Do women deserve better? Then why the stereotype - Isah Samaila Nitte

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   The African culture is such a one that by norms and traditions stereotype against women is never considered a taboo as it has dominate everyday life and activities. Some group of people by traditional practices have being marked with the incapacity to engage or be involved in certain activities. Sometimes I begin to wonder if I should call this discrimination or humiliation suffered by women due to the gender socialization acquired in the process of growth in our societies.

   Let me not get you confused, the stereotype I am talking about here is the marginalisation of women concerning how they are perceived and should be seen by the society. In most African setting, a woman cannot make a decision onbehalf of her family as she is considered weak and irrational due to her emotions, male child education is considered more important than their female counterpart in most African oriented settings with the vain hope that the male child carries the name of the family further and therefore will tend to the needs of the parent in their old age, while in the real world based on a proven research, females tends to look after their parent more than their male counterpart, so the belief is "women are only to be seen and not be heard." in an African sense.

   Most often I hear men saying "oh my wife doesn't work she is a full house wife". To be frank I always wonder if this statement is right or wrong until I came across purple Academy where I undergo some courses. Going by a comparative analysis of how a typical Africa woman spends her day in contrast to the man, we then can decide if "she" really is not a worker when compared to her man.

  Going by how the woman spends her day, we can say after the morning prayer by 5am to around 5:30am, the woman start the house chores such as washing the dishes, cleaning the house, then she makes the breakfast. Afterward when the day is getting more brighter she wakes the man to take his shower, she bath the children and get them ready for school. She might however take the children to school and then come back home and wash the dishes and dirty clothes. She might Sometimes take a rest for about 2hrs and then prepare the lunch and afterward pick up the children from school, she then make sure their homeworks are done appropriately and then she wash the dishes and possibly wash the children school uniforms. She further prepares the dinner when the day is getting dark and then take her children to bed by telling them that stories they love or then sings them lullabies. Don't forget she had to gist with the husband to relieve him of the day stress and then still have to satisfy his bodily desires at night.

  However in contrast, the man goes back to sleep after the morning prayers, then he wakes up and finds virtually everything he needed to set off to work ready, I mean his warm bath ready in the bathroom, iron clothes and breakfast and then he proceed to work. While in the office, the man doesn't work all the time, so he gist with friends at the early hours of the working day and then get down to work and at around 12 noon, he goes for break and either comes back home or get to a fast food joint for lunch. He comes back after the break and finished his day job, then he closes from work and possibly visit a friend where they either hangout at a bar or a joint to gist. When the day is getting dark he comes back home and finds food ready and that's how it continues.

   Going by this analysis, we can see that men have more time for leisure than women, they do lesser work than the female gender, their responsibilities is lesser than their female counterpart and many more. Still yet someone will look at a woman and say she doesn't work. Infact, the most work in our existence is done by women, they train and teach us how to live in a world full of evil, they stick to us as we grow and tell us what's right and wrong.

   I guess it is time we change our mentality towards women, it is time we appreciate the effort they have been putting in building a better world, it is time we view them in a new light of equality. The time to stop the stereotyping and giving respect to each individual, irrespective of sex and gender, irrespective of capabilities and incapability is now. So let's join hands together and support one another.