I’m a feminist not a sexist… gerrit?

I’ve been thinking of doing an article on Nigerian people (mostly women) who go on and on and on (ad infinitum) about their not being feminists, on the other hand I was thinking I shouldn’t because… ‘hey, it’s alright, your opinions are valid’. And because it’s a pleasure seeing women expressing their opinions, no matter how reprehensible I personally find it, that’s what feminism is about, giving voice to people the society has fought for so long to silence…
… but … there are times that these fingers of mine just can’t keep their thoughts to themselves, they are too opinionated for their own good… and their opinions are as valid as yours.

One of the things I try to do before jumping into any conversation (in my usual half-assed, screeching, bush-Ibadan-woman way) is try to understand the other person’s side of a story. So I’ve read a whole slew of articles (written mostly by Nigerian women) on why they do not like the label – feminist – being used on them. And the one thing I’ve come away with is that most of these women keep confusing feminism with sexism… the summary of their arguments? ‘I believe in equality but I don’t hate men, so I’m not a feminist’, I guess this is as opposed to ‘I believe in equality, I hate men, so I’m a feminist’.
Well I’m a feminist, I believe in equality and I do not hate men.
My men can attest to this. I grew up with a bunch of feisty men. I’ve loved some as friends, I’ve loved some as part of my support network, I’ve loved some at the back of cars, up a wall, on chairs, in trains (no I’ve not joined the Mile High Club or whatever they call themselves…yet). I’ve loved them in the missionary position, doggy style, straddling… don’t let us get side-tracked here but you got it, right?
Now, a feminist is someone who believes that men, women, trans, asexuals, intersex or whatever label you paste on yourself (or whichever one the society has stuck on you) are first and foremost, HUMAN BEINGS, and should be treated as such… equally.
Everybody should be treated equally.
Nobody should be fired because they are pregnant, or don’t look feminine/masculine enough.
Everybody should have rights to justice, should live their lives fully without being afraid that they’ll get raped because of the way they dress or are undressed. They should get equal pay for equal work. Should be able to choose how they want to live their lives, without being judged by the ‘society’.
They should be free enough to choose whether to marry or not, to have children or not, to make career choices based on their abilities not because they have been told to or not, or because they are afraid there won’t be room for promotion for them because they are going into a field dominated by one sex or the other.
A society where equality is a tangible fact, not something someone is paying lip service to by forming ‘Ministry for Women and Youths and Children and the Disadvantaged and fools and idiots’ or distributing stoves to women so that they won’t return to the kitchen (oxymoronic right?).
Feminism goes beyond hashtags and social media banters, it is when women (mostly feminists) spend almost fifteen to twenty years pushing a bill called ‘Violence Against Persons’ into law. When they stepped in to make sure that the IDP’s do not go hungry or naked. When they are presently working on changing the language of our constitution so that someone cannot decide to marry off a 3months old child and there’s nothing you can do about it because the constitution clearly states that anybody who is married is a woman or you can’t bestow your citizenship on your spouse or partner because you are female.
Feminism is about working on inheritance rights, so that women can have access to the lands they work on.
Feminism is beyond Facebook or Twitter ‘rants’.
They are not rants, you moron! It is giving voice to people who have been systemically silenced over the years because you can’t talk too loudly or complain about the way you’re being treated simply because you’re of a certain sex or you will not be considered a ‘lady’.
Feminism is about giving platform to women who have been abused beyond your self-satisfied lower middle class smirk about how YOUR husband pays ALL the bills so what’s the big deal about a slap or two here and there? And how sharing house-hold chores is no big deal because you have a fucking under-aged boy or girl enslaved in your house in guise of a ‘houseboy’ or ‘housegirl’.
We are talking about women whose husbands take iron rods to them at the slightest provocation, break-bottles on their heads, turn them into punching bags. Women who genuinely have nowhere else to go, because they are economically disadvantaged and not staying in abusive relationships because they love the title of ‘Mrs’ so much they’d go through hell and fire and brimstone to keep it.
This as far as I’m concerned is a simple thing, as simple as abc. Unfortunately there is no equality anywhere, there is no justice (just us) but there is such a thing as the patriarchy. A system that has been so institutionalized it has even succeeded in making the oppressed oppress other people. It stands to reason that if you were bullied by your mother-in-law, for example, chances are that you will bully your daughter/son-in-law. If your clitoris was cut off as a child and you never got to feel sexual pleasure, chances are that you will cut off the clitoris of your female child.
There is no such thing as the Matriarchy or whatever ojuju is lying inside your wardrobe at night about to jump out and eat you up because you call yourself a feminist.
Feminism is not a cult, it is a choice… you can actually choose to be one or not. Nobody is trying to ‘recruit’ you or force you to work for the emancipation of women who are not as advantaged as you. It is not a superstardom, in fact you lose a lot when you’re tagged a feminist but you gain yourself freedom from mental slavery. Nobody will knight you or pay you for being a feminist. The fact that you even have a choice is because some people in the past (or presently) have decided they’ve had enough of being oppressed, refused the right to vote, raped in the name of child marriage or any kind of marriage, paid a pittance for what men are getting loads of money for doing.
Feminism is activism not for the faint hearted.
So please keep apologizing for daring to believe in equal rights and emancipation of the sexes, in fact you can continue jeering at women who are feminist, but please, get your fucking facts straight while doing all these, because you just look plain stupid.
Repeat after me … feminism is NOT sexism.

In Defense of World Rapists Day

Going through my TL on twitter today I read that a wonderful man of god, Reverend Ogechi Ofurum, claims that rape is justified because of the way ladies dress ‘indecently’. Sometime last year Katsina’s State Attorney-General, Alhaji Ibrahim Dan-Soho made a case for rapists, in his own words ‘rapes are self-inflicted 90% of the time’. For those of you who do not understand English, this means most rape victims either rape themselves or force somebody to rape them!

