The Anatomy of Transmisogyny

by Tiwatope Adunni

In 2019 I was at one of my lowest after surviving a motorcycle accident which left me with a fractured limb, and hospitalized for  6 months. This period can be considered a phase of awakening because I had nothing else to do but read and reflect.

Shortly after my recovery came the unfortunate incident with the Nigerian police. I was unlawfully harassed, detained and extorted because I was a non-binary feminine of centre person. A month later, my partner of 4years called off the relationship, he was afraid I was high risk and bait for police extortion and attention.

Then came another traumatic period with members of my extended family, some of whom threatened to kill me. I was saved by my great-grandmother, who took me away from this unsafe situation. Now, my grandmother has always been supportive, she in fact raised me, and believed I am the reincarnation of a daughter that she lost when she was a young mother.

It was during this period that it became clear I wouldn’t survive through my identity and I had nowhere to run to. I had two options to either live or die.

In January 2020, I decided to live, and the only means I could live was to agree with and face my reality as a transgender woman and this led to my medical transitioning.

Before my medical transitioning, I only knew what it means to be a non-binary feminine of centre person who lived 21years of their life in an androgynous body, having to struggle daily with questions from both intimates and strangers about my gender identity and expression. The societal construct of what a man should be and what makes a woman, and also having to publicly carry the shame of my gestures, identification, behavioural and gender expression.

However, in my 3^rd month of medical transitioning, I started to realize who a Nigerian woman is and what a Nigerian woman should be.

Nigerian women, what kind of women are we?

An average Nigerian woman’s idea of femininity is rooted in the ideological alignment of patriarchy and heteronormativity which unfortunately is the definition of “ideal woman” in a main-stream (men-owned) society. In the Nigeria of today, women are perceived to be second class citizens with little to no significant representation compared to men, and with forcefully ascribed provision of free domestic labour and motherhood duties backed up by social institutions and morality that strongly prioritizes ‘man-hood’.

The socialization of the girl in Nigeria is characterized by fragile femininity, subordination, dependency, prioritizing the male identified body. Most Nigerian girls indoctrinated into this oppressive system grow into women who are upholders of the system suiting the patriarchal satisfaction of what a woman should be and women who set to challenge this patriarchal order are harassed, dehumanized, molested and often criminalized.

Toxic masculinity and femininity, the offshoot of misogyny and transphobia

Toxic masculinity is the foundation of toxic femininity that birthed transphobia. In Nigeria, men are programmed to be measured, dominant and violent through which control the society, while women are programmed to be subordinate irrespective of who or what she thinks she is, she is forcefully pressured and gaslighted to be accountable to a man.

Societal norms and values are dictated by men and any form of opposition to their dominant ideology is considered a threat to society.

Toxic masculinity is the enforcement of dominant masculinity that uphold the reinforcement of patriarchal ideology as a tool for gender policing and misogyny. This means that your masculinity is toxic when you violently make your ‘Maness’ (gender) the criteria for your being by creating an institutionalized behavioural attitude and distinctive features of what a man should be. The patriarchal ideology positions what it is to be a “man” by creating gender scripts as traits that reinstate the dominant features of a man. Toxic masculinity is a tool of oppression in a patriarchal and heteronormative state like Nigeria.

Over time unending violence, harassment, exploitation and marginalization experienced by women has forced most Nigerian women into strongly believing the notion of their oppressors and not only do they believe and absorb the unending violence, but women are also used as bait tools of oppression on other women who are not in construct with the features of womanhood in a patriarchal/heteronormative society. This set of women are the dominant women “hegemonic femininity”.

Hegemonic femininity consists of characteristics defined as womanly that establish and legitimate a hierarchical and complementary relationship to hegemonic masculinity and that, by doing so, guarantee the dominant position of men and subordination of women. (Schippers, 2007: 94).

This simply refers to women who uphold the legitimacy of patriarchy and misogynistic rhetoric to instil fear in other women. A typical example would be a light-skinned woman, heterosexual, gentle, obedient, a ‘good cook’ morally virtuous, able to have kids, and able to stay at home to take care of her husband and children in order words “wife material”.

However, toxic femininity is the influential act of gender policing other women to act in accordance to the woman script, heteronormativity that deifies patriarchal power. It is an integral weapon of transphobia, it normalizes the patriarchal notion of CIS genderism, heteronormativity and so gender policing any person that does not fit into the binary.

Your femininity is toxic when you put the validation of humanness and femininity to the test in the hands of men who are ascribed as superiors. In today’s Nigeria, you are nothing if you are dark-skinned, poor, disabled and a WOMAN.

Femininity in Nigeria at the present date is still deemed as less to masculinity. As a result of the unequal gender binary constructed by the state, women are stereotypically perceived as weak, hypersexual, subhuman and objectified as subservient to men. It is believed that women are incapable to be women when they are not at par with the gender script roles instilled in them by the malestream system. The gender roles of a woman in Nigeria are dictated by men just so women can remain incapable, lesser and weak and not be compared to men who are ‘strong’. The patriarchal tool of oppression has kept women in a cocoon that is in turn giving men more power, recognition and dominance leading to continual gender inequality.

‘MISOGYNY in the cis-heteronormative binary is a way to measure masculine power’.

