Personhood and Bodily Autonomy: aka Who owns the breast? The man or the Baby?

One of the funniest jokes in the whole wide world, and one of the most serious question is … who owns the breast? Man or baby.

Now you might think we are exaggerating but we dare you go to any gathering where alcohol and food is flowing in abundance, and a lady with an amazing posterior, aka breast, passes by, and come back with that claim of exaggeration.

This topic has been discussed for years, accompanied by titters and uncomfortable avoidance of one another’s eyes, but it never loses it’s freshness … who owns the breast?

Ownership is the operative word here.

A sitting senator, Shehu Sanni, last year did a brave thing, something that most Nigerian politicians shy away from. He declared his assets.

This honest and forthright deed broke more than the taboo of asset declaration and Nigerian politicians, it also broke the silence on what an average Nigerian man considers his property.

Senator Shehu Sanni – Hero of our democracrazy

Senator Sani Jibril listed his wives and children in the asset declaration form. And instead of being outraged, Nigerian journals praised him for this heroic deed with the blazing headline Meet The Senator That Declared His Wives Among His Assets….Right Or Wrong?

Actually, the headline was clickbait for those nosey feminists and gender rights activists, because the content of the article did not question the rightness or wrongness of his declaration. It simply went on about his ‘bravery’ and ‘heroism’.

Let’s be candid, we know that a lot of Nigerian men consider their wives and children as their property. And post-birth, women are ‘allowed’ by their husbands to ‘breastfeed’ the baby, with the ‘understanding’ that the breasts actually, really, truly belongs to him.

Don’t get us wrong, women also discuss this ‘important’ issue with a lot of tittering.

Wikipedia defines bodily integrity[autonomy] as the inviolability of the physical body and emphasizes the importance of personal autonomy and the self-determination of human beings over their own bodies. It considers the violation of bodily integrity as an unethical infringement, intrusive, and possibly criminal.

In simple English, Wikipedia is saying that your body belongs to you, to do with as you like. Bodily autonomy is your right, as backed up by Universal Declaration of Human Rights, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and The African Charter on Human and People’s Rights.

The question is why do Nigerian men believe they OWN a woman’s body?

Culture: They believe that once they pay ‘bride price’ this means they have bought their wives. Actually any man who thinks this way is recognized under the law as a criminal, because in a sense, you’re admitting that you’ve partaken in human trafficking.

Religion: Many clerics, both in Nigeria and other parts of the world are fond of misquoting and taking things stated in their different holy books out of context.

Sexism: The sexism prevalent in the country, due to the fact that a lot more value has been placed on a male child, gives men the impression that they have the right to the body of any woman they meet. That’s why the boys at Yaba, or any large market, would grab at any girl they see, sexual harassment is rampant in both schools and offices, unchecked. Because men have been taught that women are less, that they are the head, women are … sidekicks.

And why do women take it? Because of the above listed, and a lot of us don’t know that we have the power to sue harassers … and win! Check this out … Former Microsoft Nigeria Employee gets N39m for unlawful Sack after Sexual Harassment and this Supreme Court – Female Child can Inherit Property in Igboland.

Yes we understand how utterly outrageous it is that we are celebrating these victories in 2016! But it’s a start and we know we are not alone, or helpless, or have to submit to dehumanization because culture or religion or the patriarchy says so.

Now back to the question – who owns the breast? Man or the baby?

Please answer the question with the fear of Universal Declaration of Human Rights, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and The African Charter on Human and People’s Rights… who owns the breast?

…You give away your power the moment you start to believe that you have none…

How to Identify Witches

Witches are the bane of our lives in Nigeria, and that’s a fact! After spending years avoiding them by not going to the village or having anything to do with our illiterate relatives (because those people are prone to witchcraft), it appears that these people simply refuse to leave us alone! They’ve moved their ministry to towns and cities all across the country. The end-of-the-world is truly nigh! In fact Jesus should just come now!

As if we don’t have enough to deal with, everything is going to hell in a hand-basket! There are the feminists, the gays, the Illuminatis and all sorts that we have to battle with on cyberspace, now the witches are trying to take over!

Don’t get us wrong, we know that witches don’t really exist, it’s just that they do! They eat pregnancies, kill children, steal destinies, make people’s private parts disappear and sometimes make announcements in the newspapers concerning political parties!

Witches have taken over *insert hysteria*!

