African Love 2

One of the best songs I have ever heard is “if you get there before I do” or “love me” by Collin Raye. It is a simple song about true love. In the song, a young boy finds a note in his grand father’s coat.  So the grandfather explains to his grandson that when he was younger, his grandmother’s father did not like him much and so they planned to run away together, get married in the first town they came to and live forever.

 But when he got to the place they were supposed to meet, he instead found a letter pinned on a tree

The letter said:

if you get there before I do, don’t give up on me, I’ll meet you when my chores are through, I don’t know how long I’ll be…but am not going to let you down, darling wait and see…

The song goes on with other details and finally ends with the grandfather reading the same letter to the grandmother in her coffin when she has passed on. Indeed according to the song they did live forever.

Now apparently this song note was written in 1923 and clearly the setting is not in Africa. Now flash forward to the present day Kenya. I recently was told a story about a young man and his girlfriend…ex girlfriend rather. Now, they were high school sweet hearts and very much in love. A year or so after high school, the young man got a scholarship to go study abroad and chose to turn it down as it involved leaving his love behind. The gesture was all much appreciated, kisses exchanged, promises renewed and what have you. It was a beautiful thing that the young man had done and the greatest show of love.

A couple of months later, in a nice twist of events, the girl also got a scholarship to go study abroad. She went.

This brings me back to my previous point that most African and to be more precise most Kenyan relationships are based on convenience rather than love.

Lets go back to Collin Raye’s grand parents who I suppose in 1923 must have been in their late teens or very early 20’s. Was the girl running away with her love very convenience? I think not. The fact that she was actually finishing her chores first, show how much of an inconvenience she was putting herself into. Of course the most convenient thing would have been to tell the guy “look we are never going to get my father’s blessing so we might as well move on with our different lives…” and it would'nt have hurt to throw the good old “its you not me” or “we can still be friends” line.

I might be wrong but I suspect most Kenyan marriages are borne out of convenience. A man impregnates a woman and so they opt to get married or move in together love not withstanding. Your parents prefer one spouse to the other and so you marry or stick with your parents’ choice to avoid tussle and conflict. A girl marries a richer man whom she does not love because it guarantees her a good life.

All convenience no love.

And if you should ever choose love over convenience especially in matters financial, you get bombarded with shitty advice from family and friends. Lines such as love does not put food on the table and love will not pay the rent and so on and so forth.


and am not done yet...

African Love

I read somewhere today that people with a higher IQ tend to be more sexually faithful to their partners. If that’s the case then most people I know are quite dumb. The issue of being faithful is one that I have discussed in great length with my friends. Mostly in bars but I think that makes it more truthful.

 

Our conclusion was, we Africans don’t seem to know how to love (and lil wayne cant teach us either)…or at least to love genuinely.  We don’t give love and relationships as much importance as they deserve. We mostly view relationships as unions of convenience for regular sex and whatnot. When it comes to matters of love we do it sort of half-heartedly and skeptically. In a defensive manner if you will.

Once on a road trip from Meru, me and some three friends Austin, martin and Muchi talked and  for more than three hours  about how fathers show love to their children in Kenya. Unfortunately for me I had little or no contribution to the matter having not being raised by a father. We found it rather disappointing that none of the fathers who had raised them had rarely if ever been to their sport matches or to events that they were being honored.

None of them had shared words of affection with their fathers with most talk restricted to when it was completely necessary or when one was in trouble. Most fathers play the role of a school principal and disciplinarian other than a family member.  Ever noticed how most fathers bring a newspaper to their children’s parents’ day and whatnot and end up burying their heads in them the whole time.

As boys in the early age we learn a lot of behaviors from the males that we are exposed to. In most cases these are older brothers or fathers. We want to act, talk and even walk like these male figures in our lives.  I suppose we also learn how to treat women from how they treat women.

And how do they?

Well, in most homes I have been to, while the lady of the house almost always plays a big role in the family and may be quite respected, is rarely shown love.  I mean how often do you see an African father hug or kiss his wife in front of company or treat her like a queen? Most fathers are busy reading newspapers, yelling commands, watching TV, drinking away with friends at the bar or SHOWING LOVE to the clande.

And so when the sons grow up they adopt the same.

