Thanks a lot for this initiative.
I guess all our biographies are littered with one such story a day, at least, if you have a very close look. Also mine, that of my mother, my grandmothers etc. Sexism is alive and kicking (literally) around the world, also where I come from (Europe). I’m not a South(ern) African and there are many differences in socialized gender interaction I still don’t fully grasp, so I don’t want to be too judgemental. But the levels of disrespect for a woman’s word and will, in short for her personhood, I encounter here on a day-to-day basis are quite disturbing to me. “Rape. A South African Nightmare” by Pumla Dineo Gqola has made me understand quite a number of things, they nonetheless remain hurtful to witness and to experience. I’d venture to say that – on average – women here (be they black, white, brown, green, orange or blue) are probably worse off than in (Western urbanite) Europe because of three things: decades of racism (and centuries of colonialism) which fostered militaristic and violent white masculinities pitched against anything perceived as “feminine” (next to “black”), a significant number of (emotionally and physically) brutalized black men who in the process lost how to interact with “their” women in non-violating ways, and today’s widespread poverty in the context of millennium-old patriarchy-cum-neoliberal capitalism which boils down to less avenues of real self-determination in life and less real (economic) opportunities to opt out of submissively enduring egos raised (by women as well!) in a spirit that makes it seem self-evident that male gratification comes first. Sexism is that they mostly don’t even notice what they are doing wrong and/or that they can afford those violent and violating behaviours because the atmospheric cocoon of impunity is still too thick and that there a lot of women around whose minds function in no less (self-)demeaning ways. I wonder which one is the most difficult to fight: capitalism, classism, racism, sexism? I guess the distinct evil of sexism is that it subtly affects the very core of our existence, [redacted by administrator] (but I’m not in a position to assess this, I am “white”): the vital need to love and to be loved. I can’t find any other explanation as to why many also well-off women endure horrible stuff perpetrated by their intimate partners or family members for years. Anyway, dear sisters out there, thanks for sharing your stories and keep raising your voices.
If a single teacher, cashier, doctor, vendor, passer-by… had raised their voice at the sight of my mother’s bruises back in the 1950s, my grandfather would perhaps not have had a chance of beating her up daily from the age of five until he just suddenly left.