We at 9jafeminista, your ever-so-helpful-blogzine, have taken it upon ourselves, at the risk of losing our vaginas, penises, boobs and destinies,  to help you identify all the witches that might have moved into your neighbourhood, churches, offices or (horror!) homes. These helpful tips might be the saviour of your destiny, and maybe some money because you won’t have to take these people to spiritual leaders (who might charge you an arm and a leg because money is the vehicle of the ‘good news’ or is it that money is the root of all evil? But we won’t worry about those distinctions now)

The steps:

Skin tone: the first thing you have to do when meeting new people is to gauge their skin tones. As we all know black is the colour of evil, so how many shades of black is this black person you’re meeting? Is it warm brown? Dirty brown? Black-black? Dirty black? Blue-black? Night black? B-b-b-b-b-black!? The darker the skin tone of a person, the more likely they are to be witches. There are some yellow witches too but those ones are related to Mammy-Wata, so we won’t bother with those just yet. On the other hand, too much of a good thing is bad. So, those extremely yellow persons, who look as if they are newly ripened mangos, might just be witches!

Age- this is another telling indicator of witchcraft. Really old people are witches! Honestly! Look at it this way, Nigeria is the worst country in the world to grow to a ripe old age! Studies have it that the life expectation of an average Nigerian is forty years. What with the bad roads, terrible to non-existent health-care facilities, lassa fever, etcetera, forty years is even too long! So why would anyone dare to live for more than 60years and then get wrinkled and stooped, and black and talking to themselves and confessing to witchcraft… in saner climes some of these old people would have even been diagnosed with dementia, or Alzheimer’s, or depression, but luckily we are Nigerians and sanity is not our strong suit. All old people, including your granny, are witches! Avoid them at all costs! Encourage your children NOT to visit their grannies, aka your parents, because ALL OLD PEOPLE ARE WITCHES!

… Wait a second, young people are witches too! Yes we said it! Especially those ill-educated young girls from the villages. They usually come to town with all their earthly goods in a black polythene bag, most of the stuff in the bags are rags sef, in fact they wear rags all the time! We’ve heard of a young village girl whose clothes would turn to a rag as soon as she wears them, yup, like reverse Cinderella! These girls are about seven or eight years old and they’ve never been to school before in their lives! And their parents have sold them to be given out as housemaids! And they are poor because of the state of the economy and their parents can barely afford to feed them. These young witches are wicked! They don’t even take their baths even after being brought to the city! They are not to be trusted with babies! We all know there is absolutely NOTHING wrong with employing a six or seven year old as a housemaid, especially to take care of 3month old babies. There is NOTHING wrong with waking these children up at 5am to take care of our ajebutter children who can barely lift a finger! Please, please, as soon as you employ any of these children… better still don’t!

Sex – not that type you perv! We mean the sex assigned to you as soon as the doctor pulls you out of your mother’s womb and either spots a penis or a vagina. Sex is a huge determinant of whether you’re a witch or not, because, this might come as a shock to you, so brace yourself… women are witches! Yup! How many men have been accused of witchcraft and stoned to death? While you’re counting let’s just tell you something, it’s only women that are witches, especially and particularly poor women, or single to stupor women, or women who do not meet up with the current societal standard of beauty, or women who have not taken refuge under the benevolent patriarchal arms and conformed to societal rules or women who have crossed eyes, or women who have beards or women whose mouth are too sharp, or women who don’t have children, or women who are really not womanly enough, but most importantly, they are poor women, disempowered women, women suffering from mental health problems, women who are not soft enough.

There are too many women out there who are witches and we need to strip them down (very important to humiliate them) and then stone them. We’ll need a lot of stones though because these women make up the larger part of the society. But we can do this! Stone every single one of them, one woman at a time! Are we misogynists? No we don’t hate women! We are Nigerians, and we love our women with big bum-bums and tits! It’s just that those women who have turned down our advances and women who think too highly of themselves and women who don’t have big yanshes are witches! Women who refuse to SUBMIT, should be stoned to death, all of them!

