Articles

Discrimination in the family creates a remorseless cycle which makes women face further discrimination when they move to the outside world, writes M Mizanur Rahman and Aisha Siddika  

DEC 29, 2010 - Nepal’s print and electronic media has expanded immensely in recent years. More than a dozen national broadsheet dailies are published from the Kathmandu Valley alone. Around 300 FM stations, 14 television channels and a multitude of online portals are in operation across the country. However, when we switch on the radio or TV or turn the pages of the newspapers, we see that there is extreme male domination in the news and current affairs programmes, especially those concerning political affairs. 

“Girls begin to talk and to stand on their feet sooner than boys because weeds always grow up more quickly than good crops” — Martin Luther, 1533. When I first read the above quotation several decades ago, I wanted to know why anyone would say such a thing. What I discovered is that Martin Luther’s reflection was, and continues to be, the echo of ancient philosophical and theological conjecture about female inferiority. Luther was primed to believe this fallacy by centuries of both great and small minds that came before him.