Perusing certain articles on the issues of gender can be very disheartening at times, the article heading alone is enough to tell you our stance on gender issues as a people, ranging from: “the downside of focusing on women and girls” to “The struggle to dominate the male gender”. Is that not what they used to do in the past? Focusing on boys which unfortunately has led to this gender gap and is in fact the reason we are now forced to focus on the female gender to mitigate the harms of this gender divides. So, what changes now that we are focusing on girls? Especially when the incentive to do so this time around is not one which seeks to relegate the male gender to the background, neither because their contributions are not valued nor seen as an inferior gender to the female gender as was done in the past where females were the victims. It Is rather unfortunate that although the promulgators of such articles are mostly male some females are also guilty party to such bigotry write-ups.
In these articles what tends to be very disingenuous on the part of these writers are when they normally conclude their piece with an advocacy note on how marginalised people in society irrespective of gender, class, race, or colour should be assisted but fail to recognize that the least regarded human on the value ladder is the black female. It is women and girls that are marginalised and excluded in various aspects and spaces of society such as politics, economics, education, health, technology, etc.
As a club we focus on women not because we want to discriminate against the males but simply because for too long society has focused its lens on men for the very wrong reasons and consequently but not very surprisingly there exist a gender gap. With or without statistics it is obvious there exist a gender gap. There exist a problem and whether we admit or not that problem is that for so long women have been discriminated against, relegated to the background, and excluded from prominent spaces and societal norms have only gone far to entrench the narrative that women are to aspire to as high as marriage to self-actualize; worse is the narrative that iterates the most valuable services of women can be realized only in the kitchen and bedroom.
“Study after study has taught us that there is no tool for development more effective than the education of girls and the empowerment of women. No other policy is as likely to raise economic productivity, lower infant, and maternal mortality, or improve nutrition and promote health, including the prevention of HIV/AIDS. When women are fully involved, the benefits can be seen immediately: families are healthier, they are better fed; their income, saving and reinvestment go up. And what is true of families is true of communities and, eventually whole countries, whole countries.”-Kofi Annan, Former Secretary-General of the united Nations.
Over the years some women and unconventional men have risen and advocated for equality by fighting for the rights of the female gender. Several steps and sacrifices have been made in the pursuit of this objective. Unfortunately, these efforts have either been hindered by retrogressive societal norms or wrongful interpretation of religious doctrine; the perceived inferiority of women in conservative societies especially is reliant on the misconstrued religious principles where women are to submit to men. These are all erroneous concepts that made the world see women as not only less important but trivializes their contributions to the growth of society as well. 135 million women have been undergone female genital mutilation (FGM) and two million girls are at risk of FGM annually (Half the Sky). FGM is used to “control women sexually” or make them please to their husbands. The average age of FGM is ages 7-10 and is often done with rudimentary instruments and without medical care or anaesthesia. The degree of circumcision varies by tradition (Long). The second most common reason for death of girls ages 15-19 is childbirth and complications.
Girls between ages 15-19 produce 10% of the babies born annually (Half the Sky). 603 million women live in countries where domestic violence is not illegal, in 102 countries domestic abuse is not illegal, and in 53 marital rape is also legal (Half the Sky). Rape is still regularly used in war as a weapon. For example, during the Bosnian Crisis in the early 90’s, 20,000-50,000 women were raped, and in 1994 during the Rwandan genocide, 250,000-500,000 women were raped (Half the Sky). Currently, with genocides happening in Sudan, and also in the Middle East with ISIS, and other conflicts from the Middle East and around the globe, we can’t begin to put a number to current war-related rape. Of the 21-45 million modern slaves, at least 71% are female (Free the Slaves).50% of modern slaves are in forced marriages or are sex trafficking victims (Free the Slaves). Human trafficking generates at least $150 billion in illegal profits per year (LBD.Project).
Dr. Kwegyir Aggrey said "If you educate a man you educate an individual but if you educate a woman you educate a whole nation"; this legit statement by all standards is evident in status quo by observing how mothers do a great job in training and informally educating their children as way of socializing them into society. Why then are women who train up these kids who later become the heads of society, denied the right to share their opinions and ideas and have them valued in the same light as that of their male counterparts in matters that obviously does not concern only one gender but the whole human race. This and many other concerns are what have pushed some persons to strive to lift this blinding veil from the face of society by actively advocating for a change in status quo.
A lot of work has been done so far by clubs and institutions who have risen to the challenge of striving for equality but much more work needs to be done especially in our part of the world where it is no longer an issue of emancipation of women but emancipation of black women. It is rather sad that up until now some women in our world still do not know their rights, they are still being abused and cowed to remain silent. For women who strive to defy the odds and go above and beyond in shattering the glass ceilings all they face is intimidation and public shaming and worse if they fail at their attempted flight.
Women empowerment is needed to ensure that societal cap that limits is shattered so that women can dream and live up to their fullest capabilities and not feel inadequate or inferior. Especially because there exists this tendency for women to easily give up due to the numerous obstacles, they must overcome to make it. They need to be constantly reminded of what they can do because of who they are. Giving them a platform to harness their talents and educating them by exposure to the several opportunities that exist for them if they can refine their potentials. And most importantly making them aware they have the right to ask for more because they deserve the best like everyone else.
OUR OBJECTIVE AS A CLUB.
The United Nations (UN) under the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) has noted gender equality as one of the goals member countries are to attain. Girl Up club was created purposely to attain the 5th SDG: Gender equality. The club focuses on girls because gender equality is about empowering the oppressed and vulnerable gender to have equal opportunities like any other gender. We simply want to close that gap, we want the ratio to be near equal if not equal because currently the disparities that exist between both genders is simply too wide, we want girls to make their own choices just as boys, we want girls to take part in decision making by making informed valuable contributions as by-products of their being educated and refined. We want to advocate so that girls need not to work twice as hard as men just to be recognised and given the nod by society, we do not want girls to feel the need to behave in a particular way to just fit in, we want them to be themselves without feeling the need to shrink themselves. We want “like a girl” to mean positive attributes and not weakness.
Around the globe, despite one's ethnicity or belief, there is one thing that can be observed about the female gender. Females are subordinates, oppressed and victims of abuse. The world wants to progress, developing countries desire to be developed, the poor desire to be rich, likewise the female gender wishes to upgrade beyond the point society has marked out for them. Females around the world wished to be recognized by their counterparts not as baby makers, sex toys, slaves. Females want to be more than what the society has labelled them to be.
As shown women are almost always at the receiving end of every bad social practice be it abuse and violence, poverty, low education, etc. It is the girl that suffers the most. We want to break that cycle that is why we want to focus on girls. For too long we have sought to make the world a better place but have refused to identify that this is not possible if over half of the world’s population is prevented from effectively and efficiently contributing their quota but rather relegated to the background. The time to break that cycle is now and we as a club want to be a part of this social revolution!