Defying Gravity: THIS RIGHT HERE IS THE GREATEST OF THEM ALL! Kai! How can a mere human being defy gravity! Defying gravity comes in different forms, from jumping all the time, to putting your legs on the wall when you’re asleep, to morphing into birds (big black birds particularly, don’t forget black is the colour of ugly and evil) and to levitating. Hian! We’ve all read or watched badly filmed shots of old black women morphing into birds and FLYING! We all know about planes and helicopters and other things that fly, although most of us don’t know how these things perform this feat but we climb into planes without giving it a second thought! But the moment we smell a human being flying we just KNOW that these people are witches! Especially and particularly if they are dark skinned and are women. Flying is a sin! Are we sinners when we fly in an airplane? No! Should we be stoned to death? No! but the moment we hear that a non-oyinbo person is flying or has flown we congregate and stone the person to death because those people are witches! We do enjoy watching movies about monsters and vampires and human beings morphing into animals, well as long as they are Hollywood movies, those Nollywood people know how to treat such sin! Anybody who can fly in say, England or America would obviously be taken an interest in by the government and scientifically analysed, their methodology thoroughly studied. In Nigeria we stone them to death because we do not tolerate such nonsense! We like ourselves the way we are, our Ministry of ‘Science and Technology’ will soon be inventing pencils… you heard me right! We are just in the nick of time because pencils are yet to be invented. We are not backwards, we are forwards, we are brilliantly, shamelessly, and insanely fearful of anything that’s in the least different! Let fear continue to dodge our footsteps, let it rule us, let fear eat us from the insides out, that’s the way we’ve survived all these years by fearing even our shadows.

We hope these helpful tips will continue to guide and guard us throughout our lives, we shall continually tell our children and ourselves not to read books by Nigerians or other Africans about fantasy, although they can read ‘furreign’ books so they can acquire ‘furrigne’ accents and speak through their nostrils, ‘nspirin nspirin’. Do NOT let us progress beyond an economy of consumerism, do not let us invent anything new. Let our young women and men ‘disrupt’ how we import shit from other countries, while those other countries invent new things.

Finally, if all else fails we advise you to do The Mirror Test

The Mirror Test: This test has been passed down from one generation of witch-hunters to the next, the steps are very simple:-

1. Clean your mirror with soft cloth and white powder. Make sure it is sparkling.
2. Cover the mirror at 12midnight with a white cloth. Note that the mirror must be COMPLETELY COVERED.
3. Have a good night’s rest knowing that the witches haunting you shall be revealed soon
4. After 24hrs (i.e. 12 midnight the following day)
5. Take off all your clothes, including your underwear
6. Stand in front of the covered mirror
7. Close your eyes
8. Shout ‘Yeepa!’ Thrice
9. Pull off the mirror covering
10. The person you’re seeing in that mirror? That’s the witch eating your destiny!

Wait… can any of you explain how the internet works?

SEXISTS, FEMINISTS AND THAT SPACE BUS RIDE INTO 2016

This year has seen a resurgence in women finding their voices and refusing to be shut down…

This year has seen the transformation of your garden variety, everyday sexist into… The Thing!

For some of us that are not comic or cartoon  or Manga buffs, The Thing is this mild-mannered young man who can hardly swallow even the water that has been placed on his lips. But watch him ‘rub’ his balls rings together … And he becomes this huge,  destructive troll with anger management problems.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sorry wrong picture

Yup this picture…

So The Thing is the representative of the Nigerian Sexist Troll Cabal. A bunch of misogynistic types with mummy or daddy issues.

This does not leave out the ‘cultural’ troll cabal like marketing outfits

Bloggers who have perfected the art of victim blaming by turning stories upside down…

The sheer El Stupido

And the most heartbreaking… Parents

But seriously you troll cabal guys need to up your game because it appears your bullying game is getting old…

Of course feminists don’t take any prisoners…

Like bang!

Boom!

Boom!

Oh and a quick reminder

Happy New Year!!!

The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Fuckboys: Editorial

Fuckboys are a special breed. These set of people have one mind, one hope, one future. They have truly transcended the barriers usually imposed by class, gender, race, sexuality, religion and marital status. And we at 9jafeminista have this to say – ‘fuckboys of the world unite!’

We have noticed, however, that some people are doing it all wrong, they have aspirations to join the Fuckboy Club but they are struggling, and people, the struggle is real.

Luckily for you, we at 9jafeminista have spent years observing and studying these special set of human beings and have been able to come up with seven simple habits that will take you into the Kingdom (yes it’s a male dominated thing) of fuckboyism.

