The Sunday Mail
Ivy Nyasha Vimbai Chibanda – Media Student, MSU
BEING a woman in a male- dominated society is not easy, but over the years, women have managed to pull through and achieve their goals and dreams despite the challenges of men and even other women looking down upon them. They have proved they can do it.
Being an independent woman is more difficult in this kind of society, as people warn you, you will not make it without a man and the moment you prove them wrong, you are labelled.
It’s even more difficult to be a feminist in the African society as you are seen as a destroyer and bad influence to the rest of the women. You are told that no matter how much you try, women can never be equal to men. Funny enough, the men give you a bit of hope, they give you a chance to try, with the warning though that you are bound to fail somehow but the women themselves demotivate you from the start.
I remember one day, in one of my gender classes, I got in a heated debate with my classmates over the point that women should at least try to fight this dominance from men. Most of the people were of the idea that no matter what, no matter how educated you are and no matter how much you earn, as a woman, you should sacrifice your potential to men, because it’s what culture has taught us.
Talk about culture, I have learnt that culture is dynamic and not static, if it wasn’t, ‘‘musengabere’’ would still have been in practice and a lot of women would have ‘‘disappeared’’. People would still be in animal skins right now, walking half naked. If those practices were abandoned with time because of civilisation, why can’t we adapt to change and be civilised enough to give women a chance and support them fully?
Over the years, especially in the Middle Eastern and western male-dominated societies, women have had the short end of the stick and in many aspects of life, they still do. I don’t see a problem with pointing that fact out, and ensuring that the laws we make combat that attitude. And not just about “violence,” either, but also about economic equality, job opportunities, and everything else.
Gender equality has quite improved, a number of women are being given the chance, and unlike yesteryears when most industries were dominated by men in managerial positions, more women can be seen holding the top positions as well, which is a positive.
The issue is not just about women getting positions at work and forget about it at home, gender equality begins at home. Equality is not having the girl child cooking and the boys digging, equality is having a fair share in everything. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie in her presentation titled, ‘‘We should all be feminists’’ once said that, “Take cooking for example, women generally do the cooking and the cleaning, but why is that? Is it because women are born with a cooking gene or over the years they have been socialised to see cooking as a rule.”
When a girl is born, she is taught to take care of people, she is taught to be docile, and she is raised to become a mother and a submissive wife. This is proven by the kind of toys she gets from a tender age, she gets kitchen utensils, dolls and doll houses, so that she learns to care. The boys, on the other hand are taught to be leaders from the start, they are taught not to cry, no matter how hurt, they are told ‘‘boys don’t cry’’ as if it’s only in the girls’ DNA to cry.
Tsitsi Dangarembga in Nervous Conditions once wrote, “This business of womanhood is a heavy burden. How could it not be? Aren’t we the ones who bear children? When it is like that you can’t just decide today I want to do this, tomorrow I want to do that, the next day I want to be educated! When there are sacrifices to be made, you are the one who has to make them. And these things are not easy, you have to start learning them early, from a very early age. The earlier the better so that it is easy later on.”
It is how we have been raised, to look down upon ourselves, to sacrifice because the boys have much more responsibility than us girls, financially. We have been raised to think that after all, no matter what we do, we are going to get married hence not much effort should be put.
My plea to the young women out there is to look at ourselves differently. No one was born to be looked down upon, the reason more we should not look down upon ourselves. We have so much potential but we don’t have to sacrifice it just because “you might scare the guys away.”
Take control of your life, don’t let anyone tell you that you won’t make it, we are no different from men, and we have as much ability as they do to move forward.
Desist from the mentality that I will be taken care of, take care of yourself and life will be easier. The only reason why men might seem to take advantage of us is because we are too dependent. Stand up for yourself and be independent.
Do not be discouraged, you can make it.
Parents as well should try from a tender age, not to raise wives but to raise independent women. The moment you raise us as wives is the moment we lose confidence in ourselves. Tell your daughter she is going to be a pilot, she is going to be an engineer, she can make it as a journalist, and she can be a truck driver. There’s no gender discrimination out there, it’s within us, and it begins in the family.
Boys on the other hand are discouraged to do household chores in some households, with the belief that they will become weak and the girls should do it for them.
I think children should be raised by ability and interest and not by gender. The world would be a better place.
This aftermath of international women’s day, let’s celebrate our existence as women. We are the future of tomorrow.
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