Society And The Child(ren)

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2 years ago

As a male, society has not been kind to my gender, especially in my part of the world, as it is where I have been since I was born, and I can only speak from this point of view. The society has modified the male child to be a certain way and do certain things simply because they are males.

This, I believe is mostly due to our culture and traditions which I daresay is patriarchal, and to a great degree misogynistic. Culture and tradition are important pillars that hold the society itself. And because of that, our society portrays what our culture and tradition stands for.

The male gender has always been favoured by part of these culture and traditions. In marriages, many culture permits the man to marry more than one wife. In fact, I can say every culture permitted that before Christianity was introduced to the country by the British. But what about the female gender? They are frowned upon by anything that can frown should they speak of polyandry not to mention practice it.

Still about marriage, tradition is that a man is to pay a bride price (dowry) which is determined by the family of the woman he intends to marry. Though, the price is not fixed, and varies from culture to culture, this tradition of paying has given a lot of men the impression that the woman they are marrying is their PROPERTY because they are paying for her, and they can do with her as they see fit. And should he be displeased with her services – childbearing, cooking, washing, among others – he can send her back to her father’s house, after all, he has paid her price tag, needless to say, in full. Not to mention the sense of entitlement that comes with this mentality. She is his wife, he is entitled to anything she has to offer, be it sexual or domestic or financial. Also, she can be his human punching bag whenever he so desires his knuckles to be exercised.

You might wonder how all these is not kind to the men, after all, everything has been designed to favour them. We are all products of our society one way or another, and society has done the males a great damage by raising them to think their masculinity is to be proven by certain acts and/or expectations, such as how males are expected to be less emotional. You’re not supposed to do things such as crying or whining about anything or being afraid. “BE A MAN”. You can’t show any form of weaknesses. These have detrimental effects such as masking their true nature.

The man is supposed to provide for the family, and if he fails at this task, he has failed as a man even if he works hard at it. You go on a date with a girl, and you’re not allowed to let her pay a dime for anything, as it is wrong and an insult to your masculinity even to think of it. If she must pay, collect the cash from her and make the payment yourself. What do men have to prove with this? Superiority? If the superiority has to be proven in the first place, then it isn’t superiority, it’s a facade.

The real problem with this is, it is being taught to children at a very young age. A male child trip’s and falls, and he’s being told not to cry, that he’s a man, and men don’t cry. A female child shoves another male child as children often do when playing together, and she’s asked if she doesn’t know that he’s a male, is she supposed to see males as a gods and worship them every time they are around her?

Internalised misogyny runs deep in the body which is our society, and not enough is being done to change it. Actually, the change will take time, as the only way to go about it now is to raise children properly. It is okay to be a male, and being a male doesn’t make you a god, neither does it make you any less of a human. Humans have emotions, and emotions should be felt and expressed. It is also okay to be a female, and men are in no way superior. Maybe generally stronger physically but they are only different mainly in terms of their organs and hormones. One cannot exist without the other, and that makes them equally important, none better than the other.

In conclusion, this article is merely an expression of my displeasure with the way a lot of us have grown up with the wrong notion and orientation. Males are raised a certain way, and females too are raised a certain way. I hope we can do better as parents and make things much better than we met it, your little + everyone else’s little changes can make a big difference.

Thank You For Reading 🖤🖤

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Comments

The people that came up with this idea where not educated enough to know that it will go bad, maybe it worked during their time, but it's not working now. If our generation can walk towards correcting it, then it is welcome.

$ 0.02
2 years ago

Exactly, they are archaic traditions, and it is up to us to discard and change them

$ 0.00
2 years ago

Nature designed and assigned roles for both genders, which is quite clear enough, I guess society in the bid of enforcing it kind of overdid it and here we're today. It's getting worse everyday. Peer pressure, parent's pressure, pushes men to do things they shouldn't do. God created you to be a man not to suffer, but to be His representative on earth. Same goes for women. GOD created a simple life, we make it hard for ourselves and loved ones.

$ 0.02
2 years ago

Trust us to make simple things complicated.

$ 0.00
2 years ago

Even before that the opportunities are given to males like power, jobs, obligation while for women they have no rights to havean education and they are only obliged to take cars of the husband and the family, but now I'm glad that those stereotypes are abolished and male and female nowadays are equal, what man can done also can be done by female, we must support women empowerment since at any angle, women is more intelligent than men.

$ 0.02
2 years ago

Absolutely Chikakiku. I am glad you support gender equality. Thank you for stopping by

$ 0.00
2 years ago

It's unfortunate that the society is too harsh on the male child like they're not human as well.

$ 0.02
2 years ago

It is sad really, if I am being honest

$ 0.00
2 years ago

I hate what the society has created for the male child especially in Africa. I'm male doesn't mean I should kill myself. To me it's just nonsense tradition.

$ 0.02
2 years ago

Hahaha. To be honest, it is disappointing and heart breaking like I have ti do all these things because?

$ 0.00
2 years ago

How pitiful if a woman will end up like a punching bag if ever she became unfortunate in her marriage.But that kind of tradition has exist even before in your place?I think if a man really loves a woman he will treat her fair and full of love

$ 0.02
2 years ago

Truly, he would. But a lot of these marriages happen because the man wills to be a father, and not because of love. I have talked about it in one of my previous articles, you can read it here

https://read.cash/@Aimure/marriage-why-we-do-it-ab98f9c5

$ 0.00
2 years ago

Some traditional stats are ok but some are against gender equality. Women deserve more respect from us.

$ 0.02
2 years ago

Exactly, and we as men have to ensure that is the case by unlearning the wrong things the society has imbibed in us

$ 0.00
2 years ago