Feminists are here to stay and you need to listen to them

I was honoured to be part of a group of African women who gathered in Maputo, Mozambique, by the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung to forge a pathway on modern day feminism.

Today, more women are publicly claiming feminism than before and it was therefore necessary to go back to be able to understand why this ideology is here to stay.

I realise that even the definition of feminism has been totally bungled leaving it with numerous negative undertones.

Feminism is the rejection of and struggle against patriarchy (as a system and set of structures and ideologies that privilege men and allot them various forms of power in all societies) and is also the celebration of freedom for women everywhere.

EQUALITY
As Stevi Jackson and Jackie Jones (1998) put it: “Feminist theory seeks to analyse the conditions which shape women’s lives and to explore cultural understanding of what it means to be a woman.”

It was initially guided by the political aims of the Women’s Movement – the need to understand women’s subordination and our exclusion from, and marginalisation within, a variety of social arenas.

Many are mislead by the notion that feminism means sidelining men or anti-men instead of the real feminist tenets and values like equity, choice, opportunity, protection by laws, gender justice, inclusion, non-discrimination, human rights et cetera.

It’s got nothing to do with the laughable argument that feminists are angry women who’ve failed in their personal lives.

VALUE

Feminism to me is the fight to attain full humanisation of the female person.

And I mean literal humanisation where you make a woman humane and grant her the right to belong to herself and the right to be enough.

Women in societies past and present rarely belong to themselves.

Feminists refuse to accept that inequalities between women and men are natural and inevitable and insist that they should be questioned.

The use of African culture plus convenient religious texts to suppress and condone inequalities of a system that devalues another gender requires re-thinking.

POLITICS
To comprehend the existence of feminist theory requires that you check your biases, stereotypes and prejudices.

Political and economical structures are dominated by the male gender, this is modern day inequality supported by patriarchal structure.

In Kenya, most of the elected first female governors are a reflection of the farthing integrity of the male counterparts with equally dirty hands.

Politics is a man’s game, you must be like them, their game, their rules.

These rules are among the many that society has implored to sustain patriarchy.

RESPECT
Feminists want a society that respects the right of women to flourish without having to explain themselves; one that doesn’t measure a woman’s worth using her civil status; doesn’t collectively punish women for mistakes of one woman and allows women to fail granting them a chance to start over; a society that’s committed to the safety of women; a society that perceives leadership as a human trait and not a gender trait.

I challenge us during this time of the year to go back and talk candidly with women who raised us and ask them one question, if society was to see you as human-flaws and all - what would that mean and would you be the same person you are today?

The writer is Program Manager at Siasa Place @scheafferoo