Pubdate: Wed, 29 Dec 2004
Source: Cape Argus (South Africa)
Copyright: 2004 Cape Argus.
Contact:  http://capeargus.co.za/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2939
Author: Ajm, Sabie
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/women.htm (Women)

MINDSET ON WOMEN MUST CHANGE

I was sitting down to my second cup of coffee early this month
listening to SAFM when the news reader told of a rape suspect who
suddenly found himself in far worse trouble.

The police had arrived to arrest him and discovered enough dagga to
charge him with drug-dealing.

I really couldn't believe my ears.

How can whoever wrote the news regard dealing in dagga to be far worse
than rape? (And the newsreader was a woman).

In the current climate of activism against woman and child abuse,
someone is showing exactly why South Africa is destined to get nowhere
with its endeavours when rape is regarded as a less-serious crime than
dagga-dealing.

I'm generalising of course, but there is an attitude of acceptance to
the crime of rape that has to be eradicated from the male psyche
before we can really move on.

My theory is that because of the outdated lobola system, and because
many South Africans are able to have more than one wife, women are
still regarded as a commodity.

When this knowledge is imparted on South Africa's youth it compounds
the problem, producing yet another generation of young men who have
the same attitude as their fathers.

Democracy is for the individual, freeing man from the restraints of
tradition, yet we are trying to preserve what we know in our hearts
has to be left behind.

The only way to address woman and child abuse is to change the mindset
of the nation's men.

They must not just say they want to change, they have to believe
it.

The women's liberation movement at the turn of the last century was
able to take hold only because of the persistence of the women
involved and also because of the softening of the mindset of the men
of Europe at the time.

We know that this movement had no influence at all on any of the
blacks in Africa.

So the time is now for Africa to really think what its traditions are
doing in this modern world.
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MAP posted-by: Derek