1. Group think: Fuckboys do not have one original idea in their heads, anybody who thinks outside of this rarefied group will have a lot of problems fitting in and might suffer from a social disorder called ‘relational aggression’ the result of which is ostracism and heaven forbid you be ostracized or have to stand out or be considered different. You have to monitor trending topics and contribute accordingly. Fitting in has never been so easy, all you need is a phone and internet connectivity then support the most popular opinions.
2. Bling: It is important that you dress the part. Successful fuckboys worldwide are known to wear designer clothes and accessories. You need to let people know that these items are high end stuff. You need an Instagram account to post your many pictures of clothes, accessories and their labels MUST SHOW. Fortunately you don’t need to be too rich to wear all these things, Aba boys and the Chinese have made these things dirt cheap. The logo of your designer must be displayed in a very obvious position.
3. Religion: To be a fuckboy you need to belong to one of the many religions, but if you’re a Nigerian, you need to be either a Christian or a Muslim. Do not join groups like the Hare Krishna or claim you’re a Buddhist. You don’t need to go deep into these religions or read their many books. The point is to be able to refer to a bible or Quran passage to back up some of the ignorant things you say.
4. Sexism: Highly successful fuckboys are sexists and you need to get this shit right. You have to say a lot of shit like ‘women are the weaker vessel’, ‘men should provide for their families’, ‘unmarried single ladies of a certain age are sluts’, ‘feminists are men hating, bitter, forever single women who have failed at marriage’. Not only do you have to say these things you need to actually believe they are true. And they are Universal Truths, according to fuckboys. Everybody knows that women are the worst drivers in the world and real men don’t cry. Women are irrational creatures, real men don’t wear pink. Refer to point no 1 above if you’re in doubt, group think is the ish.
5. Homophobia: Another important aspect of being a fuckboy is homophobia. You need to have an irrational hatred of all lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people. You need to ignore the fact that your uncle, dad, mum, sister, brother, friend, cousin or even you belong to this group (although they try hard to hide it). You need to believe that all queer people wear baby pampers and are out to ‘recruit’ you. Whenever you’re out drinking with your friends or exchanging bants with them online, always make sure you drop words like, ‘pink is such a gay colour, I will never wear pink.’
6. Trolling: Get your troll game on. You need to perfect this game. Anybody who disagrees with you or troll fuckboy cabal must feel the wrath of the gods. You can learn trolling by simply retweeting other fuckboy cabal members, then you up your game by responding to people you disagree with (mostly women and feminists – either male or female). And the final step is by starting a troll game ALL BY YOURSELF. While trolling you can cast doubt on the ‘masculinity’, ‘marriageability’ and ‘richness’ of your victim. Make references to the body parts of your victim eg ‘see your droopy breasts’, ‘your yansh is too flat for the big grammar you’re speaking’, ‘carry your pimply face off my tl’ etc. You must be vicious, no prisoners taken. Use sentences like ‘anti go and marry’, ‘you’re nothing but a hoe’, ‘your body count must be over a million by now’. When people talk about rape take it personal and call them liars, ask them what they were wearing when they got raped, talk about the time a girl or a boy came to your house at 9pm and refused to give you ‘show’.
7. DM Sliding: Follow a lot of girls and women, especially the type you know can never give you the time of the day, slide into their DM’s or inboxes. Make your opening words very attractive, you can start with stuff like ‘Hey beautiful, who’s preeking you?’ or send dick pics, if the girl refuses to reply to your dm, kindly go and insult her very well so that she will know that you’re not to be trifled with. You can also do this in real life by catcalling ‘fine girls’ and when they ignore you yell insults at them, take particular care to talk about how they are dressed like ‘prostitutes’ and how they are ugly, also tell them that they will never find ‘husband’ because they will never find someone like you.

This list is in no way exhaustive, there’s the fact that fuckboys believe marriage is the only reason women were placed on earth, that women must have children because that’s the whole essence of their being. Support the ‘pro-life’ movement. Make stupid comments on how women should behave, dress, be…

We wish you luck in your bid to be the best fuckboy ever!

Editorial: 12 Yards of Wife Material for Christmas (II)

