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Let's talk about how we’re raising our men

Thursday August 02 2018
chauve

When it comes to women in public life, there is no shortage of rules and expectations imposed upon her, from tone of voice and behaviour to sartorial restrictions. We don’t have the equivalent for men. FOTOSEARCH

By ELSIE EYAKUZE

Oh, we are going to talk about men and politics, folks. We going to chew this beef.

When African countries overthrew the yoke of European colonialism if not economic dominance, they kept most of the format of the nation states that were created by the invaders.

As with all things, there were advantages and disadvantages. From a gendered perspective and especially in those states that experimented with adopting a Marxist approach to their nation building, this was good.

Good in the sense that women were immediately granted almost the full rights of citizenship in their own countries.

We even have a major road named after Bibi Titi Mohamed, liberation heroine of the Tanzanian Independence movement. Yes, we had one.

And so at least one-and-a-half generations of Tanzanians have grown up used to the sight of women in positions of power in the civil service, politics and the armed forces.

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But reality check: This is still Africa. Most, not all but most, of our precolonial societies were patriarchal and chauvinistic to varying degrees.

Some benefited for women in complementary positions of power, some to date celebrate the practice of domestic violence as an aspect of their culture. In our public life we have stuck with the masculine as the natural face of leadership.

And to quote Obama’s Mandela lecture again since it bears repeating: “History shows the lasting hold of greed and the desire to dominate others in the minds of men. Especially men.”

So you can imagine that as a progressive democratic republican (no, not the warped American meaning of the term) who worries about development, Tanzania’s current state and future prospects, I spend a lot of time thinking about men. One of the great ironies of feminism is that so much of it revolves around guys.

Here is something to ponder: When it comes to women in public life, there is no shortage of rules and expectations imposed upon her, from tone of voice and behaviour to sartorial restrictions. Most of them are ridiculous but they do give an idea of what we believe a “good” woman should be.

We don’t have the equivalent for men. As far as I can tell, as long as they keep their hair short and their pants aren’t pedal pushers, anything goes.

This is indicative of a certain neglect on our part as a society, a neglect of the moral and mental health of these boys we raise to mould into men. Men whom we expect to be leaders. And we lie cruelly to them that their sex makes them superior to women.

As much as we have been spoiled by administrations that upheld the Nyerereist egalitarian socialist approach to gender, the worm was sure to turn someday. And sure enough, it has.

Of course, being a woman of a certain age I am a shangazi (an aunt) both by blood and by friendship. For my nieces, it is easy enough to navigate the responsibilities of raising them to face the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century. The future belongs to them.

It’s my boys I am worried about. Should someone threaten to beat me for their political decisions, they need not fear that I will defend myself.

No, the real question is what kind of role model of leadership is this rise of chauvinism exposing them to? It raises the question: What is the measure of a man? Oh, we are going to talk about this.

Elsie Eyakuze is a consultant and blogger for The Mikocheni Report. Email: [email protected]

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