The struggles of a Male Child

I could have named this “The struggles of a child”, however, a few things stopped me:

1. The words are closer to the life of a Male child.
2. There has so much been written & thought about the female.
3. No one bothers to care about what does a male child might be going through.

Actually, this is something I had written about 2 years back. I have no recollection of things or circumstances or incident that triggered this thought process, nevertheless every time I take a look at it, it says something to me about the expectations of all that have from a male overlooking the thoughts of him. In fact this can be the topic of a whole thesis or book under Sociology or Humanities. Well that can wait… Right???

And, I know if I continue right now, I might write a whole new article on this & not share the original one that I wrote so back. So this one can wait for later, let me share with you what I wrote 2 years back as it is in Quotes:

“The day he is born, everyone in the family is happy, enjoying over the good news of his birth, so happy that almost always everyone forgets whether he is happy or not. He might keep crying due to his feelings of loneliness to be able to share his experience with someone, due to his inability to mention his fears to the elders due to the barriers the adults have created by losing the capability to feel as a child in the race to grow up. He might not be happy due to his birth in a place where his birth is only significant because he is a male child, he might be feeling happy because he is amongst so many people but still who cares whether he is happy or not, who cares what he feels, who will care for what he really needs or wants.

Today his parents are happy because now they have someone on whom they can impose their dreams and wishes. They have someone who will run the races they have lost, whether he wants it or not. He will grow up in an environment where he will always be in the race to achieve the next standards set by his family, and the society he lives in, and the race starts the day he is born in the form of everyone trying to guess what he will achieve in his life. His father might start by saying, wow, here he is ready to become an Engg or a doctor or a businessman…etc. etc. What if he does not wants to become all those or any other things, what if he wants to just live his life on the terms he will decide when he will want to. What if he wants to look at the world without prejudices, and standards, but just look at it in a manner he will decide whenever he will need to. But again who would care for his feelings.

If he looks at a toy with curiosity and tries to look inside it, may be even in search of an ant he just saw getting inside, people just decide he will be very happy if he becomes an Engg, but nobody cares to find out whether he really wants to be an Engg or in reality he was on the path of becoming a nature lover, an observer of nature, an adventurist or may be what… But what goes, nobody cares.

After the day he is born, parents start planning his life according to their wishes, which path to take, which city to settle down, which school to send, to start his education. He grows for a few years while the parents anticipate his future, teach him lessons of the so called morality, the difference of good and bad, punishing for his wrong deeds, feeling proud over his small achievements. He grows to learn the methods through which he can make his parents happy and the methods to get his wishes fulfilled.

When he was a child, he expressed his opinion only through his smiles and cries, which was sometimes understood, and often ignored or even misunderstood. When he found more and more of his wishes & expressions being misunderstood, he tries to learn the language of his parents and those around him, the language we often call words and speech. When he starts to express through words, again people are happy and listen to whatever he says. All his words are cared for, everyone tries to understand him, and his wishes are fulfilled.

Slowly, again the magic of his words fade away, his expressions go unanswered again. So he starts observing the world around for clues to what to do next? He looks listens, analyses and understands that it’s not only words that are required to get noticed. He sees his father reacting on his mother for things, sometimes in a manner of love, at other times in anger. He sees his mother trying to please his father to bring peace to home; he observes others hiding things, facts, trying to manipulate situations according to their own benefits. He is often asked and requested by many not to tell some things he might have seen to be told to others. He is told to hide certain incidents and facts, he sees everyone conveniently trying to forget things and sees the blame game being played amongst the adults as pertaining to who did what and whose fault is it really as to the things that have happened.

In the beginning he is confused as to the true reason behind these kinds of things, gets curious, and does the good thing of asking some sensible (read Childish if you are an adult) questions at the right times (again read wrong if an adult), gets scolded, or often is punished for his foolishness. He is confused that when he was taught in the beginning that Lies are bad, hiding is bad, selfish is bad than why everyone around him his doing these things. He tries to understand these questions and tries to find the answers. In this quest to understand the world around him, he finds his expressions being lost to everyone. He finds his needs being unfulfilled, he finds himself alone in need for someone who could understand his feelings.

Has anyone thought why Kids have such strong friendships, such bonds with kids of their own age? Why do they always try to protect each other? I feel it’s simply because they are afraid to lose them to the world, they are afraid to lose those who understand their real feelings and expressions to the world around them. Kids like places which are quiet, not because they don’t like crowd but because they get confused due to all the commotion around them.

And the story of the life of the Male child continues…”