Let us stop pretending. All religions—without exception—are built on the backs of women, oppressed classes, gender and sexual minorities, and people of color. They have always been political projects masquerading as moral ideologies. What they call “sacred law” is nothing more than a manual for domination. What they call “divine truth” is the oldest form of authoritarian propaganda.

Religion is not about liberation, it is about control. Religion is not morality. Religion is politics. And its politics is always patriarchal.

Even the so-called revolutionaries who claim to liberate us from superstition fall into the same trap. Marxism, too, became its own religion. The irony is glaring: they call themselves atheists, yet defend “freedom of religion” as if choosing between chains makes us free. Tell me, do we really have a choice? Can any human truly read and understand the hundreds of religions, sects, cults, and sub-cults before making an “informed decision”? By the time we even scratch the surface of one, life is over. The so-called “freedom to choose religion” is an illusion. It is not choice—it is entrapment.

And then come the liberals. They proudly claim to “defend women’s right to choose” to wear the veil. But is it really a choice if you are born into a system that conditions you from infancy to cover yourself in shame, while men parade barefaced without consequence? Why is the conversation always about women’s bodies—burka or bikini—while men are conveniently exempt? Why don’t men also wear the veil if it is about “dignity” or “choice”? Why is there no equal enforcement, no equal symbolism, no equal burden?

Look at Iran, where women are beaten for a strand of hair out of place. Look at Afghanistan, where the Taliban reimposes gender apartheid in the name of “God.” Look at Saudi Arabia, where women can finally drive but only under the permanent guardianship of men. Shift your eyes to Europe, where liberal politicians cheer “freedom of religion” while criminalizing women who refuse veils in France—or defending those forced into them elsewhere. In the West, the bikini is celebrated as liberation. In the Middle East, the burka is defended as tradition. Both are lies if choice is not equal for all genders.

And what of the self-styled revolutionaries? In Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea—Marxist or socialist leaders happily play the role of supreme patriarch, demanding obedience not unlike the priests and popes they claim to oppose. They chant “equality” while building armies—patriarchal machines designed not to protect the weak but to suppress them. Wars are not waged by women for freedom; wars are waged by men for power and control. Militaries have always been the steel backbone of patriarchy.

This pattern extends across democracies too. In India, the ruling Hindutva project fuses religion with state power, policing what women wear and whom they love. In the United States, Christian nationalism has captured political institutions, stripping away reproductive rights in the name of morality. Whether in temples, mosques, or churches—or in parliaments and presidential palaces—the old scam is the same: power cloaked in the language of faith and freedom.

But patriarchy is not destiny. In Nepal, before religious and colonial imports rewrote our past, our people lived under matriarchal traditions. The Ajima—grandmother goddesses—were revered as central forces of life, not passive saints. Our ancient culture recognized six genders, celebrating diversity rather than erasing it. Sexuality and gender diversity were carved openly on temple walls, integrated into spiritual life rather than condemned as sin. These traditions prove patriarchy is not natural; it is an invasion, an imposition, a theft of memory.

So let us stop being fooled by semantics. Whether in the mosque or the church, in the temple or the party congress, in the parliament or the liberal arts classroom—the story repeats. Patriarchal systems disguise themselves: sometimes in robes, sometimes in uniforms, sometimes in suits. They call it religion, ideology, democracy, revolution, or “choice.” But the outcome is the same: control over women, erasure of gender and sexual minorities, domination of the weak, and a hierarchy sanctified by violence.

If freedom means anything, it must mean freedom from patriarchal ideology—whether religious, political, or military. True choice cannot exist until every system that thrives on inequality and domination is dismantled, and until men, too, are forced to carry the burdens they so easily impose on others.

Nepal’s memory of Ajima goddesses and six genders reminds us that patriarchy is not inevitable. There have been societies where community, diversity, and freedom were sacred. The task before us is not to defend false choices like burka or bikini—it is to reclaim the freedom and dignity patriarchy stole from all of us.

Until then, let us be clear: the real prison is patriarchy itself.