Perhaps the most unfortunate part is that the few African males who do show the affection and love to their women (carrying her handbag doesn’t count though) are viewed as weaklings and are looked down upon by their friends and family.

Am still thinking of the rest of the post…ok bye.

Homophobia

this is a term paper i wrote for a class a while back...

Introduction

This paper aims to look at the history of homophobia in the world over the years and a brief look of the effects of homophobia in present day Africa and in the world as a whole

Homophobia: definition and meaning

Homophobia is the hatred or fear of homosexuals - that is, lesbians and gay men - sometimes leading to acts of violence and expressions of hostility. It covers a wide range of different viewpoints and attitudes.

Homophobia can also refer to social ideologies which stigmatize homosexuality Homophobia is not confined to any one segment of society, and can be found in people from all walks of life.

Negative feelings or attitudes towards non-heterosexual behavior, identity, relationships and community, can lead to homophobic behavior and is the root of the discrimination experienced by many lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. Homophobia manifests itself in different forms, for example homophobic jokes, physical attacks, discrimination in the workplace and media representation.

A brief history of homophobia

The concept of homophobia was invented by Dr Wainwright Churchill in Homosexual Behavior Among Males (1967) — though his actual term was "homoerotophobia" is often little more than a political metaphor used to castigate people who dislike homosexuals, and users of the term ascribe anti-gay attitudes more to ignorance than to clinical phobia. 

However according to essays by Rictor Norton on the Historical Roots of Homophobia from Ancient Israel to the End of the Middle Ages, homophobia does indeed exist as a specific classifiable mental illness, ranging from mild anxiety to paranoia, with physiological symptoms such as an involuntary gag-reflex, dilation of the pupils, and a shrinking in penile volume upon seeing a naked male — all of which have been scientifically measured in sporadic experimental research. 

Norton states that It is commonplace to say that anti-gay prejudice is "a medieval Christian attitude." Although it is true that such prejudice was certainly expanded and cruelly enforced during the medieval Christian ethos, homophobia nevertheless began long before Christ or the Church Fathers, and is quite specifically Jewish or Hebrew.

Mosaic law listed a 36 crimes which were punishable by death. But of these 36 crimes, exactly one half were "crimes" involving sex, so in contrast to other legal systems the Hebrews gradually extended the notion of "crime" into the personal and private affairs of people rather than limiting it to the social and public level such as the public crimes of murder or theft. 

This quickly evolved the notion that crime and sex were intimately related. Unlike their contemporary Greek, Egyptian, and other civilizations, the Hebrews held the view that sex, the sex organs, and nudity were shameful.

Homophobia was originally a condemnation of specifically the male-to-male anal intercourse which was a feature of Assyrian and other religions and usually symbolized humility and subservience, though the Hebrews regarded this is humiliation. More than a millennium would pass before the "crime" was extended to include male oral copulation, and not until the twentieth century could mere male-to-male kissing in public be prosecuted as lewd behavior

Lesbian practices were rarely prohibited, not because "what women do doesn't interest male lawgivers" (a superficial feminist analysis), but because law proceeds by precedent and there was no precedent for lesbian prosecution, and because lesbian practices were not part of the religious rituals originally prohibited by homophobia. The Hebrew degradation of women, however, began simultaneously with their religious-based homophobia.

In 390 the roman Emperor Valentinian decreed burning at the stake as a fit punishment for homosexuals — in memory of the purifying flames which devoured the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. 

The Byzantine Emperor Justinian in 529 believed firmly that the tale of Sodom and Gomorrah was an example of how God destroyed cities with homosexual citizens, and feared it would happen again in his realm. So he decided to salvage the Empire by the methodical suppression of homosexuality.

Justinian ordered the Prefect to arrest any homosexual who refused to repent, and to subject him "to the extreme punishments." The punitive correction was brutal: first the convicted homosexual's testicles would be cut off. Then sharp reeds would be thrust into his penis. Then he would be led, or dragged, naked through the streets for public humiliation. Finally he would be burned at the stake. The Bishops Isaiah of Rhodes and Alexander of Diospolis were so mutilated, and dragged in agony through the streets.

