Confidence, Corrected ✅

Today in class, our teacher asked us to watch a YouTube video and share our views and perspectives on it. The scene was from VIP-2, the contract scene where Dhanush and Kajol are competing to be chosen to build a hospital.

At first glance, it looked simple. Two professionals. One opportunity. One decision.

Kajol’s character speaks with extreme confidence. She explains her ideas fluently in English, firmly, without hesitation. There is authority in her voice, and also a certain sharpness. At one point, she even asks the client whether he can understand what she’s saying. It feels like mockery, or at least that’s how it is framed, because the client and Dhanush don’t seem fluent in English.

Dhanush, on the other hand, stays calm. He doesn’t challenge the client. He switches to the vernacular language, explains things softly, patiently, almost gently. His approach feels emotionally intelligent, grounded, respectful.

In the end, the client reveals that he actually knows English fluently. He was testing their behaviour all along. And because Kajol’s confidence came across as rude, and Dhanush’s calmness felt humble, he chooses Dhanush as the partner.

To seal the moment, Dhanush delivers a Thirukkural:

அடக்கம் அமரருள் உய்க்கும்

அடங்காமை ஆரிருள் உய்த்துவிடும்.

(Self-restraint leads one towards greatness; lack of restraint drags one into darkness.)

The scene is framed as savage. A lesson delivered. Humility rewarded.

And I’ll be honest, I liked it. Instinctively. Without questioning it.

Only later did I realise why I liked it. And that’s what disturbed me.

Because during the discussion, someone in class said something that stayed with me...

If Dhanush had behaved the way Kajol did,  confident, dominant, a little rude, he would have been celebrated, not criticised.

That sentence changed everything for me.

The scene wasn’t just about humility versus arrogance. It was about who is allowed to be confident without punishment.

When a man is assertive, he is seen as strategic. When a woman is assertive, she becomes “head weight.” Confidence, when spoken in a woman’s voice, suddenly needs moral correction. Authority must be softened. Intelligence must be polite. Power must be pleasing.

What unsettled me further was how the Thirukkural, a universal moral teaching, was used. The verse speaks about restraint as a human virtue, not a gendered one. Yet cinema often turns humility into a lesson that women specifically need to learn, while men are allowed to arrive confident and leave celebrated.

The client didn’t reject incompetence. He rejected discomfort. And society often does the same, especially when that discomfort comes from women who refuse to dilute themselves.

This does not mean that rudeness should be excused, whether it comes from a man or a woman. What I am questioning is the imbalance in response. If a woman’s confidence is immediately labelled arrogance, then the same standard must apply when a man behaves the same way. Accountability should not change with gender.

This isn’t about saying Kajol’s character was right and Dhanush was wrong. It’s about asking why we are so comfortable watching a woman’s confidence be disciplined on screen, and even more comfortable applauding it.

The scene ended. The classroom discussion moved on. It was a thought-provoking session that made me think a lot about the things we laugh about.

But the question stayed with me....

When women try to be as confident and brave as men, why are they labelled head weight,

while the same behaviour, in a man, is celebrated as leadership?

Maybe the scene wasn’t wrong. 

Maybe it simply revealed how deeply we’ve learned to accept this difference without questioning it. 

It might just be a joke. A cinematic moment meant to feel clever and satisfying. And I’m not criticising the scene itself, I enjoyed it, like most people did. What interests me is not the intention of the scene, but what it quietly carries beneath the humour. Sometimes, what we laugh at reveals more than what we argue against.