Aishwarya Mohanraj Slammed Over Reel, Why Women Are Misjudged Quickly?

An Indian female comedian, Aishwarya Mohanraj, has found herself in hot water over a recent reel she posted on her Instagram handle. The reel showed Aishwarya Mohanraj along with her boyfriend-turned-husband Aakash Shah, and she sarcastically made a joke, "POV: Your husband fulfills the dream you saw with your ex-boyfriend."

As soon as the reel went viral, netizens started calling her out and slamming the social media influencer for her supposedly "insensitive" comment. Why are people so quick to judge women for everything they do and say? Can’t people take a moment to actually read what’s written and spot sarcasm between the lines?

Aishwarya Mohanraj Slammed Over Reel

That woman is a comedian, and jokes and sarcasm are her second language. As long as they don't hurt an individual or a sentiment, why make a huge fuss out of it? Why can’t people spend a minute to understand what the comment was before expressing irrational fury against her? Is it because it’s a woman that made the joke and women aren’t supposed to say certain things while men can go about cracking women and wives bashing jokes?

Moreover, this wasn’t even supposed to be what it was misinterpreted to be. When she mentioned her ex-boyfriend, she was referring to her husband, who is no longer her boyfriend but her life partner now. Was that so difficult to get? Or did people just want to spew venom because it was a woman who made a remark about her "ex-boyfriend?"

Basically, women are supposed to be "good girls" before marriage. They cannot afford to have male friends, let alone boyfriends. The sight of a woman talking to a man over coffee is enough to assassinate her character and to assume that she has lost her "virginity." With that regressive mindset in a patriarchal country like India, it’s no wonder that some netizens can’t bear a woman uttering the term "ex-boyfriend."

Why Are Netizens Hasty In Making Assumptions About Women?

It's quite clear that they didn’t even take a moment to try to connect the dots and make sense of her content. It seems like they immediately resorted to spewing hate comments on her by just seeing the words ex-boyfriend. But what if a woman does have ex-boyfriends? Why shouldn’t she have been in a relationship before marriage?

Only a few people hit the jackpot by getting to tie the knot with their first love. Regardless of society’s acceptance, women too need to test the waters before taking the plunge. If it works out and leads to marriage, then good. If it doesn’t and turns into a past relationship, even better, because why should women be with someone incompatible?

While it’s so common for men to have past relationships before marriage, it’s never the same for women. Women’s past relationships, even if they were platonic, make them immoral people. But then, it’s not wrong if women have had past romantic or sexual relationships. It's just women exercising their agency over their lives and autonomy over their bodies! When is society going to stop obsessing over consensual relationships and focus on calling out non-consensual intimacy, marital rape, etc., which are the actual concerns?

As Dr. Jug from Dear Zindagi said, we try sitting on different chairs before buying the most comfortable one. If we are so choosy about the chair we buy, shouldn’t women have the liberty to meet different people before finding the one they want to share their lives with?

Suggested Reading: Sussanne Khan Trolled Over Vacation Photos: Can We Stop Judging Women?

Views expressed by the author are their own