6. Must not be too bookish: …by the time you’re done with schooling, you’re in your early twenties! Already some men consider you overage, the ideal age for marriage, in Nigeria, is between ten and twelve … but … these days some Nigerian men have become more patient, they’d still manage you in your early twenties. The trouble starts when you decide you want a postgraduate degree! Do you know what that certificate is called? It is called a Master’s Degree! You want to marry and you go and be getting something called a MASTERS do you want to be struggling that masculine title with your husband? Well, some sisters now push things further and go for a doctorate! Let’s reason this thing together, first you get a BACHELORS (mannish), then you get a MASTERS (more mannish) then you get a DOCTORATE (most mannish). My sister, your wife material has just disintegrated! The men out there with a list in their pockets, looking for wife would have no problem with all these titles if there was a way of distinguishing all these bookish things and making them more feminine, for example if the Bachelor Degree was called a SPINSTER Degree, the Masters a MISTRESS and the Doctorate a NURSERATE … our advice? Never ever disclose your age to anybody, even if you have to go to Oluwole to get a fake birth certificate and secondly, do not be ambitious, even if you have all these degrees you have to pretend you have never crossed the gates of a school before, do not think … do not breathe! Just be A WIFE MATERIAL… Dass all!
7. Must be great in bed: Being great in bed is an art that must be mastered by all women who are keen to be wife materials (don’t worry a masters in bedmatics is alright). You have to be great in bed without being slutty or sexy (we’ve already defined being slutty in the first installment as enjoying sex). So you have to master all those porn star moves without enjoying them. All your moves are to be learnt in order to please the lord and master. The gymnastics are not for you, you must somehow learn all these things without having to practice (remember the ‘body count’ wahala), you need to get it by divine inspiration, because wife materials neither watch, nor read porn. You have to be great in bed without being great in bed so that your husband will not suspect you of cheating on him.
8. Must be Forgiving: Have you ever seen a poem written in honour of a woman who did not forgive her man before? No,

   

   Original Art by Kehinde Awofeso

   seriously, how many songs have you listened to sung by a man in honour of a woman who kicked out his drunken, cheating, wife-beating ass? How many times have you seen a man, all dressed up in his best suit, taking his ex out for dinner to thank her for ending her relationship with him? When you’re out and about, exchanging gossips with your friends, how many times have you heard somebody praise a woman who said ‘rather than give myself heartache/regular black eyes/ drag home a perpetual drunk, I’d stick with being alone’. You’ll note that most poets write for their mothers who ‘suffered’ to raise them, the operative word here is suffer. You’ll be a gem only if you had to sell firewood by the roadside to send your children to school, no child has ever written a poem for a single parent who has enough money to pay school fees, or enough left over to give her children the good life, only the suffering wife and mother gets all the eulogies. Therefore, for your wife material to be complete, you must, of necessity be forgiving and ready to suffer. You must always have an ‘I’ve forgiven you’ placard hidden somewhere about your person in case you need to forgive your man, at any point. Your man lied to you about his income? Forgive him. He’s just a man with a fragile ego, and it’s your fault for not noticing that he borrowed those Louboutins, and that the car he used to take you out on all those dates belonged to his older sister. Your man cheats on you regularly? Forgive him. Those ones are the side-chicks, you’re the main chick, you’ve won the lottery of cooking and caring for him, and when you get uncontrollably jealous, fight the side chicks, whip them well-well, cuss them out on Facebook, sub them on Twitter, but always, always forgive your man. After all how else can he prove his manhood except by dashing preek to every pretty girl(or boy) that passes by?

9. Must be the neck: The neck, is the most important part of the body … well, except that the head is more important. But to be a wife material, you cannot, must not, even consider the possibility of becoming the head … of anything! Why? Because your husband must be the head and you the neck, silly! You know that prayer they say in church, the one about being the ‘head and not the tail’ , the next time you’re in church or in any public space where prayers are (necessarily or unnecessarily) being offered up, just say, ‘I’m the neck and not the head’ at top volume and watch proposals pour in by the bucketful. The neck is the most important part of the body because it tells the head where to turn, except that the head contains the brain which gives the neck the direction it should go. Clear ehn? Leave the thinking to the head, remember you’re there for the cooking, the bearing of children, the satisfaction of celebrating your golden/silver/ diamond wedding anniversary and most importantly for those children to call you blessed. You do want to be that crumpled looking old woman, in that sepia picture, with that slightly sad smile on your face.
10. Must make sacrifices: Now this is very important for anybody seeking husband. To be wife material, you have to understand that men are ‘inherently selfish’, they can’t help it, it’s their nature, just as it’s in their nature not to cry. Real men shouldn’t be called to make sacrifices so that you don’t turn them into ‘women’. Your man thinks you’re too educated? Drop out of school. Your man thinks you’re dangerously earning more than he is? Resign from your job. You are the one who was made to be nailed to the cross, the sacrificial lamb. You must be ready to give up everything you are to satisfy ‘your man’, even if he’s a lot of other ladies’ man, remember, you are the ‘main chick’.
11. Must be prayerful: According to non-existent statistics Nigeria is the holiest nation on the face of the earth, everybody is either a Christian or a Muslim, anybody who is not a member of a church or a mosque is a member of the illuminati. Truth. So as a wife material you must be prayerful, there are so many books out there for women (yes you may read religious books but not any other immoral literature) with titles such as Praying Wives, Praying Mothers, Preying Mantis, sorry … Praying Church. You must be ready to lead preyer … sorry … prayers at the drop of a hat, especially when travelling by public transportation, in an office meeting, at book launchings etcetera. The longer and louder you can pray, the longer your wife material becomes. Be the first to volunteer to bring tea for the men whenever there’s an office meeting, even if you’re a manager, always have your writing pad ready whenever you’re to attend important meetings in case the secretary is not around. Make sure you type ‘amen’ under all those weird pictures on Facebook showing mutilated bodies, ‘like’ all posts that have prayers on them and says that anybody that likes the post will get all their prayers answered. Retweet every post by every demented preacher on twitter, especially ones titled ‘Letter to Jeel’.
12. Must be Certain: You must be absolutely convinced that we are all not equals, that men and women are not first and most importantly human beings, beings who are flawed and perfect at the same time. You must be certain that everybody with a pair of breasts and a vagina is a woman and everybody with a penis is a man. You must not question beliefs, you must not dare entertain the thought that single people can be deliriously happy, or that there are men out there who don’t have this list. You must be absolutely convinced that every person who is not ‘wife material’ will be miserable and only those who do live happily ever after. You must be sure of your generalizations and stereotyping… you must receive your 12yards of wife material this Christmas, by faya by force, IJN (type ‘Amen’ in the comments section to receive this impartation).

