Man, Check your privilege. By Aduwa Otieno

I will tell you a short story:
It’s almost 10PM.  My female friend and I are leaving Pawa254. We are from an art event, busy discussing how person X is a terrible poet and why we think person Y’s politics on gender is just bullshit. It’s just the two of us when we arrive at the junction that connects Valley Road and Upper State House Road. My friend, let’s call her Wangari, has to walk to town to catch a jav home, I, on the other hand, only has to walk to Mamlaka. Normally I’d just walk up Nyerere Road, then branch at the intersection with Mamlaka Road. But I’m in the company of a woman. , and that Serena stretch doesn’t look safe, at least for her. So, we trek all the way down Valley Road, connect with Kenyatta Avenue till we get to Odeon, where she gets a jav home.
You probably don’t get where I’m getting with this. Or, you just don’t see the moral of the story, especially if a man. You are not entirely to be blamed for not recognizing the gist of the story. You’ve been raised in a society that normalizes privileges to men at the expense of women. I’ll break it down for you.
Wangari, just by being female, is more likely to be a prey to sexual predators and other assaults perpetrated by men. I walk her to Khoja because, unlike me, she has to worry about her safety. She has to worry about the possibility of rape and being mugged, among other aggressions. I don’t worry about anything while walking back to Mamlaka. I mean, what’s the worst that could happen to me, as a man? Get mugged? But I don’t have valuables with me. And worth noting is that I’m relatively able-bodied. That means I’m less likely to be raped or assaulted than Wangari. And this comes as advantage by the virtue of my being male (and being able-bodied). That, friend, is male privilege. And it’s no rocket science how it marginalizes women.
Male privilege can be defined as unearned advantage men have over women just for being male. Obviously, male privilege is a creation of patriarchy. ALL men, believe me, are beneficiaries of it. Many men and even the marginalized fail to recognize this because it is deeply entrenched in our cultures, spaces and even religion. Its pervasive nature makes it hard for someone to view it as a gender issue. There are countless examples of male privileges that happen before our eyes, and we raise not a finger.
Before I began writing this, I was scrolling through my Twitter feeds. One tweet captured my attention. It was about a Saudi woman who, after reporting that she was a victim of rape, gets accused of extra-marital sex instead. It never felt real until I clicked on the link and read all through. The sexual aggressor, obviously male, was nowhere in the picture. To understand how male privilege is at work here, you need to look at the cultural and religious aspects of a country like Saudi Arabia. For a start, Saudi is deeply Islamic. Religion, as you probably know, codifies morality into absolutes that in most cases just aim to serve men. Pick up your holy writ. Look up the gender of those who happen to pass down the laws to the lay people.
In the case of the Saudi woman, the injustices perpetrated on her can thus be safely said to be religiously sanctioned. She lives in a sphere where consensual sexual is a non-issue when a man wants to bust a nut. She lives in a society where the law (codified by men) are harsher on women who have extra-marital affairs than male sexual aggressors. She lives in a culture that doesn’t even want her to drive a car. She lives in a country where writers of my kind get jailed or killed for merely stating this. Than a man could get away with rape just shows how male privilege is normalized in the Islamic world.
Here’s another instance: Male X, driven by the need to physically resemble Channing Tatum, decides to hit the gym. Female Y wants a Teyana Taylor body too. (She’s been watching Kanye West’s Fade video on repeat) They both meet at the same gym. In the process of lifting up heavy things and putting them down, it gets unbearable hot. Male X, without giving it any thought, takes off his T-shirt (size s, by the way. Yet he has a big upper body). Female Y, though, can’t bring herself to doing the same. Given the years of cultivation of the male perception that her nipples are for sexual arousal, she can’t possibly be like Male X without inviting the male gaze and other sexual micro-aggressions like sexual slurs. She’ll likely be called a slut. She could get slapped by some law with fancy words like ‘indecent exposure’. And the worst that could happen is sexual assault. Non-consensual sexual acts. Nobody has anything agains Male X taking off his shirt, but everyone will have everything against Female Y if she does the same. That’s male privilege.
This painfully reminds me of the incidence with Embassava touts. Men, of course. They undressed (read: sexually assaulted) a woman because apparently, how a woman dresses tells about what she wants to be done unto her. This is a case that captures the male privilege to authority. They feel like their authority should be extended to women. The walk around with a moral whip, lashing at any woman they deem morally wrong. Still on male privilege to authority, I’d argue that’s why we have mostly men in positions of power. How many women do you see in positions of authority? They were many back when Africa still valued its women. Back when Victorian ideals about women hadn’t been imposed on us. When Mekatilili Wa Menza were figures even men revered.
Male privilege also manifests itself in the academic sphere. Here’s your homework – use Google or your library to know why there are few female scientists and scholars. Tally up their numbers and then contrast with their male counterparts'. Also, look up the experiences these women go through while in the academic field.
Male privilege, just like other privileges, serves to marginalize a group of persons. Usually the minority. For instance, there’s straight privilege. Here, LGBT guys receive the short end of the stick. Imagine how hard it is, if not possible, for a gay couple to receive a marriage certificate when compared to hetero couple. Imagine how problematic it is for a genderqueer person to walk into a public washroom only to find that there’s only the gender binary, male and female signs on the doors.
Acknowledging that you, as a man, is a beneficiary of male privilege shouldn’t be seen as an admission of guilt. It should be an acknowledgement that women are victims to a system that lends you the upper hand. With that insight, you can work towards purging the structures that allow for such privileges.  There are many things you could do to balance the scales. For example, if your female colleague at work, who works just as much as you (maybe even more), gets paid less than you, raise a voice of concern as a start. Boycott if unheard. In other words, always check your privilege.
Beloved women, pick up your arms. It’s your fight. Be at the battle forefront. Fight to your last breath. That way your daughters won’t be put to chains by the society of men. If you don’t see a glimmer of hope in that, who will?