In due course homosexuality became a civil crime throughout Christianized Europe, a phenomenon aided greatly in the eighth century when the Emperor Charlemagne condemned "sodomy" and Alfred the Great, under pressure from the Church, condemned the "disgusting foulness . . . as contagious as any disease." 

The most famous professor at the University of Paris in the thirteenth century was St Thomas Aquinas, who in his Summa Theologica established a rational basis for anti-homosexual prejudice by defining the peccata contra naturam as the greatest sin of lust, specifically founded upon pleasure rather than procreation.

 He declared that "right reason" would always see procreation as the purpose of intercourse, and his philosophical condemnation of homosexuality became the precedent for all theological and intellectual discourse upon the subject. His views are the foundation for most modern declarations against homosexual acts by the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church.

In fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Florence — where men were fond of sodomy to such an extent that the Germans dubbed pederasts Florenzer and the German word for sodomy became florenzen — the laws were precise with a vengeance: pederasts were castrated; consenting boys under 14 were beaten, driven naked through the city, and fine 50 lire; youths between 14 and 18 were fined 100 lire; houses or fields where the act took place were laid waste; men found in suspicious circumstances were presumed guilty; torture could be used to elicit a confession; conviction resulted in burning at the stake. The chief city officials could investigate, punish, and torture in any way they saw fit, and could ban suspects from the city; even songs about sodomy were fined 100 lire.

Although it has since watered down, homophobia continues to haunt the present day.

Major reasons homophobes give

·         Its unnatural

·         Its against Good’s law

·         It is disgusting

·         It’s a perversion

The Real Reasons behind homophobia

Us versus them: this is the subconscious belief that if someone else is granted rights, those rights come at one's own expense. For example, one of the oft-quoted reasons why some oppose gay marriage is that it will somehow threaten the heterosexual institution of marriage. How that would happen is never explained. This reason is an emotional reaction rather than a reasoned argument.

Loss of control: the more conservative an individual he is, the more concerned he is about being able to control his environment.

Someone who lives life in a manner quite different than one represents a threat to that individual. The threat is a threat to the ego in the sense that one's own choices may prove not to be optimal; it is also a subconscious threat to one's security in the sense that the other may prove to be more successful.

Again, the threat here is an emotional one, not a real, tangible threat. And again, there's no real-world evidence to support it. But emotion is what drives the argument.

Fear of rape: It is that instinctual fear of rape that drives much of homophobia. Straight men often instinctually see gay men as a threat and they instinctively fear that threat. It's a fear of a loss of control, of dominance, of status.

The threat is very real - in some rare, isolated circumstances. This instinctive means of asserting dominance is the source of prison rape. It's why men, who on the inside of prisons rape other men with brutal frequency, become promiscuous heterosexuals on the outside. Such men almost never have sex with other men as a means of emotional sharing, it's rather a violent act, intended to control, assert dominance and force other men into a subordinate position.

Threat to one's world-view: When someone has held to the same ideas and has staunchly advocated them all of his life, someone else who says he's wrong can be rather threatening.

The notion that "that old time religion is good enough for me" is one that is a lot more than just an old song, it represents a fundamental attitude towards one's roots that make it difficult to accept that one has been wrong all of one's life.

Fear that one may actually be homosexual himself: Homosexuality is, by even the most conservative estimates, far more common than the number of open homosexuals would imply. And with the realization that bisexuality is actually fairly common, particularly among women, there is a genuine fear among the more conservative that they, themselves, may be homosexual, The fear leads to a subconscious reaction

Homophobia in Africa

Homosexuality is illegal in many African countries - particularly Arab North Africa and those with a British colonial past such as Kenya, Uganda and Malawi.

The height of homophobia was in the recent past shown when a Ugandan MP proposed the death penalty for some gay people.

 While homosexuality is already illegal under Ugandan law, a proposed bill takes things up a notch. It penalizes homosexuality with a prison sentence or the death penalty, if it involves a minor, a disabled person, or the accused individual has HIV. It also penalizes individuals (e.g., landlords or relatives) who fail to report homosexuality with prison time.