As an indigenous Nigerian transgender woman that is living her reality, my experiences with transmisogyny is usually deliberate act/actions from people towards me make me feel less of myself and less of a “woman” such as misgendering with pronouns, hypersexualized because I am a transgender woman in Nigeria whose identity is only determined by my genitalia and an uncommon fantasy that CIS heterosexual men and women want to explore, I experienced deliberate molestation, abuse, gender and body policing by random Nigerians and a lot more that makes question my safety in both public and private spaces.

We cannot fail to acknowledge the presence of transmisogyny in the LGBTQI+ community as trans and femme bodies are isolated from the benefit of this union.

Tiwatope Adunni is queer, a writer , feminist , ijogbon , advocate for gender diverse and sexual minorities. She is currently the programs director at Queercity Media and Productions

Kindly donate to her gofundme, thanks!

https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-t-survive?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=copy_link&utm_campaign=p_cf+share-flow-1

Winnie Madikizela-Mandela: Truth-butes

Editor’s Note: Over the next few days we’ll be curating the tributes and thoughts of African feminists about Winnie Madikizela-Mandela (26th September 1936 – 2nd April 2018), her life and activism.

Bibi Bakare-Yusuf

RIP Winnie Mandela, you indomitable spirit, sleep tight. You live on.
Here is Winnie in her own words: “The overwhelming majority of women accept patriarchy unquestioningly and even protect it, working out the resultant frustrations not against men but against themselves in their competition for men as sons, lovers and husbands. Traditionally the violated wife bides her time and off-loads her built-in aggression on her daughter-in-law.So men dominate women through the agency of women themselves.” Let’s share her words before CNN, Sky, BBC and White South African media machinery do it for us.

In reference to Winnie, people should stop saying, ‘obviously she was imperfect’. Erh, imperfection is part of what makes us human or did people forget the memo? Or is it only applicable to black women? Till you can present a perfect human, shut up!!

And then when you say, ‘she is a complicated figure’, do you want her to be simple and bland? The starting point of our discourse about her life should not be that she was ‘an imperfect or complicated figure’, that should be assumed – she is human damn it!

Let’s talk about what she made possible precisely because of her imperfection and complexity. Let’s talk about her challenge to the rule of the father (black and white), let’s talk about her confrontation with white supremacy and her rejection of the Christian notion of truth and reconciliation, let’s talk about how she responded to a violent and violating system and see what lesson we can learn from it today. Yes, let’s talk about how she handled power and agency. But please don’t go be saying she is a complicated and imperfect figure. She deserves better!

The Curious Case of D S Fapson and the Taxify Driver

On the 25th January, actress Dorcas Shola Fapson, accused, via some Snapchat posts, a Taxify driver of attempted kidnap and rape. Within 24 hours, the driver had posted a contrary account and Fapson had provided further details, including video footage of the incident – such is the power and urgency of social media these days.

I’ve found the public’s reaction to these accounts bewildering. Polarised opinions are the order of the day on social media but this case feels special. There have been disagreements on not just the story as a whole or who was right but also, the individual events which make up the story.

The only thing that everyone agrees on is that Fapson booked and entered a taxi, the trip ended badly and that pepper spray was involved. The driver says that the disagreement started when she refused to reveal her destination whereupon he stopped the trip, moved the car forward – an action which took him a few seconds – and tried to retrieve his car keys from her.

She says he tried to insist on an unregistered cash payment instead of a card payment with the company as booked, refused to take her to her destination or let her out of the car when she declined, drove her to unknown premises, tried to drag her into the building, threatened and assaulted her with a choke hold, closed the car door on her legs etc. Even stranger than the irreconcilable accounts is the focus on baying for Fapson’s blood (and anyone who tries to support her), without acknowledging these factual disparities.

While Fapson’s initial account was at first met with disgruntled silence and followed by demands for evidence, the driver’s post connected with Nigerian Twitter. Perhaps it was the perceived class differences between them but I think the real basis of the simmering rage and public outcry is the belief that this is yet another example of a woman weaponising the ability to accuse a man of rape for her own evil purposes.

The outcry fails to take into account of the fact that Fapson’s video evidence refutes some of the claims made by the driver. An example is the driver’s claim that he only drove a few yards down the road to take advantage of some security lighting. The video clearly shows him driving her to a set of gates, she stating that she doesn’t know where she is and he not counteracting that statement. He gets out of the car and hurried towards the gates, leaving his keys in the ignition (providing an answer to the stupid question ‘why would he leave his keys in the car if he meant to kidnap her?’).

The video also shows him trying to keep her in the car, rather than his account of repeatedly and politely asking her to alight and only engaging her physically to retrieve his car keys.
This is confusing because, while one could build a narrative that when she refused to get out of the car like he asked her to, he drove off to his house in frustration, reached the gates and then tried to chuck her out of the car, I can’t think of any reason he would want to keep her in the car. If he was so worried about his car, like he claimed, surely that would increase the chances of her driving off.

We do eventually hear him trying to drag her (but this is after she had asked him to let her out of the car – did he change his mind about keeping her in or was he trying to drag her on to the premises?) and we don’t see the choke hold of course. There are those better qualified than me to untangle the facts and perhaps they will get a chance to do so.

Instead of a discussion about the facts, the initial, and sustained, reaction has been one of massive outrage that Fapson dared to label this driver a rapist.

I believe this discussion sheds some light on two aspects of rape culture – the concerted effort to discredit rape and sexual assault victims for the purpose of silencing them and women who actually make false accusations that they have been raped.

In relation to the discrediting, rape is, of course, a difficult crime to prove and one way of the most effective methods for stopping victims from coming forward, is the threat that, should a conviction not occur or even before any charge is laid or prosecution carried out, the victims will be forever labelled ‘evil women’ willing to ruin lives for no justifiable reason.

