Shedding Victorian mentality

STRONG MINDS: It is time for Sri Lankan women to abandon the colonial mentality and the mentality of the Victorian woman introduced by the colonialists.

This sick mentality of the colonial Victorian woman still affects Sri Lankan women, especially the younger female generation and prevents them from building an identity for themselves and their children. The result is a nation without a national identity.

Ancient Sri Lankan women were very brave. They were physically strong and contributed to the family economy through labour. They worked hard in the agricultural sector and had some power in decision-making within the family as mothers.

Those women had average body fat, which was admired in the traditional Sri Lankan culture. They had strong patriotic feelings. We cannot forget that Viharamahadevi sacrificed her life to save the country.

But today how many mothers tell the story of Viharamahadevi to their little daughters at least when visiting the Viharamahadevi Park ? History should be one of the main subjects in all school syllabi in Sri Lanka.

But after colonialism, this original Sri Lankan woman disappeared from Sri Lanka and a Victorian woman emerged destroying the identity of typical Sri Lankan woman.

The pessimistic qualities of this Victorian woman made a negative impact on Sri Lankan women and destroyed the true identity of Sri Lankan culture and society. Her braveness, physical strength and ability to have strong patriotic feelings were identified as weaknesses and something non-feminine.

Unfortunately, the male community of Sri Lanka strongly absorbed these sick features of the Victorian women and started to admire it. Even after 58 years of independence Sri Lankan males live in that old colonial era and admire the features of Victorian woman and see it as something 'Sri Lankan'.

Whether married or single all Victorian women were expected to be weak and helpless. She was a fragile delicate flower incapable of making decisions beyond selecting the menu and ensuring that her children were taught moral values.

She needed to be innocent, virtuous, biddable, and dutiful and be ignorant of intellectual opinion. She did not have a right even to her body.

Victorian girls were brought up as race horses only aimed at marriage. The simple meaning of this Victorian woman is a pretty doll without any feelings, intelligence and identity.

It is sad to see some Sri Lankan women still acting like Victorian women in the colonial era while such foreign women themselves had shed their negative qualities a long time ago and moved on. There are no more Victorian women in UK today.

We cannot blame women alone for this because the male community in Sri Lanka is partly responsible for admiring negative qualities of Victorian women such as weakness and ignorance of intellectual opinion.

Sri Lankan society should be conditioned in order to bring patriotic feelings into the hearts of people, especially women because women bring up children, the future generation of our country.

Only then will the country move forward. Without a national identity Sri Lanka will never be able to move towards developed status.

Some NGOs preach about 'women's liberation' but it is mythical and inappropriate concept for Sri Lankan culture because the majority of those preachers are still living in the Victorian woman's mentality.

They are ashamed of speaking their mother tongue and try to add a funny accent. What Sri Lankan women should go for is achieving the rights for all, not 'liberation'.