AWiM18 Made me think differently about gender equality

AWiM18 left some prints on my heart. I say this because I had always considered women’s rights talk an unusual or unnecessary boisterousness. The whole idea of gender sensitivity to me was troubling in the sense that I thought it was uncalled for. Life I believe was filled with too many challenges and didn’t see any reason to add any more to it. I considered leading voices in the call for women’s rights mere opportunists who were enjoying some recognition they couldn’t resist – hence they made more noise. My opinion was: Why would a man not love his wife? Any man who beats out the self-dignity of his wife, be it physically or verbally was an idiot. Anyone who can’t recognize women as partners in the office space, to me is silly. These were natural thoughts I believed came with growing up, education, common sense and clergy’s sharing for those getting married. So why should I listen to some voice championing what I already know and was a champion at?

Then I came to AWiM18.

In the preliminary hours, I asked myself, what are you doing here? I listened through a number of talks and didn’t catch the essence, I mainly had my mind more on the paper I had to present. Once done, my whole thinking started metamorphosing into my present resolve – ‘Let Them say it, because They only feel it’.

Eugenia Abu took me by surprise.

Her thoughts for me had an emotional spark to it. They jolted my present consciousness. Her time of stagnancy, patience and resilience which although brought the sweet reward of a well-deserved victory, was the antidote for my resentment. I mean, how do you explain the number of kids she bore during her years of service without even knowing the privileges she had or was denied?

I then saw myself in the office, and a couple discussions with colleagues about how women in their child bearing stage was not too good for business played back.

Even though I had never stood in a woman’s way for career progression, the fact that I stayed where such thoughts were considered or mentioned irked my spirit. Believe me, on my own, I had always stood for women, at home among my six sisters, in school with those course mates who went through hard times surviving some male lecturers, and even at work where I had stood in for three different female lecturers who had to go on maternity leave.

Yet AWIM made me see that more needed to be done.

I said to myself, all these women speaking at AWiM18 were speaking from experience. Then I knew that like a sheep facing a brick wall with no option than turning back, the men folk had pushed their luck for too long. I instantly saw the reasons for these talks. I am not saying all men are bad, but that somehow, we took things too far. We have turned insensitive either because of our upbringing, religion or cultural nonsensical dominance values. Men, I started thinking, deserved what was coming because the women folk’s noise is not going away any time soon and they needed to start preparing for rain because they ain’t seen nothing yet.

The way out is to turn a new leaf, but I guess it won’t just happen easily, women, and us male champions of women, will have to keep agitating.

We will have to push like it was done before women were allowed to vote in America or go to school in Africa. If the we give this up now, we might slide into an eternal bleak state of abandonment. All must join the struggle to undo what has been long done. Every parent must bring up their kids, bequeathing to them equal respect and dignity for both genders. Teachers also must rise to teach in a new way, and society through our new teachings must allow this wrong culture to die.

It may take a while, but we must not fail to start and try.

Men above all need to practice the philosophical sense of the golden rule, knowing that what we can’t take consistently for a month, year or decades should not be thrown at women.

I close with the thoughts of the writer Tayo Olafioye to all women agitators: ‘Many more mountains to climb, yet only the strong survives’.

Dr Johnson Babafemi Akintayo is Lecturer 1 at the Department of Mass Communication, Babcock University. He also doubles as the Director of the Adventist World Radio (AWR) Nigeria and Hope 89.1 FM (official radio station of Babcock University).  Johnson has done and supervised both radio and television productions since 1999, and has been fully engaged in the classroom teaching since 2000.