If this fear affects conventional victims (raped by strangers after violence or the threat of violence), it becomes scarier when a victim has been raped by family members, close friends, relationship partners, dates or colleagues.

The silencing is perpetuated, not just by immediately assuming that the victim is lying, it includes dragging out past, unrelated sexual liaisons, slut shaming, purity culture (a woman is spoiled by sexual activity anyway – who cares whether it’s consensual or not?), spiritual blackmailing (if you don’t forgive that deacon for molesting you, aren’t you really as bad as him in Jesus’ eyes?) and questioning why she chose to drive a man to such a sexual peak that he could not help but attack her.

The culture of silencing victims is clearly traumatising and is the major reason so many victims keep quiet.

Some of these tools/weapons have already been deployed against Fapson. It is being claimed that she once begged a male singer to start a relationship with her to increase her celebrity status– information related to this incident…how?

Many people are very much aware of the above issues. While we know that too many sexual assaults go unreported because of silencing tactics, we also acknowledge that it is a terrible and devastating thing to falsely accuse a man of rape. Although it’s only fair to point out the inconsistency between Nigerians describing, on social media, the effects of rape and the effects of being accused of rape.

If a man is assumed to be falsely accused of rape, then it is a horrendous thing that will destroy his life, presumably because rape is such a terrible thing. If a man is actually proven to have raped someone then we should forgive him because everyone makes mistakes, do we want to kill him, did he kill someone, what was she wearing ……??

Anyway! False claims do happen and apart from tearing a hole through a man’s life, they drag the fight against rape and rape culture backwards. The next victim will always be prejudiced by a false rape claim.

Despite the fact that the movement for dismantling the rampant rape culture and addressing the high occurrence of sexual assaults in Nigeria is relatively new, it seems Nigerians have had enough of rape allegations already. No woman is allowed to utter the words ‘rape’ or ‘rapist’ – unless:-
(1) it has happened – I won’t bother adding ‘or is about to happen’ as, in this case, even if the attack had been in an advanced stage, some would still have insisted that Fapson could have avoided it by being polite, begged or time travelled to choose a better outfit;
(2) you have ample evidence of being raped and you are prepared to paste the evidence all over social media;
(3) you are prepared to attend a police station, even though numerous women have reported sexual assault carried out by Nigerian police officers and their reprehensible attitude towards rape victims;
(4) you never withdraw your complaint because, for the price of bringing a potentially good man down, you should be prepared to accept any and all threats to your being;
of course (5) you were the perfect rape victim – dressed modestly, not roaming the streets at night, polite and respectful to all involved, with a propensity for sprinting.

Even if you have been able to do all these and go on about it too much, Nigerian twitter will advise you to move on with your life and have some dignity for God’s sake!

There is clearly some panic about women wielding their power and privilege to cry rape at any every instance and this panic, I would suggest, is nothing new whenever there is a concerted effort to address sexual crimes. Hopefully it will pass but, when you compare the reaction to Fapson to the reaction to Kemen in BBNaija (https://talkglitz.tv/nigerians-blast-bbnaija-for-continuous-association-with-kemen-tag-him-rapst/) in April of last year, the real crime appears to be broadcasting a rape or rape attempt rather than committing one, according to Nigerian Social Media.

I hate to drag out the past but for those who don’t know the Kemen story, he was a Big Brother Nigeria contestant who was disqualified for sexually assaulting a sleeping female housemate . The real debate began after the programme concluded and Kemen was invited to join the housemates on various publicity tours and effectively resumed his status as a celebrity reality show contestant. I was grimly satisfied when the ‘woke’ people whom I follow recognised this as an outrageous endorsement of the lack of consequences for sexual assault in Nigeria. Imagine my horror and bitterness when I learned that the #freekemen contingent were not only in the majority but felt that the incident being brought to public knowledge was punishment enough and that Kemen should be allowed to flourish free from these Godless, unforgiving, judgmental people who insisted on dragging out issues that should be allowed to die down, after all ‘did he kill somebody?’ and also what was she wearing…?

Back to the recent incident, perhaps there are other ways in which Fapson could have made the incident known, if you ignore how shocking that night must have been for her. With the benefit of hindsight, maybe she could have started with a fuller account instead of short posts and labelling – but I can’t see anything wrong in her letting people know about this event, if only to stop other women from going through the same thing.

On a related subject, I notice, in addition to women who make false rape allegations, another group of women who have been condemned in this incident – women who have accused Fapson of making the whole thing up. Fapson dramatically said ‘I hope far worse happens to you, your mother and your unborn children’. Lord. Simi, in a deleted post echoing some of the sentiments that Adekunle Gold had expressed and also deleted due to the backlash from his followers (They said what to you on Twitter, Kunle? Hold my beer…..), also singled them out as being particularly reprehensible.

It is especially dispiriting when women defend sexism, rape culture and the like. It’s even worse when they take part in sexual attacks. It is surprising, as well, given that they could more readily be a victim of what they are undertaking in or failing to condemn. But I’ve always wondered (but never voiced aloud) about the claim that they are ‘worse than the men’?

It is bad for both women and men to fail to address or participate in rape culture. Men do it because of the obvious privileges of being able to act badly or not without many consequences; women do it to align with or identify with the conventional society, to cement their status as ‘good or sensible women’ and ‘not one of these crazy feminists’ and probably for other reasons, like protecting themselves against male (out) rage or even maybe because they genuinely believe what they are saying. Both have their reasons and both are equally bad, in my view.

