I remember a few years ago a Pakistani drama called 'Mere paas tum ho' started taking headlines to the point where all of social media was filled with memes and posts regarding its content. Every time a new episode would come up the next day all anybody in the country seemed to care about was discussing it at length. I thought I should give it a watch considering so many people had become indulged to this new piece of media.
Once I actually started watching and became acquainted with the storyline I realised just how problematic the drama; and in turn our society's perception of women is. The reason that the drama was so popular was because unlike most plot lines, in this case it was the woman that was committing adultery and was the main antagonist of the story.
The plot itself wasn't anything new or original, it was just that the Pakistani audience loved the idea of hating on a woman with so much passion and conversely sympathising with the male lead. It came to the point where the actress playing the part would also receive hate online. It made me realise that as long as the woman is the villain, somehow the story makes sense to people.
It was no surprise that the writer of the drama was a big misogynist and his way of writing always went on to cast the female population as gold diggers and opportunistic individuals. There was a lot of controversy surrounding the drama because of all of this but it still managed to receive high ratings and make a lot of money!
In the end what surprised me the most was not that the drama was made and the way it was written, but how it was received with so much praise by our country's people.