Photo credits to: questionsandtea.wordpress.com
menprivilege.tumblr.com

Let's feminist... Woman up! By Aduwa Otieno

Imagine a world where matriarchy was a thing…
***
I prefer sitting at the back. Be it in a class or just at any other gathering. I take comfort in imagining that no one’s watching. It’s you doing the watching, silently judging.
This one time I’m in class, at my usual spot. Our beloved, PHD-holding, been-to-Nyayo-house lecturer, brings up an argument: women can’t run a family business. To support their case, they tell a story about a friend of theirs who got scammed by the wife. To seal his argument, he mentions something about "women knowing their place”. There was a round of applause. I was still reeling over that when a lady, few seats from this pathetic sexist, raised an objection. She seemed pissed, rightfully so. Even then, she maintained her cool and said something along the lines of “screw gender roles!” Not having a sensible counter to that, the teacher replied with a “read the bible” suggestion.
I imagine even the religious find that problematic. He used religion to justify a system that victimizes women.
Yes, it’s hard to make sense of anything that violates your sensibilities as a woman and a feminist. Our lady, perhaps sensing a likely defeat, gave up. I think walking out would have been a revolutionary act. What would Emma Goldman or Chimamanda Adichie do? Not sure about the latter, but the former, given her political leanings (she was an anarchist), would have thought of “direct action” of sorts. Something between a slap and a full blown assault. [Pauses to reflect on Adichie’s disapproval of Beyoncé’s brand of feminism]
It dawned on me that we’ve been doing it all wrong. We don’t need equality between the sexes, we need female supremacy. That’s why Lucy Ellmann has been making a strong appeal to me lately. Look her up. She identifies as a radical feminist. Oh, and she has that up-in-your-face attitude. In her rom-com novel titled Mimi, she argues for matriarchy. She attacks patriarchy head-on. She imagines most vile things as creations of men. Like war. And yes, she alludes to history to back up her claims. She even goes back to when matriarchy was a thing. Before men took over, then remodeled everything to fit the male worldview. To balance the scales, she makes a rather radical suggestion: men should surrender all their property, including money, to women of their choice. As a start she had her loving husband do that. [Pauses to read a Twitter thread about the classic ‘not all X are…’]
Look around. Why do you think that a lady, even with the glaring fact that high heels are a pain in the ass, is still rocking them? And the wig? The mini-skirt? You guessed right – men want it that way. She’s living in a world that’s unjustly a male set-up. Men hold the view that a woman’s only worth is their physical attractiveness. That’s why you have men, mostly white, overlooking Serena Williams’ achievements because she doesn’t meet their standards of beauty. ‘Oh look! She’s a good tennis player, but that only counts  if she has a pretty face too'. Maybe also layer that with the race issue. Black and beauty aren’t bedfellows, apparently.
Ever asked yourself why that ad just before the news o’clock is that of a pretty woman? We call it exploitation of female sexuality for profit-making purposes. Consumerism pairs up with misogyny and what you get is female sexuality commodified. (By the way, I’d bet an arm that capitalism is a man’s invention. Women, I think, are socialists)
“Sure, some people are attractive. But so what?” That’s Lucy Ellmann in one of her online articles critiquing the obsession with looks. Hollywood, for example, fosters this  kind of obsession. In Hunger Games, Katniss (played by Jennifer Lawrence) is a revolutionary. But, for maximum relatability, they had to make her beautiful. Not just that. In Home Sweet Hell, women are portrayed as manipulative beings and psychopaths. Men, on the other hand, are portrayed as hardworking and only women bring them down. [Pauses to read an article by Laurie Penny – Are You Man Enough for Birth Control?] Sometimes, though, they repackage ideals we cherish as feminists and then sell them back to us. They did a great job with The Suffragette and Carol.
Back to ‘not all men are’. I was under the impression that it’s obvious  this line of argument is bullshit when the problem in question is rather systemic. In the case of  racially motivated police shootings in the US, it never made any sense to counter criticisms of racism with a 'not all (white) cops are bad’. That alone wasn’t enough to discredit the Black Lives Matter movement. Borrow that line of thought when bothered with a tweet about men being trash. Imagine how wrong it is to call a woman sexist. She could hate men of all kinds -- good and bad. But given the lack of structural support (men have patriarchy), she can’t possibly be labeled as sexist. It could be prejudice on a personal level. Even then, that would be a stretch. Can a black person be racist? The answer is an obvious no. But some would still argue otherwise, clothing it in confusing terms like reverse-racism. [Pauses to curse why the front seats at Safaricom Jazz Fest were mostly occupied by whites]
Feministing is something one can do as long as it takes. There’s always so much to talk and rant about (in my case, mostly the latter, seeing that women have been victims for ages now). The take-home point is clear – men are trash (clearly repeated by those ‘woke’ individuals on Twitter ad nauseam). A reversal of things feels necessary. I want my mom as the head of the family. In place of oppressive patriarchy, let’s have loving matriarchy. Oh, and if you find Lucy Ellmann’s proposal okay, surrender your property to women, if a man. If a woman, asking your boyfriend or husband to do that would be a start.
I choose  to identify  as male, by the way.