How to join the Ya-Ya Sisterhood of Pick-Me’s!

It’s the New Year! Yipee! A New Us! A NEW EVERYTHING! YAY! (AIR KISSES!) Sorry we were yelling, but it’s so exciting to start the New Year with a brilliant new topic on how to join the Ya-Ya Sisterhood of Pick-Me’s.

Now we are so excited to lay our hands on this manual because it’s so exclusive, and so expensive and soo classy, (even if we are saying so ourselves). But this is a new 9jafeminista and we will do anything and everything to please you, (we are also hustling for more readers, but that’s by the way). As you well know we are feminist and intersectional and everything but we get all excited when we find new ways to help our fellow sisters.

There’s a whole movement on all social media platforms of the ‘pick-me’ sisters and they do the mostest to get the notice of all the men, (both hot and cold) on Social Media. And we totally understand and damn it the pick-me movement is VALID! (Damn we’re yelling again). This is due to the fact that finding a ‘man’ is so hard, harder than the unpaid labour women put in on the daily. But even harder than that KEEPING the man, phew! That’s close to an impossibility, like pushing a needle through a camel’s toe, or something like that.

Anyway, these special Ya-Ya Sisterhood of the Pick-Me’s have discovered something that has never been heard of before, FEMINISTS (spelt s-a-t-a-n) and these people are trying to ruin the market by demanding for absurdities like equity, and equality and educating men to stop raping and assaulting anyone they deem weaker than them, and better governance and bringing an end to domestic, mental and emotional violence… the list of demands goes on and on, but that’s not why we are here. To counter all these narratives that will alienate the better sex (spelt m-e-n) and protect a system(spelt p-a-t-r-i-a-r-c-h-y) the sisters have developed a strategy which we will share with you as soon as we finish jumping for joy.

Get a professionally taken profile picture: The struggle is real sisters, to join the Ya-Ya Sisterhood of Pick-Me’s you need a well taken photograph, by a professional, showing your best angles, because before you start creating a social media persona for yourself you need to ensure that your profile pic is popping. Who knows? That brother who will come and change your destiny might decide to zoom in and see the person behind all the brilliant shit you’ll soon be spouting.

Follow feminists: On all your social media handles make sure you follow as many feminists as you can find, because how do you pick their arguments apart if you don’t even see their tweets, facebook posts, Instagram protest photos, snapchat… umm… snapchats?

Make it clear that you are NOT a feminist: Now this here point is EXTREMELY important. From the get-go make it clear that you are NOT a feminist. Yes you are educated, and you might even have a job, and maybe, you even own a car (all of which feminists fought for so you can enjoy but that’s unimportant). Now don’t get it twisted, there are some women who although don’t like the feminist tag (which is totally valid) still believe in equality and equity and all those outrageous demands, you don’t want to get mixed up with those ones either… nah. Make it clear you do not believe in equality, or equity, tell them about your willingness to be a ‘traditional’ wife. Show them!

Display your dexterity at cooking: We all know that feminists don’t (also known as can’t) cook, so you need to display the beauty of your wife material by showing people on social media, that you can cook. Take pictures of yourself in the kitchen, or in the village blowing fire, or handwashing your clothes. In your updates add how hard working you are and how you wake up early in the morning to cook for yourself and all the men in your neighbourhood. We are emphasizing cooking and cleaning since it is a well-known fact that a lot of Nigerian men are looking for unpaid housemaids and they are always hungry.

Take sides with the right side: There are times that arguments will show up on your timeline about these ‘social media feminists’ that come online to advise women to leave their husbands while they are, in real life, cooking, cleaning and blah, blah, blah… make sure you go on that thread and support whoever made that post. Make snide remarks about ‘feminists’ and the fact that they are all bitter aunties and yahdahyah.

Honestly this is getting boring but we never give up do we?

Emphasize traditional values: Why should boys wear yellow? Why should girls wear blue? Boys are boys girls are girls, all these homo-woke people should just go and take several seats! Our mothers lived in the kitchen and see how well we have all turned out, see how Nigeria is the most well-adjusted, corruption free nation on the earth because we are all so perfect, all due to our ‘mothers’ who stayed in the kitchen!

Participate in campaigns: in order to show your ‘human’ side, anytime handles like STER (Stand to End Rape) starts online campaigns to end rape, please join in the thread, especially telling ‘sisters’ to stop clubbing and dancing and wearing short dresses. Give them examples of how women’s dressing can cause ‘temptation’. Make snide remarks about how ‘moral standards’ have been lowered and how ‘good girls get all the attention’.

This shit can go on and on, but it is boring. We hope the above has been useful though… yawn.

Mansplaining for Beginners

Aside from the Bro Code, real men don’t cry, men don’t get emotional, real men don’t wear pink, real men don’t scream when they are coming, real men don’t moan during sex and a lot of other rules on the list men are handed in order to earn their ‘manhood’ (otherwise known as The Hypermasculinity List), there is one particular rule that transcends all art, and logic, called mansplaining.

Now mansplaining is not to be confused with manspreading. Although they are similar in some ways, they are simply NOT THE SAME!

Manspreading is physical. Simply put, a man sitting next to a female of any specie or race (on a bus, in a plane, or a chair), will spread themselves in such a way that they’ll take up extra space.

