The Lazy State of Manhood

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I do not know where to start. It is such a current, burning and flammable issue...

This state of manhood, which breaks out any moment and anywhere ranging from the violence against Sıla to the cocktail of harassment, violence and mobbing inflicted on Elit İşcan and the harassment of the costume assistant Özge Ş., is just the tip of the iceberg in the cinema industry. Of course, not only in the cinema industry either.

This is what I know: the 21st century will be the century of women and it has to be so.

In every part of the world, women are coming together for equal pay for equal work, for the right to abortion and sexuality, and to defend their sexual orientation and resist and mobilize against violence and harassment. And these are just their footsteps heard from afar.

The fact that the government does not intervene in the feminists' magnificent night march held on the İstiklal Avenue in İstanbul on every March 8 despite the existing environment of oppression prevalent in our country is an indication of the legitimacy of this struggle.

For that reason, it is incumbent upon us men to genuinely confront ourselves and our own states of manhood and get rid of all our judgements and actions which prevent us from seeing women as equal, free and independent individuals in every sphere of life.

That is exactly why our own life is the very place we have to look at first.

It is one of the few things that I boast about myself. Throughout my life I have never inflicted violence on any women, and except for a few petty incidents in secondary school, on any men either. And I have never forced any women to be with me involuntarily, or by violating their bodily integrity or through actions that can be considered harassment.

It is not because I am the epitome of integrity. It is essentially because I grew up not in a family where violence was normalized, but in an environment where love was felt more intensely.

Perhaps, we did not have very special moments with my family, but I definitely had a childhood that can be deemed normal. Overall, I have good memories about my childhood. Except for a few incidents, I did not experience any violence and I recount those incidents with laughter today.

Even though the least developed aspect of the state of manhood is those displays of violence that erupt from within men, there is also another, an unseen aspect: The male laziness.

The laziness that men see as their right. A highly important fact, albeit quite ordinary, banal and familiar. This type of laziness, which also harbors some type of hubris, manifests itself the most in responsibilities pertaining to housework and parenthood, which require intellectual and manual labor.

The figures shared by the OECD have shown that the average daily time women in Turkey spend for housework is 261 minutes while that of men is only 21 minutes. Only 21 minutes!

We rank third in this inequality after India and Mexico. But inequality is encountered in every part of the world, the state of things is against women even in Scandinavian countries where the highest level of equality has been reached.

In religious holidays, weddings, funerals and the crowded family gatherings on special days, it was always the women of the family who cooked. We left the dinner table and sprawled on the coach.

Once, when I attempted to take my plate to the kitchen, the five-year-old daughter of my cousin had laughed at me. Not only have we left the fate of our laundries and dirty dishes to women, at times we have delegated our self-care to women as well. Even if they work the same hours as we do.

When we did the shopping, they gave us the list and we left it to their organizing skills and minds. To make matters worse, we have always considered these tasks as petty, unimportant chores. Even if we did not say it aloud, that is what we thought.

The facts of life and economic relations have been changing at a rate that we, humans, cannot adapt into our personal lives. The feudal relations of history do not conform with the modern world of our present day.

While men were chasing after conquests on horseback, the house was entirely left to women. For centuries no less. And no one found this odd. However, today, as the popular saying goes, the cat is out of the bag.

Once women started participating in the work force and social life as individuals the balance was overturned.

Even though it has been generations since the balances were overturned with the entry of women into the work force, we tried to maintain the established order since all its habits and advantages were for the benefit of men.

We continued with our laziness not because we were unaware but because it served our purposes. That being the case, it became harder for unemployed women to be a part of the paid work force and for the employed women to have hobbies and interests.

As I turn 35, I, for my part, owe an apology to my mother, my aunt and my aunts-in-law, for whom I have been a burden during my childhood and adolescence.

I owe an apology to my wife for my laziness which I used to indulge in more frequently during the first years of our marriage than I do nowadays. I owe an apology to all these people because I failed to adopt in my own daily life the leftist values, equality and fairness which I have advocated in this world and because this advantageous position served my purposes.

Equality, justice and freedom, of course, do not come with apologies. But, realizing that we are constantly going through a change is as important as emphasizing that women are not only mothers, partners, sisters, but also independent individuals who are the heroines of their own stories in every sphere of life, and being side by side with them in all of these spheres no matter how big or small the tasks involved in these spheres may be. It is equally important to make our own individual life a part of the world where we would like to live.

Since I will try to touch upon this issue in my next movie, I am having an internal discussing about it more than ever before.

And let this text be a binding expression of these discussions. Let us start our self-criticism by seeing that the little things are not that little after all. Let us start carrying a new, beautiful and equal world to the tomorrows in this way.

Laziness is a right.

But, it does not belong solely to men. (KS/ŞA/APA/SD/IG)

* Images: Kemal Gökhan Gürses

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