New Generation, Who Dis? By Esther Nyabuto

We are the daughters of the women that told us we could be anything, and we heard that we must be everything. That sounds like the most cliché, down the river pon de banks statement a twenty year old girl would say. However, leaving out the macho personality engrossed in the saying, there is some little bit of truth in that saying.  Aha…..the world where we beg women to be themselves and tell the confident women to calm down. Being born in the 90s is one of the most confusing things that could happen to a young adult. More so, being born a girl during that period. Don’t get me wrong, being a guy from that bracket is also hard….kinda. Being born during that period means that you were a link, the umbilical cord of two generations. The latter generation being the matured-at-two-years-old generation and the swiftly drifting “never-gon-grow-up-generation”. Translate all that into the mind of a woman…you can be exactly like your mother…or the woman your mother was scared of.  Of course, every woman wants to be like their mother. Or the one their fathers cheated on their mother with, you know the one that didn’t have kids in their twenties and maintained her strong features and lives in some posh estate in Nairobi. I meant to say that with no disrespect to the women that have stayed behind after being battered, had their ego insulted, dropped their life long passions and dreams to take care of their families and woke up every morning and made sure each member of the family got closer to their dreams. Have you ever wondered if that what your mother is today was what she dreamt of as a little girl…or like any traditional woman in this depraved culture, settled for.  I dream of sitting amidst huge conferences and   having my opinion valued. But then again, I feel my mother dreamt of the same too. You can then crush people’s worlds with one gesture or lean back, like our mothers and take the bait. You can jump high, but not too high, since there’s no man that wants a woman that stands that high. You have to be appealing to the eye, but not too much, they’ll say you seek too much attention. Show some skin….to show how progressive you are….but not too much…least they call you a whore. You can aspire to be a great entrepreneur with the latest brand of everything, but keep in mind at the end, you’ll get the same brand of life. The children born after the 1999 age bracket are wild, vicious. Trust me I’ve seen an 11 year old girl grind a 15 year old boy to an utmost seizure, a twelve year old girl that lost her “virginity” to an eleven year old boy as they played house and that’s just those that are bonkers enough to say it in front of my face.  And the whole time I’m looking at them with partial admiration as I wouldn’t bring myself to do such and disgust over where their mommas are when they grew into such *liberal Misfits*. So really, each morning I wake up, dress and walk into class, I look at the male students of my class with aspiration. Not the one I wish to shake their hands though. Hahaha….naah, but with the one that no matter how high they dream, no matter how far they aspire to build empires …..The chances of them doing so are much greater than I. I might have consoled myself through middle school and high school of being an equal, but in truth….I was always just an equal in thoughts. I mean, I could hide behind the notion of the 21st Century woman in the western world that has it all, a successful career, a loyal husband that cheats at least once every five years and children and grow so distant to my relatives they only see me on Christmas every five years.  But then again, I’ve grown watching my mother, the woman that took me to school every day, cooked my meals every day. Was at home every holiday and whacked the hell out of my behind every time she found me peeing at the bold and the beautiful { what the hell was with that show…did they meet at the African convection of strict parents and ruled out the show as a top secret affair… smh}.   And when the time comes, like my mother, will fold my dreams as a blanket and support the dreams of little ones.