Parents and the Pill

HAAAAAA......

Great piece Miss Zehra! The blotting out of the desi Muslim woman`s body is perfectly pitched! (From within and without)

You are a braver woman than I-that bit about you and your pops had my mouth hanging open. Loving, complex and hilarious!

Please write more :)

You will no doubt get praise on chowk for being honest and bold. And that praise would certainly be appropriate.

I dont like much in this article, however: you use really trashy language (``f* with me...`` when referring to your father at that!!) to begin with. While there is so much else to pick up in US culture, I for one (and I realize its just me) am not impressed by trash talk. And do we really need to know that you were getting your warts burnt?? Good to be honest. But honesty does not require that you tell us the details about what you did in the loo this morning.

Second, what`s with this self-absorption: so you use birth control pills, meaning you mess around. Nothing to be proud of. You are merely satisfying your physical pleasures. Its not like you are doing something to promote world peace or end world hunger. Its like some fellows on chowk take pride in their drinking as if this makes them cool. It does not. Any bum can mess around, and any bum can can get drunk. In fact this is what makes him a bum.

Sorry if I sound mean. But thats how I see it.

Desi parents can surprise you! They`re not always all that intractable.

Rozaiba,

True. One of the more comic scenes in the novel Born Confused is the protagonist`s view of her parents as uptight and unquestioning. In fact, everyone in the book has this ``doubleness` until the end, where yup, everyone`s smoking grass, bhangraing and noshing on samosay, lassi and gulab jamun...sigh.....

Zehra - i`m still giggling as i write this. Yeah, I think I`ve had more ... er, meaningful discussions about sex with my friends than with my parents. My dad [like all good dads] only ever told me to be careful of rapists while my mom actually tried to have a conversation about the birds and bees [literally] and it has to have been the most boring - and redundant - conversation I ever had about the subject.

Good luck dancing with the Chowk crowd. Some of them are kinda hard on the toes. :)

“I will not answer the question as to why I am on the pill. I’m not done dancing with the Chowk crowd here.”

Okay fine! I am cool with preemption.

I also have a daughter, she is passing thru the period where boyfriends are important and sometime I hear my son teasing her ...``N… has a boyfriend!`` I have been hearing from her about boyfriends and stuff since she was six years old. My wife and I talk to her about what life is like in teen years. But I am not sure that the talk or discussions would have any impact on Hormones. I am somewhat surprised at your observation that Pak families don’t talk about sex with their kids. Pakistani or Indian families that I know of here do talk about it and it sometimes comes up for discussion among parents too. So it is not that many Pakistani families don’t talk about sex with their kids and especially daughters but would the talk be helpful at all? Every American Father worries about the dreaded Prom Night and threatens the boy and girl both with the consequences but they still go ahead and do it.

I think it is nice of you to write about it on Chowk.
What your suggestions would be on how to deal with something that may or may not happen. I am not going to hold that against my daughter or even die of shame but I would like to have a perspective from the younger crowd. Would you, Samina or ZahraJ or someone else from the younger crowd shed some more light on this issue?

I also agree with tahmed. There was no need for the language you used. This is an important subject and foul language was not necessary.

HP,

Only in the Pakistani community can you write about sex and be told not to use the word ``fucking``.

I suggest you read the book Lipstick Jihad in which the author Azadeh Moaveni offers a nuanced discussion of gender, sexuality and the Islamic regome.

Samina,
“Only in the Pakistani community can you write about sex and be told not to use the word ``fcking``.

Not true at all!
Unless you are on a porn site.
I have yet to meet an american family-and I know a lot- who would use this word while discussing sex with kids or in a family or neighborhood gathering. How they discuss sex in private is not of my concern.

Well done Ms Rizvi. You should write more often, or may be you do and I havent read you enough. You get marks not only for good expression but also for being brave, honest and bold.

To `tahmed32`: Lets just admit it that this is a well written text, and lets not get drifted away by one word which, she probably has used just to be expressive enough. And please... let us not judge her character and morals by what she has written.

To `HP`: ``I am somewhat surprised at your observation that Pak families don’t talk about sex with their kids. Pakistani or Indian families that I know of here do talk about it and it sometimes comes up for discussion among parents too.`` Now, this is a fact that needs to poll : Most Pakistani families would NOT talk about sex, those who do would be in a minority. There can be no argument on this!!

Anyway, Ms Rizvi. A nice read. Hope you keep `em coming!

Regards
Dr Farhaan Vahidy

oh lord... this is getting to be one of those discussions... read it carefully - she did not use it when discussing sex with her father but as an adverb while speaking to us as readers. even if she did use it in conversation with her father its nobody`s biz but their own. if you dont like it when she uses it in an article then thats another matter.

re: talking of sex with your children... i think its the bright thing to do. but you have to understand that they might not want to let you in on everything thats going on in their life. also that they might be more open to experimenting sexually or romantically than you were at their age. you can at best tell them how you feel about it, but you cant stop them from doing what they want to do unless you`re ready to act like someone out of a bad hindi movie.

the best thing you can do is hook them up with a good obgyn [and the male equivalent coz guys have issues too] and then refrain from checkig up about what they`re up to at the doctor`s. kids hate going to the family doctor`s coz they think its a free spying service for their parents, and they would be right mostly.

HP,

Do you not see the irony of this exchange? The writer is discussing the inability of one Pakistani American family to talk about sexuality, and you are 1. telling her what language she may use in her discussion and 2. that language is invalidated in mainstream discourse.

As the writer has not used any of the words George Carlin catalogued in his infamous monologue, we might bring ourselves to meditate on her intentional usage of the word and its corresponding rhetorical purpose. :)

Amrita,

Dont deny us our right to act like we are in a bad hindi movie...please....i`ve bought outfits for the group gaanaaa/naatch scenes...

Re: # 12
yeah, all the world`s a hindi movie set and we all bad actors. :)

Samina
The issue is this statement. “I think at this point that he is really just enjoying fcking with me”. She could have just said, “fcking with my brain”. I mean no girl of any decent upbringing would say, “her dad was enjoying fcking with her.” I know this phrase is used but not with Dad. That was the extent of my objection.

Amrita,
Are you suggesting that Ob-gyn is the only choice left? Interesting!

HP,

In North America, the expression the writer is using is completely authentic to her signification of mind games. Very few North Americans understand otherwise.

Saminasha #15 ``In North America, the expression the writer is using is completely authentic to her signification of mind games.``

What would this be in english please??