and “manliness”, but little do we know that we are making them insensitive to the pains and pleasures of life…