 

Editorial: 12 yards of Wife Material for Christmas (I)

A friend of ours and her twin sister are quite accomplished in their chosen fields, fierce, strong, independent women in their early thirties, living fulfilled lives… but their mother is worried, emm, they are not married and worse still, they are not wife material at all!

culled from myweddingnigeria.com

One of them read engineering and is a fantastic money manager, she’s already started acquiring properties and she’s  good at fixing things like furniture, fixtures, generators, cars … did we mention generators? And oh, she has this unfortunate propensity for not wearing skirts and gowns, she’d rather wear trousers, because she finds them comfortable and she wears her hair in a low cut, because … it is easier to maintain.

Nope! Not wife material at all!

Her twin sister is her complete opposite, quiet, reserved, loves keeping house and cooking, all soft curves and elegant gowns and dangling earrings. She wears gorgeous make-up and soft scenting perfumes that reminds you of the woman placed on a pedestal by the patriarchy … BUT she told her mother, quite frankly, that having children is not something she owes her, and as far as she’s concerned, if her mother wanted more grandchildren, she might as well go and adopt them.

Nope! Not wife material at all!

Being wife material is quite simple – Nigerian men have had this list since… oh well, since we left our proverbial cave and stopped grunting.

As we at 9jafeminista, want all you Nigerian girls out there to find husband, we are kindly listing twelve of these ‘qualities’ so that you can, well, grab yourself a husband… now!

Here it goes.

Qualities of wife material

1. Must be soft: Yup, all you butch ladies out there who love jogging, weightlifting, boxing, footballing etceteraetceteraetcetera! Must stop it now! Please I beg of you, stop going around with your bulging muscles, it is quite threatening. Let your stomachs be rounded, your hips flare, let that your bumbum that the good Lord gave you jiggle and wiggle, so that anytime Timaya comes and sing, ‘shake your bum-bum’ your bumbum will actually wiggle and not do that stiff ‘useless bottom shaken by force’ thing. And if you don’t have it, fake it! There are fake bumbums out there ladies, all you need to do is spend a few thousand naira to buy a strap-on … sorry to buy a fake bum. This advise applies to slender ladies with boy-like hips too. Your husband must come this year IJN! Soft can also apply to your brain … you know … as in ‘soft-in-the-head’.
2. Must be tough: Wife materials are tough, hardworking disciplinarians, able to carry a baby in one arm, a mortar and pestle in the other hand, and the troubles of the world on her head! How you’ll manage to do all these without developing muscles is no concern of the men, just do it! A wife material is Superwoman! You don’t know who she is? Google is your answer. This woman is strong (note: without muscles or moustache or bea-bea) she can cook a meal for a family of five or six (or seven) with five hundred naira, she must know how to stare down peppersellers and butchers (without looking like a man) and deal with her family with a firm hand. The thing is you must not be tough … like a man. Only men can be tough … like a man, women are to be tough … like a … umm … brb
3. Must know how to cook/clean: Let your inner housemaids out ladies, do not hold it back. Some girls claim they’d

