Explorations in Religious Identity (RE 300 WR)

Cosette, I think your analogy of Sita being Rama's pet is dead on. All throughout the Ramayana, Rama is this honorable divine-like man who is accepting and thoughtful and then right at the end as soon as he's achieved his goal he has been chasing after the whole book (of rescuing Sita) he does a complete one-eighty and rejects her. Which, thankfully, the gods were also taken aback at his behavior and were worried that he was becoming too human which was a somewhat relief. But it is completely exhausting to watch Sita and all of the women be put last. Even when Dasaratha visited Rama from the heavens it took him some convincing to forgive Kaikeyi. All of the women but especially Sita deserved better and was more than just an embellishment for the male characters.