Mansplaining is mental. It is an intellectual sontin that requires a little mental cogitation and a lot of condescension. In order to mansplain you must be able to fulfill two conditions;

1. You must have a penis dangling between your legs, also known as a doctor peeped between your thighs and announced to your parents ‘it’s a boy!’
2. You must assume that everyone who does not pack a penis between their thighs is socially, culturally, religiously, and most importantly, mentally inferior to you.

As this is a beginners manual we won’t want to confuse you by using a lot of big-grammar(which we might not understand ourselves) so we will try and make this as simple as possible. We will also try to remove our tongue from our cheeks since we know that Nigerians don’t do sarcasm, we prefer our slapstick comedies, thank you very much.

Now back to our main subject, mansplaining.

In order to be a good mansplainer, (or at least trying to have some basic knowledge of how to do this shit), you must adhere to the following rules as closely as possible.

• Always start from a place of strength: What do we mean by this? You must always be conscious of the fact that you’re a ‘man’! You don’t need any other strength bro, being a man is enough! You’ve been told this over and again and we are reiterating it, being a man is enough! Being a man gives you superiority over any- and everybody. Being a man (especially in Nigeria) means you can get away with murder, rape, domestic violence, child-marriage and mayhem! (check out the amended 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria). So whether you’re in your teens or an adult, whether you have skills or not, always, always, carry around the consciousness that you’re ‘a man!’. Anytime you start doubting your masculinity, check into the nearest religious centre (Islamic or Christian) and you’ll emerge a new being.
• Be prepared: Whenever you’re in a gathering and you get a whiff of any female around, be hyper-conscious of this fact and get ready to attack or defend whatever idea is being discussed.
• Be condescending: Seriously women don’t know anything, (no we are serious) women are as dumb as two bricks, the only thing they have in their heads (aside from wool) is how to marry and how to have babies and how to beat up side-chicks. Really, women know nothing, starting from this point you’ll never go wrong. So no matter what is being discussed, once a woman makes a contribution to the discussion, remember this fact and look down your nose at them. Curl your lips, and then open that your big mouth and start spouting nonsense.
• Have no fear: Now as we all know being afraid is not a manly trait. You have to be bold and brave at all times. For example if a woman is your lecturer or trainer or boss, make sure you’re ready and willing to correct her errors. Be sure you can tell her she is wrong about things you know absolutely nothing about. The first step is to explain to her what she is trying to say, because we all know women are stupid so she might not really understand what she is saying and it’s in your place to explain the things she’s saying to her. After that tell her YOUR own idea, which is naturally superior because… you’re a man!
• Do not engage: For example let’s say you’re in a gathering, and unfortunately for you, there are only women in the gathering. Let’s say, a training, and you’re the only man there (Oy Vey! What a misfortunate sontin! What a wawuu!) Do not talk to those women, whenever you’re on break, instead of mingling, go and sit down with your phone and chat with your wife, main chick and side chick, but do-not-talk-to-those-women. Why? Because they might start to think that you’re mates and they might laugh at you when you start propounding your ‘manly’ theories.
• Dealing with ‘those women’: There’s always one of them in gatherings these days, women who think they are as smart or even smarter than men. Those ones will never shut up, they might even challenge your ideas! (Shocking… we know). Whenever one of ‘those’ starts their rubbish just remind them that ‘I have one of you at home’. This is particularly important for married men or about to be married men, or men that have girlfriends or side-chicks. The ‘one of you’ that you have at home, might even be your housemaid, your mother or your sister, but be sure you say this and we guarantee that this will shock ‘those women’ into silence. And they will stand in awe of your mental prowress, they will bow at the feet of your intellectual perspicacity, they will kiss your little toeses etcetera, etcetera, etcetera

We know the above points are few but it’s getting really boring this mansplaining topic and one thing we are not, at 9jafeminista, is boring. You want more? Do some research.

The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma – through the eyes of a feminist

In three hundred and one pages, Chigozie Obioma weaves a tale about a family, the family of Eme Agwu, a Banker, who leaves his family in Akure because his employer, the Central Bank of Nigeria, transferred him to Yola.

Back in Akure, his first four boys break free and do the things boys do and more, while under their mother’s watch. An apocalyptic prophecy followed this freedom tumbling the family into a seemingly endless tale of horror.

When you pick a copy of The Fishermen, sit down, and make sure you get a bottle of chilled beer. It will help in the digestion of all the well-manicured sentences in the book, as the book is an intelligent book that says what it intends to say and doles out words, unsparingly, like a generous mother.

While you’re reading it, you will discover that this resplendent book is about the women that waited on their husbands to survive. Women who watched their empire fall apart because of the absence of their husbands, because they have been raised to be nothing but women; primed to depend on men for their survival. And if, per chance, the man of the house leaves, these women wear the gait of a wet mouse and murmur about being left alone with growing boys, and in the case of death, they become petty traders, hawking groundnuts, and raising malnourished sons, having a sea of endless wants and telling tales, running around their houses naked till their almost insane son rapes them, and kills their other son, and finally run mad.

When you encounter the numerous tragedies that are splattered on almost every page of the book, close your eyes to how it pulverizes and pummels the female characters, and simply shrug, after all, they are women; another name for ‘the insignificant other’.

It is horrendous to break a tear for them, and please do not even sniffle like them because it is very womanly to shed a tear.

Real men don’t cry.

Be a REAL man.