   

   audrina1759.wordpress.com

   rather cook than clean while others claim they’d rather clean than cook. To be a wife material, you do not have a choice in this matter. Hold your mops, brooms and ironing board in one hand, and the cooking stove in the other. Luckily for you the federal government of Nigeria has decided to help you out in this by deciding to buy every woman cooking stoves! Yayest! So what are you waiting for? And when we say cooking, we don’t mean those noodles cooking girls o! We are talking REAL food for REAL men. Food like – Pounded Yam (don’t go and cheat by cooking that fake poundo! You need a proper pestle and mortar for this), amala, eba, edika-ikong, starch, okro, fish stew and lots of beef! Your man needs good food to be able to perform his manly duties! Abeg don’t go and hire a housemaid o! The under-aged ones are totally useless and the young ladies will just snatch the husband that you have worked so hard for … this will not be your portion IJN!

4. Must be sexy: Presently sexy means curvy – big yansh, flat stomach, big breast, perfectly made up face. None of those sloppy skirt wearing thing. If you want to wear jeans do the tight ones that show your hips to an advantage, no dressing like boys. Being sexy in a ‘responsible’ way will get you a husband with the snap of a finger. You must be sexy in a kind of way that is not seductive… classy sexy… sexily unalluring, baring your breasts without baring it, emphasizing your big yansh in a discreet way, you do not want to give the impression that you are being sexy while you are being sexy, you do not want to wear clothes that will ‘tempt’ men all the while ‘tempting’ them. You don’t understand? Neither do we…
5. Must be ‘not slutty’: A wife material cannot afford to be slutty. Being slutty is the beginning of the tearing of your wife material into pieces. Being slutty means you’re no longer a virgin, it means your ‘body count’ is higher than… umm … one. It means you enjoy sex (oin?). You must be demure, you cannot afford to enjoy sex, asking for an orgasm is the undoing of you. A wife material does not like sex, she is frigid, she allows her man to have sex with her for one reason only – to bear children. As a woman, your totality is your womb, and to guarantee that your womb is in perfect working order so that the Great Black Man with a Huge Dick can impregnate you … your womb must remain unsullied, your ovaries must jump with joy, your monthly period must flow and that is the reason why you must remain a virgin, so that you will not come and be going to spoil your womb. But … the good news sisters, is that if your body count is higher than two, as long as you ‘confess’ your sins to your ‘man’ and reduce your body count, you can still have your 12yards of wife material. Which means, if you have a body count of like say … 10, you can ‘confess’ two, to your man so … you can thank us by sending us a piece of your wedding cake.
6. Must not be too bookish: The problem with women who read too much is that, they have a big problem. Their problems are quite many. Some of them read so much they go and acquire second and third degrees, the ones that are quite stark raving mad are those who acquire PhD’s … I mean who in the world, planning to have that happily ever after marriage that has eluded so many people – does that? The worse ones are the ones that acquire their PhD’s while still single! Let’s do the maths together. You spend four to five years (from birth) in a nursery school, you spend the next six years in primary school, another six years in secondary school(sixteen whole years wasted already!) Then you go and do a first degree for four plus x years (the Nigerian university system is weird, you spend nothing less than six years plus to read a four year course) and that’s not adding the three years or so you spent resitting JAMB and GCE …(to be continued)

Michaela Moye: On Career, Love, Sex and Orgasms

Michaela at work

9jafeminista: Let’s talk about your job(s) then, what you’re doing presently what you’ve done in the past… That big dream you chase after…

Michaela Moye: Ooookaaay!!! My jobs…They’ve been many! I remember someone told me to cut out some of my jobs so my CV doesn’t make me look like a flake. (Laughs) I love every job I’ve had. Right now, I’m a producer and a show host (I hate that OAP acronym), anyway, I’m a producer and host on We 106.3 FM, I recently moved from producing Love Talk to working on Morning Mojo – I like that. Even though I loved working on romance and sex stories, I like the fact that on Morning Mojo we handle more gritty topics (not that love cannot be gritty) but my feminist agenda can really soar here, I think.

I am living my career dream, as far as the type of work I would like to do is concerned. Ever since I was a teen, I wanted to be involved in radio. A few years ago, I joined an awesome team to script a radio drama and now, I’m producing and hosting. It’s great!

Before this, I had a temporary communications position at ActionAid Nigeria, another great experience.