I am not here to insult the ‘revered’ gentleman , who should be Christ-like in his approach to life and the people he’s supposed to shepherd or the intelligent Alhaji, who should be a vanguard of hope in our judiciary. Nope! I’m here to defend their reasoning and to advocate for a World Rapists Day, which I believe should coincide with Christmas or any other religious holiday during which love is preached, it would be so apt!

I was raped the first time I had sex. It was an older and trusted person who did me the favour of punishing me for being young and foolish. He is a hero! He cured me of my virginity, showed me that men cannot be trusted and taught me how to defend myself from would be rapists.

After the first time, two more men attempted to rape me, one a very close friend and the other the Pastor of a church I used to attend (thank heavens the guy cured me of all romantic beliefs in the sanctity of the church). Suffice to say that the two men rued the day they met me ... but enough about me.

To all sane men and women who are reading this piece, you who protest that rape is wrong, that it is dehumanizing, that it is a crime, I beg you to stop and move to the other side, let us form an association of ‘Nigerians Earnestly ask for Rapists’. We should hold a ‘One Million Man March for Rape.’ Yes, you read that correctly.

Rape should be legalized. Actually that’s why I love Nigeria, in a nice quiet way it is legal, on paper (as most of our laws are) it is a crime, but if you accidentally enter a police station to report a rape case you will be cured of all desire to ever do such again! You would be treated like a criminal! You would be asked questions meant to embarrass and anger you. You’d be treated like a pariah! You would be spoken to as if you just went in to the police station to confess a murder. God help you if you are vulnerable (eg a woman living alone, a young girl below the age of 18 or someone from a poor home).

By the way, in this great country of ours abortion is also quite illegal (like a lot of important things that would make life easier for women). So most women go to ‘doctors’ who specialize in abortions, men and women who have, in most likelihood, never seen the walls of a medical school before in their lives! These women (the word ‘woman’ is interchangeable with ‘sinner’ by the way) pay for it with their health and in a lot of cases their lives.

Women are nothing more than things in this country, you’re owned, first by your parents or male relatives who have the right to do anything they like with you. The paedophiles amongst them will molest you and the greedier ones will sell you off to the highest bidder given half the chance.

But I digress.

All rapists should be canonized. A lot of people would agree with me that too many women these days dress so indecently (including yours truly) .We go around baring parts of our bodies which should be only seen by the people who own the money on our ‘heads’, the person who has officially bought us by either sliding a ring on our fingers or better still paid the bride price. But no! We prefer to walk around the streets half naked, baring our breasts and arses to anybody who cared to look, we deserve nothing more than rape and nothing less than death sentences. Death to all sexy dressers! Off with their (our?) heads!

Although most rapists would not grab and rape us for being so dressed on the streets, rather they go home with their turgid wieners and rape the nearest girl (ages 3months to 99years). Rapists should be canonized. The fear of a rapist is the beginning of wisdom.

These men who lack self-control keep our society sane! They keep the women in their rightful place (the kitchen) and populate the face of the earth with children from their diseased loins. Yes rapists are heroes! They deserve 16 virgins when they get to heaven, who they can serially rape to their hearts’ content.

Rapists are wonderful, they are everywhere, they live among us. They believe they are god’s gift to women, the best thing since sliced bread. They are Superman, Spiderman and Robocop, all rolled into one great big specimen of manhood.

I know a lot of times in the process of raping a girl they also tend to beat them up, both physically and mentally, but all that does not matter, after all, men beat women up all the time, even women they are not married to.

I raise a toast to all rapists and encourage you all to continue doing the world this huge favour. We shall constitute a special squad for you called the Rapid Response Rape Team (RRRT) within the police ranks (a great opportunity for Policemen who specialize in raping sex workers). Where you will all be allowed to rape women and (if you swing that way) men who have not lived up to the high standards you guys live by.

You will be given the right to abuse anybody that dresses ‘indecently’ ... I wonder what happened to the ‘Act against indecent dressing in public’ passed by the Lagos State government (Eko o ni b’aje o) a few years ago. Such Acts would be resurrected. In fact rape victims should be arrested and thrown in jail (after they’ve been raped of course!).

We, as Nigerians, deserve the country we live in, we deserve the leaders in power presently, we deserve every humiliation these people mete out to us. When we are not giving our money to pastors, (who spend it on living the lives we dream about) with the hope that the Great Lord Above, will double it for us and turn us into overnight millionaires without us having to work too hard. We are out there condemning the very acts we indulge in, if not in reality but in our fantasies (the ‘gay marriage’ issue comes to mind).

We follow people blindly and refuse to question people in authority because we are cowardly and ignorant. We all want to go to heaven but we do not want to die. Ignorance and hypocrisy are the two words we live by. One thing by day, another by night.

We are sanctimonious and holy, we are all children of the Great White God who dwells in Heaven and the Great Black Man who dwells in RCCG on the expressway between Lagos and Ibadan.

We are always right and we can quote the bible passages our pastors quote at us word for word.

We are Nigerians, we Love and Defend rapists, the same way we defend our friends and relatives in government who are blatantly robbing us blind. If we had half the chance we would do EXACTLY the same.

Yes we would rape and plunder. We would steal from the mouth of the poor, employ underage children as maids, rape any girl that takes our fancy, pay our employees poorly or not at all (since there are many desperate people out there looking for jobs). Yes we can!

We are Nigerians. We defend the rights of men to rape. We want a World’s Rapist Day to encourage our men to rape in a more violent way, to rape more often. Rapists are Heroes!

I weep for my country.