Those who have sat through my investigative journalism training or class would attest to my principle on the private affairs of people. It is simple. If a married public official has 10 girlfriends or boyfriends, that is none of my business, unless such relationships affect the public purse or interfere with the public officer’s work.
Since the Daddy Lumba family controversy broke out, I have avoided reading any of the stories or the debates. I’ve tuned off on this matter, as I have on some family feuds in the past.
The closest I have come to developing an interest in the Lumba family feud is that one of the women is called Serwaa, which is the most pleasant female name I know. If you ask me who the first wife is or who won the court case, I cannot tell you.
(And I have nothing against those who follow the story. Not everyone must be interested in Elder Agyepong’s “borla” business, you barb?)
So, what I’m about to write is not the substance of the matter, but a disturbing commentary I have seen some men write about the controversy.
It is worth noting that if a woman had died and left two men fighting, the narrative would have been predictably different from what we are seeing now. But even beyond that, some men seem to be defining marriage in narrow terms, from the dominant positive of power.
I have seen sermons admonishing women to take good care of their husbands so that the men are not tempted to go for other women. Some have even compared the role of women to domestic workers. And the woman’s fellowship of social media descended on those posts with the appropriate responses, so I have nothing more to add. But the views are varied.
Clara Kowlaga Kasser-Tee posted a piece of advice she took from the learned Justice Henrietta Mensah-Bonsu on choosing the father of one’s children carefully. In response to that post, my friend Atik Mohammed, among other things, wrote:
“…The decision of marriage is strictly the man’s. You can have your ideal man you wish to marry as a woman, if that man does not do you the honors, thinking of him as a husband is at best, a wishful thought.”
Really?
Unlike random Facebookers whose intelligence I cannot vouch for, Atik is a smart dude, but I disagree with his position, which many men seem to endorse.
If you are a man who thinks marrying a woman is doing her a favour, then you are missing a major point about marriage. You’re entering into a union in which both parties have an equal stake. Being the head of that union, as men are made to believe, is just ceremonial.
Wielding a penis does not make you wiser than your wife. Why? The penis is brainless.
Any man who believes that the duty of his wife is to stay home and take care of him is not fit to be called a husband. That man is a child who should go back to his parents to be taken care of.
A married man is supposed to be an adult. The toxic mindset that a woman is responsible for taking care of her husband is ingrained in our society. That is what informs some TV commercials (such as the one in a Vodafone ad or so) in which mothers-in-law call their sons’ wives and instruct them on how to take care of their husbands.
The world has moved on. One does not need a university degree to discard the disturbingly archaic idea that marrying a woman means getting a cook or a laundry hand.
Mr. Man, it is true that your mother did not teach you how to cook. But it is also true that your father did not take you through “atopa” tutorials. So, if you have learned to have sex on your own, you can learn to cook.
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