“Women in Pakistan are strong in Array.We have a voice.We just don’t have enough room to use that voice,” says Kanwal Ahmed, a dying aunt from 260,000 other people who decided to replace the situation.
Its women-only online center sees historically taboo issues such as sex, divorce and domestic violence being freely talked about in a conservative country where women have little means to talk about non-public issues.
“I looked for this to be the kind of position where women would open up without worrying about being assaulted, harassed or tried,” Ahmed said of his Soul Sisters Pakistan network on Facebook.
The former makeup artist discovered the need for an area after spending time appeasing nervous brides while trusting her from the living room chair.
The 31-year-old says her organization is a position where women can “communicate about things they didn’t intend to communicate in society” because they are considered mis-rather than embarrassing.
In 2018, Facebook chose Ahmed as one of the social network’s 115 “community leaders” to help others.Chosen from a group of 6,000 applicants, she won a grant to expand her project.
Soul Sisters Pakistan members say they can communicate brazenly about problems, such as maternal and intellectual health, the symbol of the framework, and reproductive rights, with a frankness that is in the genuine world.
– No excuse for abuse –
One of the most discussed topics is domestic violence, which is not unusual in the patriarchal country.
Data from pakistan’s Commission on Human Rights and Pakistan’s Journal of Medical Sciences suggest that 90% in Pakistan have experienced some form of domestic violence.
Ahmed says many others don’t take the challenge seriously, even when wives trust other members of the family circle about abuse.
“It’s not very rare to be told that they are too susceptible or that they are making concessions.They are not given other options,” Ahmed said, adding that women don’t have to go through bad things.remedies for any reason.
According to the UN, Pakistan does not have access to affordable ones in “sectors such as health, police, justice and social support” to ensure women’s defense and coverage.
Soul Sisters provides informal assistance to users, from legal to emotional recommendations from other members, who call themselves Soulies.
A recent thread, #MyBodyIsNotASecret, highlights the conversion criteria of a generation that has noticed that global has an effect on the #MeToo movement, advances in frame positivity, and a counter reaction to the classic criteria of good looks and colorism.
“There is a lot of misfortune related to a woman’s body, even to general physical functions.We don’t communicate about it,” Ahmed said.
One member shared their struggle with vaginismus, which helped others identify their own symptoms.
Ahmed says she lost a circle of family friends to breast cancer after the disease remained undiagnosed and treated for too long because she “was too embarrassed to communicate her fitness with anyone.”
“This is a new story. It’s anything a lot of women can think of,” Ahmed insists.
– Breaking stereotypes –
The organization welcomes its members, who face online abuse when they publish publicly, and encourages women to share their successes and problems.
But the stories have also provoked a series of criticisms.
Ahmed has been accused of selling divorces and “wild” behaviors, even as more progressive voices have criticized the organization for allowing conservative perspectives to be shared.
His paintings are questioned from “almost every angle,” Ahmed says, pointing to a detail of internalized misogyny among some members.
But she says her purpose is not to “serve a small niche” to break stereotypes and norms.
“If other people already knew, we wouldn’t want spaces like this.It’s exhausting, frustrating and requires each and every one of my strength to move on.
“But every time someone adjusts their brain or we receive stories of good fortune, instant gratification!” he tweeted recently.
Ahmed and his team try to deal with the clash with sensitivity, allowing for a wide range of views to encourage discussion and debate, a technique that has noticed an increase in clubs.
We’re “looking to tell women who they are, to be ashamed of being themselves, to say what they think,” she says.
Splinter’s teams have struggled to achieve a fraction of Soul Sisters Pakistan’s good fortune; she says there are 3 to six million conversations in the month of the site.
Ahmed used his Facebook grant to launch an online communication screen in an effort to reach a wider audience, an episode that attracts thousands of viewers.
The coronavirus pandemic has halted production and Ahmed has moved to Canada, so the program is paused.
But he pledged to challenge a society “that is afraid of him with a voice.”
He added: “The lack of popularity of the disorders they face in society is terrible.”
kf / ecl / lto / wat / lto