Long have we watched in dismay and utter powerlessness the relentless proliferation of that scourge that is the blurring of the lines between distinct gender attributes.
I mean how often have we longed to guide back to the straight and narrow those men who glide instead of walk, who choose to cook or design artistically for a living instead of earning their keep the way men should be, who carries a purse where a simple wallet would suffice, whose immaculate coiffure has no doubt contributed significantly to the thinning of the ozone layer.
The age of the effeminate man - the metrosexual, the sissy - is upon us and clearly, enough is enough. I refer to ' Besut boot camp for 66 sissies’ the headlines highlighted, not so long ago. In choosing to tackle this issue headlong, I laud the Terengganu Education Department’s admirable stance in forging ahead with a solution which though highly unpopular now will prove, in the long run, to be of benefit to the male gender.
"The severity of the symptoms vary, but the 66 schoolboys were showing behaviours that is not usually displayed by a normal male of their age." said department director Razali Daud. "As educators, we have to do something about it before the young ones misunderstand people and reach the point of no return.”
"We are not intervening with the process of nature as we are merely trying to guide these students to a proper path in life." Razali said parents and teachers should observe the slightest effeminate tendency in their male children from an early age. "If left unchecked, it could become a problem later in life for them, their families and society."
With that being said, I find it somewhat regrettable that women, or rather, our nation’s daughters, have yet again been overlooked in this development despite an obvious increase in the number of masculine girls in our midst. Can we not see while men have picked up feminine traits over the years, traits reflected in affectations including personal grooming and vanity, choice of profession and domestic behaviours, that the reverse is also true?
How often have we been scandalised by trouser clad women; are they not garments traditionally worn by men to accommodate their physically rigorous lifestyles, a lifestyle to which women are naturally not a part of? What of women wearing their hair short as if they were men?
I cannot possibly emphasise enough how horrified I am by the number of women I‘ve seen straddling a motorcycle instead of riding them sidesaddle the way genteel women should. For shame. That women today are defying their very femininity through the adoption of masculine modes of dressing, of behaving, of thinking, of carriage even, is abominable and should be a matter of concern not to be taken lightly.
It is my firm belief, and unsolicited recommendation, that equally decisive measures should be taken to nip this other problem in the bud. Those learned teachers responsible for accurately and objectively identifying schoolboys in clear violation of their assigned gender roles should be similarly tasked to exercise the selfsame vigilance in rehabilitating female students overtly displaying undesirable masculine qualities.
Observations may take into account displayed behaviour such as a fondness for physical sports, assertiveness and charisma in speech and personality and even expressed ambitions for professions; focus on girls who choose being doctors over nurses, architects over interior designers, chairmen over secretaries.
It comforts me somewhat that the Terengganu Education Department has planned a rigorous curriculum in their ‘sissy boot camp’. Physical education is to be complemented by motivational talks; clearly an effectively holistic approach to return those identified lost boys, as they were, to masculinity. Such critical care should also be taken in the approach to reinstate femininity in female students identified displaying excessive masculine traits.
For example, we should reintroduce the lost tradition of hobbling as the most effective method to correct inappropriately masculine gaits; large strides are very unbecoming on decent girls.
Girls should also be schooled on matronly compassion, a quality most desirable in the exemplary wives and mothers we aspire our girls to be. For that I suggest motivational talks and supplementary classes teaching girls the correct way of cradling and stroking small, fluffy animals including rabbits and cats.
Our nation’s daughters must be raised in such a manner that they learn their natural place in the grand scheme of things; that their contribution to nation building should begin and end in the shadow of a man. Just imagine, if women are to be left to run wild as they choose, who are we to look to in the matter of the raising of children in domestic bliss?
Who do we depend on for the keeping of the perfect home to which the man of the house, tired from winning bread and doing other appropriately manly things, can look forward to at the end of the day?
Such roles were made to lie exclusively in the feminine domain; to ignore the nurturing of female children into this role would be to upset the natural balance of things. Scoff at this all you will, if left unchecked and allowed to spiral out of control, we may yet live to witness the advent of women in possession of responsibilities beyond their means to manage. Chaos untold will ensue, I assure you.
This line should be clearly etched in stone; men are to be masculine and women, feminine. Any violation of this fundamental law of existence should be treated as the abomination it is.