Rev. Martin Ssempa - a Ugandan minister who is such a vocal critic of homosexuality that he recently showed gay porn to his congregation to try to equate homosexuality with deviancy - has also taken aim at the Obama administration. "Recently in America, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton stood up and said, 'How can Uganda make a law against homosexuality?' I want us to tell Obama that in Africa sodomy is an abomination," said Ssempa

 Since the Ugandan proposal, homophobia has been on the rise in other parts of Africa. For the weeks that followed, police in Malawi were openly pursuing gay activists and anyone suspected of being homosexual. The first known gay couple in Malawi to have a public commitment ceremony wound up getting arrested, and faces a 14-year jail sentence.

Figure 1: the gay couple in Malawi

US President Barack Obama's criticism of the Ugandan proposals led to huge anti-gay rallies in Kenya. Soon after, rumors of a gay wedding near the Kenyan coastal city of Mombasa resulted in several arrests.
In November 2010 Raila Odinga Kenya’s prime minister called for the arrest of gays "The constitution is very clear on this issue and men or women found engaging in homosexuality will not be spared," he is quoted as saying. He then went on to note that "we want a country that is clean, a clean way of doing thing has clean mannerisms ... we do not want things to do with sodomy,"

Monica Mbaru, from the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, in a february 2010 interview said many African leaders and communities remain hostile to gay people because of pressure from religious leaders. Both Christian and Muslim clerics have publicly condemned homosexuality for many years - describing it as a sin, abnormal or immoral. 

"Our politicians have great respect for religious leaders and are careful not to disagree with them, especially not on homosexuality," she says.

"So they pretend that homosexuals do not exist or that they can be 'cured' and communicate this message to the community."

Effects of homophobia

According to Blumenfeld (1992) within the numerous forms of oppression, members of the target group are oppressed, while on some level members of the dominant group

are hurt. Although the effects of the oppression differ qualitatively for specific target and

dominant groups, in the end everyone loses.

·         Homophobia locks all people into rigid gender-based roles that inhibit creativity

and self-expression.

·         Homophobic conditioning compromises the integrity of heterosexual people by

pressuring them to treat others badly, actions contrary to their basic humanity.

·         Homophobia inhibits one's ability to form close, intimate relationships with

members of one's own sex.

·         Homophobia generally restricts communication with a significant portion of the

population and, more specifically, limits family relationships.

·         Societal homophobia prevents some lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people

from developing an authentic self-identity and adds to the pressure to marry,

which in turn places undue stress and oftentimes trauma on themselves as well as

their heterosexual spouses and their children.

·         Homophobia is one cause of premature sexual involvement, which increases the

chances of teen pregnancy and the spread of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs).

Young people, of all sexual identities, are often pressured to become

heterosexually active to prove to themselves and others that they are "normal."

·         Homophobia combined with sexphobia (fear and repulsion of sex) results in the

elimination of any discussion of the lifestyles and sexuality of sexual minorities as

part of school-based sex education, keeping vital information from all students.

Such a lack of information can kill people in the age of AIDS.

·         Homophobia can be used to stigmatize, silence and, on occasion, target people

who are perceived or defined by others as gay, lesbian or bisexual but who are in

actuality heterosexual.

·         Homophobia prevents heterosexuals from accepting the benefits and gifts offered

by sexual minorities: theoretical insights, social and spiritual visions and options,

contributions to the arts and culture, to religion, to family life, indeed to all facets

of society.

·         Homophobia (along with racism, sexism, classism, sexphobia, etc.) inhibits a

unified and effective governmental and societal response to AIDS.

·         Homophobia diverts energy from more constructive endeavors.

·         Homophobia inhibits appreciation of other types of diversity, making it unsafe for everyone because each person has unique traits not considered mainstream or dominant. Therefore, we are all diminished when any one of us is demeaned

Conclusion

Gay youth are nearly three times more likely to be depressed, and nearly six times more likely to have attempted suicide than gay and transgendered teens who have not experienced high levels of homophobia, according to a 2011 study in the Journal of School Health.

Before you can combat or prevent any kind of phobia you first have to understand it. Most of the time those who are homophobic are not sure why they are, they haven't fully taken time to understand what it is about gay and lesbian people that they dislike or fear.

Homophobia just like most forms of prejudice is a direct result of irrational fear and ignorance. Gay people just like everyone else has a right to have their preference and sexual choices respected.