Always bear in mind that The Fishermen is a book about a ‘head honcho’ of a father who leaves his home in Akure because his employer prefers him to be in Yola. As he leaves, he leaves his six children with his insignificant other who is ‘only fully realised in presence, the woman whose maternal vigilance falls apart with her husband’s momentary absence’.

It is, therefore, natural that while she carries her children in the earthenware pot she carries on her head, while focussing on the other things in her hands, her four boys break the pot and run free. Bouncing around with their ball to hit the disabled, shatter glass windows, and then when the ball becomes what it shouldn’t be, they become fishermen, fishing in Omi-Ala, that dreadful river where even adults dread to go.

And so, in there, they fish out the madman who utters an ugly prophecy that will fiberize the four fishermen.

And these women, when they weren’t able to bear a child for their dead husbands, wouldn’t mind seeking solace in the loins of a ‘mad’ man, after all, a mad man is also a man. A mad man is better than a drunken husband who comes home naked and couldn’t bring money for his sick child, a man who visits violence on his family when asked to perform his fatherly duties.

Such a man is better off killed with a chair.

Obioma’s The Fishermen depicts the consequences of pushing women to the margin of the society. And even when Eme Agwu sketched a pattern for the future of his children, the functionality of gender, as it stands today, isn’t thrown aside. Ikenna was to be a pilot, Boja was to be a lawyer, Obembe the family’s doctor, Benjamin a Professor, David an engineer, and Nkem… a woman.

This can be an immediate indoctrination for the female child to believe that she is a second class citizen, the one who functions like the vassal conditioned to serve the suzerains, and who in likewise manner, favour their hard deeds in a superior way. In similar vein, the women are expected to serve the men in their lives, and then depend on them for their survival; a system which readily showcases an imbalance of power.

The first sentence shows the boys’ new career as fishermen and the event that sparked up this choice: ‘…father moved out of Akure.’ And the realization of this news created a new mother for the Agwu family. ‘Mother emerged a different being. She had acquired the gait of a wet mouse, averting her eyes as she went about…(9)’ She also missed the church because she was busy priming her primary duty as a woman: taking care of her husband. The news, that her husband would be leaving their six children and the home with her, shook her. She says all she could to dissuade Eme as he drives out of the life they know, but Eme is almost sure that his wife could do it, that she could run the home without him.  Eme, just as the many men who are not aware of the gender problem in Africa, wasn’t aware that in his absence, mother isn’t human enough to keep her boys together because the society had socialized her to shrink herself, to silence herself, to always wait on the man. She is a falconer, who sees all, she staves off all ills from the hills where she stands, however, she couldn’t see that her young birds were fishing curses from the cursed river, Omi-Ala, and she still would not have seen it if her neighbour, Iya Iyabo, did not burst the boys secret.

In fact it is ignorable and forgivable.

The Fishermen does nothing to challenge the society.

The book is a perfect example of why we need to re-evaluate our postures on women and their place in the society. It shows a need for us to reign in our impulse to stereotype the Nigerian woman especially in this day and age and particularly in works of literature.

A society will be safer if it glories in the functionality of its women rather than in their passivity.

*Published by Cassava Republic in 2015, Obioma’s debut novel, TheFishermen, was shortlisted for the 2015 Man Booker Prize.

Ada Chioma Ezeano

 

On Abortion – Bunmi Tella

I was asked where I stood on abortion in Africa….here’s my response…..

I’m definitely pro-choice and hate to see men legislating on matters which they know nothing about.

Just a couple of months ago the Sierra Leonean government tried to pass a bill legalizing first term terminations and it was vetoed by male religious leaders on the basis that it’s a sin. Meanwhile that country has the highest rate of maternal deaths in Africa and since the war a steady increase in incest and rape.

It is unfair that men get to decide such matters without much consideration for the mother – who is essentially then victimized twice.

The uncomfortable truth is that even if it’s not rape or incest, a woman should have the option to say ‘I’m not ready – I cannot handle this’.

A woman having unwanted babies is the fastest path to poverty and misery.

The other day I saw a video of 2 men “fishing” a baby out of a river. It had been abandoned by its mother.

When we force people, who are not ready to be mothers, into motherhood we sentence the child to a lifetime of neglect at best and outright abuse at worse.

Its unwanted children that become victims of sexual, physical, emotional and psychological abuse. Its unwanted children that become thieves, murderers and rapists.

During the first term, the fetus is barely a fetus and if i was a fetus I’d rather be terminated than condemned to a life of misery.

There is a reason China had its one child policy and African governments should be embracing terminations en masse to stop poverty if nothing else.

I don’t understand how you can care so much about some cells the size of a grape in a woman’s body but you can’t bring yourself to care about the abject poverty and the miserable life a huge chunk of your population is condemned to.

 

…A woman is guilty of everything

Let me tell you one small something that happened yesterday morning.

As I alighted from the bus that conveyed me to my work place, a young man was making cat calls. Me, I almost never respond to anyone making psst sounds at me. If you can’t politely call out ‘hello’ or ‘excuse me, please’, then forget the message. But this one was persistent and as though he read my thoughts, he switched to ‘Excuse me!’ So I grinned to myself and turned back to him. He moved closer and pointed at my chest, muttering some words.

Man. You should see the little rush of embarrassment that ran through me as I looked down at my shirt and noticed that all the buttons on my chest region flapped open! And there was no camisole! And I cannot wear full fleshed bras even to save my life! Ha. I thanked him, walked a distance and buttoned up.

