Sundays in the Shadows- 3rd Session

A Dead Daughter Is Still More Acceptable Than A Divorced One

They would rather save a marriage than save a woman.

Photo by Abenezer Shewaga on Unsplash

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After hearing about yet another disturbing dowry-related death, my friend and I had a long conversation about marriage, patriarchy, emotional abuse, and how society continues to fail women in the name of culture and family honour.

Manisha❁: Do you see people taking and giving dowries around you? Is it normalized?

Anjali: Yes, people always say it's a gift. People who have a lot of money arrange big weddings and give huge dowries. Taking their example, normal middle-class families who cannot afford fancy weddings or dowries end up taking loans. I have even seen many people defending this by calling it traditional and necessary. One argument that always comes up is that if we do not give dowry, nobody will respect our daughter in her husband's house, which is a sad reality many women face.

Manisha❁: This is really sad, but in Uttarakhand, there is little to no dowry culture.

However, in my hometown, it's a matter of pride for both sides of the family, and they brag a lot about giving and receiving dowry.

Anjali: Yes, same here. They openly brag and even read out dowry items during engagement ceremonies like it's some kind of achievement. I am happy to hear that there is no dowry culture in Uttarakhand. My respect for the people of Uttarakhand increased today.

In my opinion, when it comes to dowry, people are blind. They do not see their daughter as a daughter. They see her as a burden. When a girl is born, people mourn and treat her like some kind of curse.

I sometimes find people bragging that they see their daughter as Lakshmi, but this only exists in books. The ground reality is so different. One question that always comes to my mind when I hear people say "daughter is Lakshmi" is why don't they say daughter is Kali or Durga? Goddesses who are powerful, fulfilled in themselves, fearless, and warriors. Why not choose them? Why don't they want their daughters to be strong?

Because it's uncomfortable for them. They cannot stand it. It hurts their fragile egos. That is why they teach girls to obey and adjust from a very young age. They hand them beauty products instead of sports equipment. They teach them cooking and train them to serve everyone.

I am not saying cooking is the same as being a maid. My point is that cooking is a normal life skill that everyone should know. Why is it limited to one gender?

And in the above paragraph, I did not mean that Lakshmi is not strong. I am not comparing them. They are all equal. The problem is how society chooses to see women.

Manisha❁: I completely agree with everything you said.

Because of this whole dowry system, many families spend less on girls' education and start saving for marriage instead. They only provide basic schooling until the intermediate level. As a result, girls have fewer chances of becoming financially independent in the future. Their families often do not support them either if they get trapped in abusive marriages.

In this culture and society, people believe that a dead daughter is better than an unmarried or divorced one.

Anjali: Yes, it is a harsh reality. Even if a woman leaves her marriage, society treats her like she committed a sin. The problem is that they cannot stand seeing women happy.

I sometimes see older-generation women hating other women just because a husband talks nicely to his wife, even though that is the bare minimum. They gossip and say all kinds of rubbish behind her back.

I do not want to sound disrespectful, but a large number of older-generation women are pick-me women. They treat their sons like kings and do not care about their daughters-in-law at all. That is where the abuse starts. Not always physically, but mentally. They torture them emotionally.

I even know women around me who bring everything from their parents' house after marriage, including bedsheets, shoes, clothes, everything, because their mother-in-law also had to do the same when she got married.

And her husband is a complete mama's boy in my opinion. Mama's boys have no right to marriage. The funny part is that he is highly educated and earns a lot.

With these kinds of people existing in society, I do not see any future for this country.

Manisha❁: Exactly. A lot of people only talk about patriarchy as something enforced by men, but older women often become its gatekeepers, too. That is what internalised misogyny looks like. Women absorb sexist beliefs for so long that they start policing and punishing other women themselves.

There is actually a sociological term for this called the “Patriarchal bargain” coined by sociologist Deniz Kandiyoti. It explains how some women survive in unequal systems by accepting patriarchal rules and then enforcing them on younger women to gain a little power, respect, or security within that system.

So when a mother-in-law says, "I suffered, so you should too," or treats her son like a king while emotionally torturing the daughter-in-law, she is continuing the same cycle that once harmed her.

And honestly, the "mama's boy" issue is real, too. A man can be highly educated and financially successful and still emotionally behave like a child who cannot stand up for his wife or create healthy boundaries. Education without emotional maturity changes nothing.

What is sad is that society still sees a happy, independent woman as threatening. If a husband respects his wife, people act like she performed black magic on him. Bare minimum kindness in marriage gets treated like some revolutionary act.

This is why so many women are exhausted. They are not only fighting patriarchy from men, but also from women who were taught that suffering is tradition and obedience is virtue.

A huge thank you to Anjali for discussing this with me so honestly and fearlessly. Conversations like these matter because silence only protects harmful systems. We will definitely continue talking more about internalised misogyny, pick-me culture, and the emotional conditioning women grow up with in patriarchal societies.

Do you have something to say? I am here to listen.

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