Mere “cock and bull,” who are we to change the societal narrative of patriarchy..? The darned thing is almost hardwired into Society’s system. But then again, who are we not to even try..?
The stats speak volumes, our women have been bruised, battered and murdered for too long, and the levy has finally broken, it won’t be too long now till the streets run red with the blood of abusers and victimisers.
So.., let’s begin shall we? Before we even attempt to rebuild our man, it is necessary that we first break him down in order to find out what makes him tick…tock. The Man’s personality is based on his environment and his biology. Genetic conditioning aside, the best we can do is to address his environment, that is to say, social background.
From the moment he is presented to the world, at birth, our Man is confronted by images all proclaiming the gospel of true “macho” behaviour. We 90’s kids know this too well, as we all looked upto screen characters like John Rambo and Jèan Claude “Fan Tam.”
Home life was no different, injured one day, a young me walked up, in fact cried over to my papa, expecting sympathy and maybe even a hug to ease my “booboo,” what I found instead was a stone cold response, “A Man Should Never Cry..” I was six at the time…
Images and messages create expectations, expectations influence behavior and behavior becomes set in stone as personality. The Basotho culture warns against giving a child a bad name, because his/her actions become a mirror that reflects on their names. We as a society have given our Man his name, “He Who Can Never Show Weakness.”
The funny thing about names is that they’re given at birth but we spend our whole lives trying to live up to them, at times, at our own expense. So when our man steps out into the world, his name in toe, his most valued possession is thus..? Yes.., you guessed it.
“Societus” though is a poor teacher, he will say, BE STRONG, and not show you how, or utter riddles such as “Man Up” but never tell you what that means because of this Man in turn becomes a poor pupil.
So what we have here is a classic case of miseducation, backed by a highly flawed educational system and little to no resources at all.
The funny thing is, Man knows he is poorly qualified, but he would hate to know that you knew it too. So he spends most his time keeping up appearances, practicing day and night, all in the hope that you will see him as a “real” Man.
His tutors, Mr Television and the esteemed Principal Societus failed to relay to him the essence of true manhood, but rather, they sold him on the image.
Thus he failed to understand that his masculine features, big arms, were meant to always protect his home and never to harm his family, the adrenaline that flowed through his veins was meant not to destroy but spur into action, always in the service of others. And leadership meant listening and taking into account the needs of others before your own.
So this goes out to my brothers, fathers, uncles..entlek NONKE, let’s strive to be better teachers.
You can reach KEMNET by emailing [email protected] or by call on +266 59062778