In the past few months I have found myself in conversations about
violence and cruelty against women. I thought I had heard all the mediocre
reasons as to why a man could possibly abuse a woman but here is the newest
excuse in town; "We African men...blah blah blah" and that’s a statement
I have heard a little too many times that i want to believe that it was only part
of a terrible nightmare which I have since woken up from, unfortunately the reality
is that there is a breed of men who have found a new excuse for abusing women.
So the reason is that you have a very small ego; to feed it and stroke it you
must fight with a woman, and the excuse is that you are an African man? Please
give me a break! Perhaps the next time you want to give that flimsy lame excuse
try to do it while in hides and skin, may be then I can begin to understand. At
the very least I will then have an imagery of the African man you purport to be.
I may have failed my history class but at least I can
remember what my mother told me about her father, a true African man. I can
remember my own father, the epitome of a true African man. African men were
protectors, providers and proclaimers. And that power was lost the day African
men of today sat in a house whose rent he had no idea how it was raised and ate
food he had no idea how to look for. That power was lost when many men started rolling
down the windows of their mothers’ Range Rovers to snare at and intimidate women
who were in their own Toyota Vitz.
I have nothing against men I have too many in my circles,
neither am I starting a battle I cannot finish. All I am doing is asking us to
wake up beyond "MAWE" and realise that the bar was set very high for
the men in our society today by those who came before them and guess what? To
reach that high bar you need to stop waiting to be a millionaire by playing Sportpesa,
boy please! What I am saying is that the real African men killed lions as a
show of might, went out literally in search of danger to demonstrate their
manliness but that was then and it worked at that time! Today my brothers you
must report to duty and be the men we want in society; Men that are not
intimidated by the success of their female counterparts but men that are
challenged by this and turn it into positive energy to propel them into higher
notches of success.
This, my brothers will not be achieved through physical or
emotional abuse. It is not achieved by stepping all over the women you come
across. The only thing that abuse does is it creates competitors and not
partners. It makes women bitter and they choose to focus on competing with you.
But when you show up for duty and work twice as hard as she does she respects
you and creates a heaven for you to operate.
Men call out the boys in men’s skin who are letting all the
men down, call out the men in these boys. Ask them to wake up from the dream
that one day while sitting lazily doing nothing they will win a betting jack
pot! This annoying betting obsession is a story for another day!
By Sarah Makena
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