As I’m writing this, I’m looking over at my plant babies. I’ve given them water, sun and love and they refuse to grow.
It’s been a pattern that I’ve repeated for the past few weeks, and all I get in return are wilted green leaves going brown at the edges.
My indoor plants and their unwillingness to thrive could be a metaphor for the broken trust that exists between men and women in South Africa.
We’ve screamed, we’ve begged and we’ve cried, and yet women remain unheard.
According to Saferspaces.org, although accurate statistics are difficult to obtain for many reasons, it is evident South Africa has particularly high rates of gender-based violence.
It’s a problem, we know. But the minute we point it out to men, they get angry, slut-shame us, call us ugly names.
It’s a cycle that repeats itself.
When Boity Thulo responded to hateful comments on Twitter this week in defence of YouTuber Mihlali Ndamase, the good, the bad and the ugly came out on social media.
“Men on this app are annoying. They want to threaten me and throw all sort of insults about my body, my sexuality, my intellect, my fertility, etc but they wanna throw b**** fits when I call them unemployed roaches? La nyela,” she said.
The responses it elicited ranged from anger to name calling, most of it from men.
And like the rest of her detractors, AKA just didn’t get it.
“Good morning brothers & sisters 💜 being unemployed does not make you a ’roach’, especially in these difficult times,” he commented on Twitter.
As women living in South Africa, we’re fearing constantly for our lives. The stats don’t lie. According to Safer Spaces:
- More than half of all the women murdered (56%) in 2009 were killed by an intimate male partner.
- Just under 50% of women report having experienced emotional or economic abuse at the hands of their intimate partners in their lifetime.
- An estimated 25% to 40% of South African women have experienced sexual and/or physical intimate partner violence in their lifetime.
We’re a country filled with angry men. If being called a roach shatters your fragile male ego, then you’re missing the point.
All we want is not to be shouted at, called names, belittled and trolled online for calling you out on your sh*t.
Try and walk a mile in our shoes.