My Vagina Is Not My Character
Smoking is injurious to health. It is not cool at all. It is a disgusting habit. This being said, there are a few drawbacks of smoking specifically for women, and they have nothing to do with health. Allow me to introduce you to these gems of social constructs.
As I stood by the bus stop, waiting for the bus, I lit a cigarette. Leaning on a wall nearby, I was smoking and trying to avoid eye contact with other people who were trying to puncture a hole in my cigarette-holding hands, with their gaze. This was my usual Monday.
I came to this bus stop, I lit my first cigarette of the day and I waited for the bus to take me to the capitalist prison we call ‘work’. I had been in the process of kicking the habit for a long time now, but I was living in Delhi, so it is not like I would’ve saved my lungs from much by quitting. At least this is how I convinced my conscience.
Nevertheless, I stood there at the bus stand, leaning on a wall and felt all the eyes stare at me. A man walked up to me, borrowed a lighter and lit his cigarette too. He moved a bit away and started smoking. I, the curious cat that I am, surveyed the crowed to see if he was being stared down too. No.
All eyes still on me. I met a few of them and then I looked away. My bus was here. I stubbed the cigarette with a shrug and proceeded to board the bus, as did a few others from the flabbergasted crowd standing near me. I mean I could see the bafflement on their face!
“A woman! Smoking a cigarette!? A VAGINA, DARING to indulge in a man’s bad habit! SHAME!”
I had half a smile of amusement as I tried to find a seat for myself. I looked out on the people who were still standing at the bus stop, and gave them my widest smile of defiance as the bus jerked forward. It was oddly satisfying.
“Hello ma’am. I am Shwetank. I borrowed the lighter from you.”
“Hi.”
“So you smoke?”
“Ummm… yea?”
“How long have you been smoking.”
“I lit a cigarette just a minute before you came to ask for the lighter.”
“Hahaha no I mean since when have you been smoking?”
I must have looked visibly uncomfortable because he trued to explain himself.
“I am just asking because I really like girls who smoke. They are fun loving.”
“What is fun loving?”
“You know like they will go out and party and go to night clubs and they don’t mind having boyfriends and all.”
I wanted to scream ‘WHAT’, but was too astonished to speak. I gave him a stone cold stare and looked away. This gesture of pure hostility was taken as encouragement by the gentleman. For he went on.
“Actually I have a lighter. I just wanted to talk to you and didn’t know how to start.”
Dear god! Which part of avoiding eye contact with people made me look like I wanted to be talked to!? I wondered.
Having obtained further encouragement of my indignant silence, the gentleman proceeded with his eulogy.
“I have seen you a number of times at the bus stop and always thought it will be fun to chill with you. You are a free kinda girl. Will you like to be friends with me? I am looking for free minded girls like you. I am new in the city, maybe you can show me around.”
At this, I turned full battery if my indignant eyes on this man. It was too much of suggestive assumptions and insinuations on my character, and I could not take more.
“WHAT. DO. YOU. MEAN. BY. FREE.”
“Arre! Why are you getting angry. Please don’t be offended. I can take you to really posh nightclubs. In fact I have a whole apartment to myself here. Fully furnished. I work at an MNC and you will really enjoy being my friend.”
Oh dear god! Is this man for real!
Saved by my stop, I got up and stomped out of the bus, enraged. What did he think I was. And WHAT on earth did he think I needed. Sick freak!
But this was not new. I had often received advances by men looking for ‘fun-loving girls’, which roughly translated to ‘sex’. People very easily assumed that my character was in my lungs. And if I was burning my lungs, then I must be promiscuous enough to go home with strangers.
Even people living in my building judged my character based on my smoking habit, if ever they happened to see me with a cigarette. Every man that visited me was automatically considered to be there for ‘wrong reasons’. For sex.
I am not denying the fact that I had a healthy sex life. I dated off and on. And SOME of the men that came to my house, DID come for sex. But again, HOW does that define my character? And can society please make up it’s mind? Where exactly was my character? My lungs? Or my vagina?
That is the thing about being a female smoker. You don’t just harm your lungs. Honestly, nobody cares if you do. What people care about is your ‘character’. And as a woman who smokes, you actually end up harming your social image and character.
The man I met at the bus stand today simply voiced what he thought to be a fact about me because I smoked. Others just thought it and took it as an open consent to stare at me however they wanted.
Cigarette is injurious to health, but may or may not cause cancer. However, if you have a vagina and you take up smoking, it will DEFINITELY harm your reputation. That, dear friends, is society for you!