But this is what I really want to say: there are many guys who notice such things like a girl stained from her period, a torn slit in a skirt, straying bra straps, panty lines, unzipped trouser, a woman’s wrapper almost falling off and many of such sights. But you know what they do? They ogle and laugh and make jests and point fingers and take pictures and put them up on Instagram and Facebook with captions like ‘bitches’ ‘hoe busted’ ‘o boy, see bobbi’ ‘if they rape this one now, she will start talking’ ‘doomed for hell, indecent bastard’ ‘look at her, no shame. Cannot buy ordinary pad, but can afford that ugly makeup. Winsh’ and many other silly comments that will follow.

We live in a world where a woman is guilty of everything, both what she knows and what she knows not.

©Jennifer Chinenye Emelife

Things Fall Apart and the African Feminist’s Manifesto

In the past few days I have found myself wading through torrents of feminism – the murky, the combative, the conciliatory, the prescriptive, the anxious, the embarrassed, the conservative, the misinformed, THE BADLY MISINFORMED, the ABJECT IGNORANT, the level-headed and the very level-headed.

I confess I was more enervated from resisting the temptation to respond to the arguments flying all over my head like drones than from actually responding. Some time ago, I made a personal vow to never argue either the basics of gender or sexuality with Nigerians. Those who already know do not need the rudiments. Those who do not know are sincerely ignorant and cannot be persuaded. It is a waste of time to convince anybody.

Like Barrister Tade Ipadeola said on a thread, feminism is one of the theories that have been badly taught in Nigerian institutions and one that has equally been badly received. I concur to that.

Last month in Ibadan, someone gave me a book –a festschrift actually- written in celebration of a Nigerian feminist professor. It was a 600 plus paged book. I started reading the Introduction written by some women. They were talking about male gaze and in the same paragraph blamed sexual violence on the way women dress. I closed the book and left it somewhere. Whatever else the book has to say has been destroyed by the poorly thought out and judgmental introduction chapter.

In the past few days however, I have come across so much talk about feminism that I am ready to make an exception just once to talk about feminism; just this once to inform those who have badly received feminism. We need them to understand that feminism is not about mundane exchanges about whether a man or his wife is supposed to cook; that feminism does not begin and end with Facebook posts; that feminism does not threaten the perfect “African culture” or “African marriage” they endlessly rhapsodize about. Instead, what it does is open their eyes to the imbalances they are wilfully blind to.

No knowledge, no philosophy, no thinking, is worth its name if it does not make one uncomfortable or threaten what is believed to be ‘normal’.

One of the arguments I hear over and over again is that there is no patriarchy in African societies; that our mothers were in no way oppressed; that black women are merely copying white women who, in private, are subservient to their own men. This argument has no clear gender divide. Women, especially those cocooned in the privileges their education affords them, rant endlessly about why we should speak of equality and not feminism. These women, ever afraid to be seen as having achieved anything based on gender kick against the appreciation of gender differences and the peculiarities of challenges that arise they spur. This makes me wonder how many generations it will take to undo the insidious effects of male domination in our society.

If you want to speak about equality in African society, draw near and I shall tell you the stories of my grandmother, mother and myself. We –three of us- represent different generations of women; we faced different challenges and I can share a narrative of how the changes in the material culture define what each of us thinks of “patriarchy.”

As an older female child in a Yoruba household, I can tell you that my age gives me certain privileges over my younger brothers. Yoruba institutions are primarily age –not gender- based. Yet, when I step out of my house in Ibadan and walk in the larger Nigerian culture, I am subject to a different dynamic.

One way or the other, we embody the contradictions of the gender relationship in our various ethnic traditions and the larger ones precipitated by forces of colonialism, globalization and other factors that order our contemporary world. These things are more complicated than the simple binary of man/woman; black/white; African/non-African to which some folks reduce every conversation. “Patriarchy” in Africa has never so been simple and shallow. If only people would take time to learn about feminism and its routes through African scholarship, we would have far more meaningful and sensible dialogues.

I understand the frustration of feminists when those who do not know jack, proudly confess they have not read shit, hand out verdicts on feminism.

To illustrate the complications of gender relationships, I turn to Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe. In the book are three women who symbolize different (and contradictory) conditions (and positions) of women in our society at every point.

There is Ani, the earth; Chielo, the priestess; Ojiugo and Ekwefi, Okonkwo’s wives. If you want to argue that the Igbo society Achebe presents is patriarchal without any redeeming value, then you are confronted with the question of why the men would revere a female god. Why should a society like that give any woman regard enough to worship her? If you want to argue that Ani is just a metaphor, an idea, an immaterial being whose principles can structure the culture only because she is disembodied, what do you do with Chielo, a woman so powerful men feared her? If you want to take both Ani and Chielo as the quintessence of African women – powerful and unaffected by the lopsidedness of patriarchy, what do you do with Ojiugo and Ekwefi? In the book, both of the women suffered measures of physical abuse but their conditions were never resolved. Okonkwo was reprimanded for beating a woman in the Week of Peace but not for the act of violence in itself.

Think about it, there is no time that these women are not archetypes of sort and represented in our society.

While you are busy praising the Nigerian society that has “made” women like Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and busy comparing her to every other woman as example of female power in contemporary society, remember, for every Ani, there are women like Ojiugo and Ekwefi whose abuses are not even a subject of conversation. Why did Achebe even create the character of Ezinma (Ekwefi’s daughter)? Why did her father look at her and wished she were male? What underlying critique do you think he was passing across about gender and social prospects?