References

Homophobia: the fear behind the hatred A personal essay in hypertext  Scott Bidstup

Rictor Norton, A History of Homophobia, "The Medieval Basis of Modern Law" 15 April 2002, updated 15 June 2008 <http://rictornorton.co.uk/homopho5.htm>.

Derrick Sherwin Bailey, Homosexuality and the Western Christian Tradition (London and New York, 1955)

John J. McNeil SJ, The Church and the Homosexual (London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 1977)

Homophobia: How We All Pay the Price, ed. Warren J. Blumenfeld (Boston: Beacon Press, 1992)

The American Psychological Association's Statement on Homosexuality

New York Gay and Lesbian Anti-Violence Report, 1996.

Well Left -- for Muchi's dad...R.I.P

only in grief do we appreciate joy
only in pain do we appreciate health
only in loneliness do we appreciate love
only in death do we truly appreciate life

to one fully and well lived
for there is no better way to leave than laughing

WE ARE NOT GOING TO FAIL--for Wacuka Kariuki and for Kenya

I don’t know but I have been told that if you are not a part of the solution then you are part of the problem. I recently read a post by wacuka kariuki titled “I hope am wrong”   (http://tabasamumonologues.com/2011/08/01/hello-world/) and good madam you are. Here is why.

2007 was a bad time for Kenya that I do not refute. Some regions of the country saw a series of senseless violence and bloody killings. Some were ethnically motivated, others were simple outrage at extreme levels of poverty and others a result of ganged criminals. Hundreds of lives were lost, immeasurable amount of property was destroyed, churches were burnt, children were orphaned, people crippled for life, families displaced and among others, faith for our country was lost.

The greatest damage, in my opinion, that an experience can do to a person, is to break their spirit.

Perhaps I am a bit too emotional on the issue but I am especially enraged when people draw comparisons between African countries and the west (as Wacuka does in her post). If the little history I know is anything to go by, Britain where I think the writer writes from was officially formed in 1707 when England and Scotland agreed to merge. That makes Britain over 300 years old. Kenya on the other hand is barely 50 years old and while this is not an excuse for any atrocities, it is a factor that must be carefully considered.

We are a relatively young republic economically and politically. It is not of help either that over the years we have had a pack of selfish, short-sighted and greedy leaders (as most of the western countries did at first). We are not a unique case, the early years (first 100) of most world democracies were characterized by high levels of corruption, assassinations, injustices and a lot of religious and politically motivated violence.

Yes progress is not as fast paced as we would like and our systems are unfair and slow. Democracy is not always the case and perhaps the saddest part; ignorance levels are high. But all this is new to us. Lets not forget that barely 100 years back we were a people depending on hunting and gathering, wearing nothing but leather loin clothes. All these matters are very new to us and we are working hard to learn.

Here is why you cannot even start to compare Britain and Kenya. In 1860, Britain opened its first public flushing toilet. About then we were still throwing our dead in the bushes. In 1877, London introduced its first public electric lighting. About then, few if any africans even had kerosene lamps. In 1891, Britain introduced free education for every child. About then, we still relied on apprenticeship on hunting and herding skills from our grandfathers.

The author of tabasamu monologues describes herself as a patriotic Kenyan but I beg to differ. Patriotism in simple terms means devotion to one’s own country and concern for its defense. Defense here does not necessarily mean physical or military defense. Rather, it means defense against slander, defense for our heritage, defense for our pride and our view in the outside world.

I have enough respect and sympathy for the victims of the Kenyan post election violence. Unlike the author of the tabasamu monologues, some of them are still internally displaced and live in camps (one of our biggest failures as a country). It is a sad affair of matters. It was wrong what happened in 2007. Whether solved or shelved, the PEV aftermath has not been the dominant issue in Kenya for the last four years or so. Development and progress has.

I would like to tell the author that we Kenyans have since moved on from our mistake. Since then, people embarked on reconciliation and re-building. Most of the displace people have been re-settled, towns have been rebuilt and businesses have since resumed. There has been a lot of progress since too. Kenya did not turn into a Somalia or a Sudan. The general spirit all around is that peace is good and progress is ongoing.

The "kanges" are still loud here but did you know that we now have regulations that limit the number of people that can be packed in a matatu and that they now have seatbelts. The preachers still preach in the buses and they now have more space to collect offerings as nobody stands in buses anymore.