My first job was at Leadership newspaper. I was at university – there was a long break and I needed a job. While discussing my love for writing with Kareem Baba Aminu (he’s now the editor of Sunday Trust), he said, “Why don’t you write for Leadership?” And that was it…my sister helped me get the ball rolling and I was hired. My first day of work, the newsroom door was opened, I was shoved in and told, “find something to do.” So I did. I read copy until I convinced my boss to let me have a column. My first article was on Prince Charles and Camilla’s wedding!

After that I ran a column there for a few years, until I graduated university. By then I had a few pages to my credit. I skipped law school to continue working there and it was a great year – I went on a short tour with some Naija music acts and reported the whole thing. It was amazing

9jafeminista: In the course of doing your job have you met with any kind of sexism? Maybe not as extreme as the one that happened between you and Marang Motlaleng, but sexism all the same

Michaela Moye: Yes. I had a co-worker at leadership who would refer to me as ‘baby’. When I told him I didn’t like it, he apologized. But guess what, my nickname became baby! I laugh about it now because I know he didn’t have bad intentions. To be honest, I find newsrooms to be rather sexually charged. So sometimes, a comment might be sexist, but sometimes it’s flirting or banter with sexual undertones.

One colleague kept harassing me to date him. My then boss thought it was funny that I kept refusing the guy – we were both single, why not give it whirl? I kept saying NO! That’s not the point! Just because we’re single doesn’t mean I want to date the guy. The last straw was when the colleague went to our boss to have a heart-to-heart about his feelings for me and could our boss talk to me? I was so mad. After I had my say, he stopped asking me out.

But that’s about it…my competence has never been questioned or anything like that

9jafeminista: What’s your take on love?

Michaela Moye: I believe that true love is not romantic, romance is deceptive. A person can be romantic with several people at the same time. As for as my thoughts on marriage… I don’t think it’s for everybody… at least, not in the conventional way… a couple living together all the time etc. I’m not big on long distance but God knows that when I get married, I will maintain a place for myself where I can just chill sometimes and be by myself

9jafeminista: So how do you measure the love which is not romantic?

Michaela Moye: let’s take my relationship with one of my nephews – it’s definitely not romantic, but that is true love right there! Here’s the thing, a couple can be together for three months and the romance is beginning to fade. What is left is their commitment, not even the friendship sef. Committing to making the relationship work, and accepting that if it doesn’t work, they will both walk away without trying to damage the other… that is love to me.

9jafeminista: That sounds like hard work

Michaela Moye: (laughs) But Relationships are hard!!!! I’m probably single right now because I’ve been too lazy to work at one I’ve never been romantic about marriage so i never felt bad when anyone implied that my single status was a problem or made me less than… maybe it’s just my inherent strong headedness. However, it’s important to add that I am interested in getting married – in so far as we can agree on the terms and conditions of our marriage contract!

9jafeminista: Since we are talking about love, what’s your take on sex? A man once said he believed pre-marital sex was a sin, and this view appears to be the prevailing opinion right now in Nigeria… I use the word ‘opinion’ because it’s actually not what is happening.

Michaela Moye: I pay no mind to hypocrites. I knew ever since I was a teen that I would not be married as a virgin. However, I made up my mind that I would wait until I was ready. I was 20 when I “lost my virginity” and even though I would have preferred a different partner, I was ready and chose to have sex then.

Sex should be enjoyable. And in my opinion, is not the right place to seek emotional attachment – that’s just a distraction from the physical pleasure one could be enjoying. Women should take their orgasms into their own hands and that includes giving themselves permission to enjoy sex. When it’s a physical ailment, then, of course, that’s a different matter and requires medical attention

9jafeminista: Why do you think women have this idea that they are not supposed to enjoy sex or have orgasms?

Michaela Moye: It’s the repression that has been sown in generations of women. Sex is bad. Sex is for men to enjoy. Sex before marriage is a sin. Masturbation will lead you to hell, etc

Michaela Moye

And you know, many women have one issue or the other with our bodies. Maybe focusing on the wrong things, distract from the pleasure. Or we’re not as cognizant with our bodies and don’t even know what would do the trick.

Ayodele Olofintuade: In a survey carried out recently by a condom manufacturer they found out that a lot more women cheat on their husbands than previously imagined, do you have any theories as per the repression of women?

Michaela Moye: I think men and women are more alike than we care to admit. Men cheat. Women cheat. It has always been that way. What is different is that women have been considered graceful, beyond-sexual reproach etc and so even they would not be so open to admitting to an affair besides one could be repressed with a husband, or expected to be a good girl… and with a lover one can be as free as one wants.