So for the Nigerian anti-feminist who says feminism is unnecessary because women have never had it so good because they see the Ani and the Chielos of this world, I say leave us who profess feminism to speak for the Ekwefi/Ojiugos. If your life suits you as it is, like Barack Obama’s insurance, we say “keep it!” Nobody is asking you not to cook for your husband or to marry a woman who gets an orgasm from watching the pots boil in her kitchen-office. That is your life but your life is not everybody’s life. If you know how much the world that you thrive in has benefited from feminist ideology, you would think twice before running it down to embrace that illusion of your perfect African life.

PAMELA ADIE: LGBT RIGHTS ADVOCATE, FEMINIST, QUEER

9jafeminista: Did you ever feel different while growing up?

Pamela Adie: Different. That’s a word I was very afraid of while growing up. I never felt different per se. In my head I believed I was “normal” like everyone else. Growing up was enjoyable. I was allowed to be a kid and I was a kid. I played outside a lot, ate a lot of food, played with my siblings, had lots of toys, a loving family, hated school (LOL) and loved riding bicycles and crashing toy cars… So, my growing up years were lots of fun.

9jafeminista: Why were you afraid of that word? Different that is…

Pamela Adie: I wanted to fit in. I wanted to be like every other girl. Society indirectly prescribes ways in which females should behave and as children we never question that. We just do as we see and as we are told. So, to be different was scary. I mean, who will be friends with the girl who is different? Since I wanted lots of friends, different was scary.

9jafeminista: Would you say you’re still afraid of being seen as different now?

Pamela Adie: No, I’m over that now. Sometimes I think I am different personified. Everything about my appearance screams different. For starters I have Locs and that sets me apart already because many Nigerian women have long weaves or braids. Very few of us carry locs. Right now, I enjoy the fact that I walk into a room and everyone can see that I’m different. I stand out. It’s a lovely feeling! Sometimes, poeple see different as bad. Different is not neccessarily bad – it’s just different, and that can be a good thing.

9jafeminista: Would you say this feeling of being different has influenced your career choice/path?

Pamela Adie: Not so much my career choice, but certainly influenced my passion – advocating for equals right for the LGBT community and women. These two groups that are very marginalized, but my LGBT brothers and sisters are often discriminated against because they are different. This is a great injustice. Treating people differently because they are different is very dangerous and that fuels my passion.

9jafeminista: As a Nigerian and a queer woman what do you think of the narratives around sex and women in our part of the world?

Pamela Adie: Africans in general, and most particularly women, are taught not to talk about sex, not to be sexual or express our sexual desires. This is a taboo topic ingrained in our minds, right from when we’re children. I believe suppressing sexual desires or not talking about sex is harmful to everyone, and women in particular. Some women go through life having never experienced an orgasm because they cannot tell their partners what pleases them or where they would like to be touched. As a queer woman, it is more difficult to talk about sex.

It’s already considered a taboo to be queer, and sexual orientation is generally a sensitive topic. However, we find that narratives around sexual orientation are mostly portrayed in a negative light. I have always believed that if I do not like the story, I can change the narrative by contributing to it.

9jafeminista: In what ways are you doing contributing to these conversations?

Pamela Adie: Well, I recently started a blog, www.dizzlesbay.blogspot.com, where I tell personal stories about my struggle with my sexuality and how I got to the point of self-acceptance. I feel it is important for queer people in Nigeria to hear these stories because it gives hope. Most importantly, people need to know that they are not alone. I share my stories with the hope that others will be inspired to do the same. Together, we can create positive narratives around sex, sexuality, and women.

It is also important to expose the negative effects of homophobia and draw attention to how it affects everyone, not just queer women.

9jafeminista: What do you think of the impact feminism has had in Nigeria? Would you say we’ve made a lot of headway just are things still the same?

Pamela Adie: I believe even an inch progress is progress nonetheless. For starters, we are at point where we can have a discussion about feminism. That in itself is a positive thing and the conversation should be continued. I have had interactions with many people and when the issue of feminism came up I discovered that a lot are ignorant about what feminism is about. A lot of people think that feminism is only supported by lesbians or women who can’t find husbands and what not. I try to bring them to the point where they understand that feminism is about men and women having equal access to economic, social opportunities. Then I see the ignorance begin to fade. So, while significant progress has been made in changing attitudes, I think a lot of work still needs to be done in education and enlightenment to bring about the change we desire.

9jafeminista: How did it feel acknowledging your preference for women and then having to come out to members of your family?

Pamela Adie: When referring to my sexuality, I don’t like the word “preference” because it seems to suggest there is a choice. But my sexual orientation is not a choice I made. That is just how I am. So, acknowledging my sexual orientation to myself was a very interesting experience, and you can read all about it on my blog. More than anything, I felt FREE! Many people do not realize that for queer people, we first have to come out to ourselves before we come out to anyone else. That process is empowering. I also describe how I came out to my family on my blog, but I can tell you that it was scary and unpredictable. I did not know what to expect. But it was very rewarding because it opened my eyes to things I did not know existed in my family.

9jafeminista: Thanks so much Pamela for taking us into your world. One final question, what are your sentiments about the Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act(SSMPA) passed last year by former president Goodluck Jonathan?

Pamela Adie: The SSMPA is a discriminatory law, and serves no purpose whatsoever. It is the kind of law that discriminates against people simply because they are different, not because they harm anyone. Furthermore, it infringes on the rights of all Nigerians, not just LGBT Nigerians. It is a harmful law and it should be repealed.