The nights in "westy" are still carefree almost every night of the week but since you have been gone we now have drinking laws meant to reduce alcoholism and encourage productivity. The not so busy bodies that you referred to at kencom, ambassador &railways bus station have slightly reduced since we introduce the ‘kazi kwa vijana’ projects.

We still eat "mutura" but since you left we have embraced smokies and the smokie stands outnumber mutura stands in the estates. And it’s good because they are generally cleaner hence healthier. If this is not a move to the right direction then I don’t know what is. We are not London; we are a slow and progressive Kenya.

You referred to two documentaries one by David Mckenzie of CNN on the locked and forgotten and another on BBC on life in Kibera. This convinced you that coming home was not wise. But please kindly consider that Kenya is much bigger than Kibera slums and Mathare mental hospital. Kenya just like any other capitalistic society is a paradise like haven for the educated and those who know their way with money. And is this something to be ashamed of? I do not think so. Name me one capitalistic society in the world isn’t like that.

I happen to be a journalist student in Kenya and BBC and CNN are not exactly masters in matters Kenya. That they even found time to squeeze in a documentary or two on Kenya is surprising. Google if you will “media coverage of Africa” and you will see that the first few pages of your search will be about how unfair the western media coverage of Africa is unfair and one-sided. As one Kenyan journalist that I bet you are not familiar with would say “you simply cannot make this stuff up…”

Less than a month ago a few days to Christmas last year, there was an ebola scare at Kenyatta hospital (remember Kenyatta hospital? They are getting new cancer equipment by the way). The story was all over the news and the next day the threat was called off. It was a wrong diagnosis. The threat was called off and there was no need to be afraid. My mother who also happens to be in the diaspora, called me worried for days on end after that. The media houses in the states where she lives reported the case but apparently forgot to report when it was found not to be ebola. What she could not understand is how it could not have been Ebola when CNN (or whatever international media house that carried the story) had told her it was.

In an article by Melissa sharp about the western media coverage of Africa she says western media portrays the image that Africa is broken and it is the western world’s duty to help fix it…the general public needs to be wary of reporting on Africa…

Here is some advice for you Wacuka, every once in a while switch off your BBC and CNN and watch a little of Kenyan TV, read a Kenyan paper and you will see the much good that is happening here. Multinational and national companies are fighting for space in Kenya providing employment for thousands. Art is getting a bigger platform than it ever has. Our education level is going up, as a matter of fact kids are now using slippers to copy exams.

Music is beautiful and young people are making money and bettering their lives. Corruption is slowly but surely being fought. People are more informed and vocal about their rights. We have a new constitution that’s promising to change things, hell we are even saying counties now. We are making better TV shows, building super highways and kicking al shaabab’s asses.

yaaay! New Constitution

 One thing I have always admired about the westerners is the amount of faith and trust that they have in their systems. Growing up I was told to always appreciate what I have and work to make it better rather than covet what my neighbor did. If we only showed a bit more faith and commitment to our systems then we would be unstoppable. Fuck the corrupt leaders, the government is you and you and me. Blabbering and bad-mouthing will not help. Change at a personal level will.

This is an election year and yes it is true that there might be a repeat of 2007 or even worse but what are you doing about it? Unfortunately, not everyone in Kenya can run away to Britain or wherever. It is up to all of us to preach the message of peace and tolerance and to break from mental manipulation by political leaders. It is time for us to stand and show solidarity and belief in our country and its beautiful people.

Oh and Wacuka you can go to Kenya. No one is slashing and maiming the other at the airport. Neither are they doing it in the Nairobi and upcountry streets…at least not yet. Forget about the documentaries if you are of sound mind you will not have to go to Mathare. Also, If you have been working hard wherever you are, you will not have to go to Kibera either unless if it’s to help. If your papers are in order, no one will prevent you from leaving. Your pessimism is imagined, You will not be in danger here.

Your concerns while touching, are invalid. We are not a collapsing nation. We just have our fair share of troubles like the rest of the world. Only we can make it fail. Grab your panga, your jembes, your micropohones or whatever tool you use for your trade and lets make this nation work.

The Kenyan glass is half full…not half empty.

That is why you see the resilience in those eyes, but it could also be a narcotic substance...i don't know.