What a Choice, Madam Jee!
Visualize yourself with a balloon that you have just blown, and a knot in the string that your fingers are trying to untangle, to tie it. Imagine the sound of air coming out bit by bit while you try your luck with the string.
This is exactly what watching ‘My Choice’ video for Vogue Empower feels like. Bit by bit, little by little the scope of what a video on women empowerment could achieve, vanishes in thin air. The attempt falls limp. Just like the balloon. An opportunity lost.
If the purpose of the video was to be in conversation for both Deepika Padukone and Vogue magazine, it has succeeded. But if at all the purpose was to go beyond the ‘me’ and ‘my’, to convey a message, or initiate a constructive thought process- think of the limp balloon again. The video uploaded by Vogue India on YouTube has had 4,386,688 views till now. I know many views would have been from people like me who watch the video again and again trying to figure out some meaning in the little over two minute video, but imagine the number of people they could have conveyed a message to! What a missed opportunity.
But what is women empowerment? Is it really just about my choice of clothes, tattoos, piercings, time of return, size, sexual preferences, babies, their fathers and the like? Really? I doubt it. Even for the elite niche audience of Vogue readers it is more than that. Those choices mentioned in the film are best in those very artificial settings of ‘My Choice’- where the hair blows lyrically with the wind blower, the light and shade- perfect, liner and mascara in harmony.
Homi Adajani is entitled to his vision. But his vision needs correction.
Empowerment is not about attempted superiority, the tone that the video reeks off. It is about respect- a respect that you get, give and command. It is about communication. It is about decision making. It is about being able to talk and discuss. It is being open to listening to the other side of the argument in a discussion too. Not just ‘me’, ‘my’ and ‘mine’. It is being able to take an informed
decision. It is about equal opportunities. It is about collaboration. It is about partnership.
Empowerment is not a tower that stands tall alone. Empowerment is a Baobab tree. It stands tall and spreads its branches. Empowerment is not either, or; it is with, alongside.
PS. This video reminds me much of Govinda’s ‘Meri Marzi song’.
