A reply to an African Feminist
(A Yoruba story)
The world will be a very beautiful place only if people will make it their business to know of what they talk about.
I shared a post about a woman who was given a piece of advice, it was enough to excite some people, especially the self-proclaimed militant feminists and self-declared patriarchal slayers, and they used it to project/promote their personal neuroses and pathologies!
These newly-fanged African Feminists confirm the saying that: New Converts make the worst Zealots. While old-fashioned Feminism in the West has lost traction and people are looking for ways to build better family relationships, African Feminists remain ardent warriors - uncompromising in shooting down anything that does not conform with their simplistic, rigid, and narrow interpretation of very complex sociological problems.
Unfortunately, like in most borrowed foreign ideas (democracy and religion being good examples), African Feminists have become pathetic caricatures as they seek to outdo the originators! As a European Christian will find it difficult to relate to or understand the Human Zombies who parade as Christians in Africa, so will a Western Feminist find anything in common with the irrational “patriarch slayers” in Africa.
If anything, African cosmogony does not interpret the world in a rigid two-color prism. African philosophy teaches that there is more to the world/universe than what we, as mere mortals, can perceive. Not surprisingly, western science is just admitting what ancient people have long deduced.
It is precisely the knowledge that the world is far bigger than what we can see or know that made our ancestors admonish us against using our mouths/tongues loosely.
Here is a Yoruba story on why we should be guided in our utterances!
The Tongue - the sweetest and bitterest part of meat
After the death of a king, the kingmakers decided to test the Heir Apparent to the throne.
They asked him to give them the name of the sweetest part of an animal.
The Heir thought hard and deep, and he decided to consult an Elder.
The Elder told him that it was the Tongue. The Prince went back to the kingmakers and told them the answer he was given.
The Elders deliberated for a while and told him that the crown was his if he could correctly tell them the most bitter part of an animal.
The Heir consulted his Elder who, again, told him that it is the Tongue.
Perplexed, the prince asked how could something be both the sweetest and also the bitterest.
The Elder explained that the Tongue is responsible for both the good and the bad things we say and, ultimately, for our fortunes and misfortunes.
It is quite unfortunate to see Africans refusing to learn from their history or consult their Elders to drink from the deep well of knowledge.
They feel comfortable filling their heads and their minds with every nonsensical idea propagated by Westerners.
And one mindless idiot got himself high on some cheap whiskey and announced that I hate women!
Me!
My Yoruba people revere Mothers, far above Fathers, hence our saying: Iyà ni Wurà, Bàbà ni diigi / Mothers are pure Gold, Fathers are mere Mirrors.
We also say that: Oriṣà bi Iyà kó si / There’s no god like a mother!
To each one according to his/her level of comprehension!
But, seriously, how could the very simple fact stable and prosperous societies can only be built by stable and prosperous families escape our educated women in Africa, who have educated themselves to think that vicious competition with their male folks is the penultimate of life’s ambitions?
Granted that problems exist in traditional societies that need to be remedied, but you do not heal fractures by pulling them apart.
How can any sane human being educate herself to think that an economic system where one parent can work and earn enough to take care of the family is to be scorned and derided, while a system where the two parents turn themselves into corporate careerists, and still struggle to make ends meet is to be celebrated?
Does anyone require anything more than simple common sense to know that the mess that currently engulfs our society has its origin in the breakdown of our traditional family systems/values?
My Yoruba people say: Àbọ̀ ọ̀rọ̀ la ńsọ fún ọmọlúwàbí, tó bá dé inú u rẹ̀, á di odindi. / Few words need be spoken to the wise; they are completed when received. [As the English say: A word is enough for the wise. Wisdom means seeing what is not shown and hearing what is not spoken.]
©️Fẹ̀mi Akọ̀mọ̀làfẹ̀
November 26, 2023
Fẹmi Akọmọlafẹ is a farmer, writer, and published author.
My latest book, “Africa: A Continent on Bended Knees” is available on:
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Africa-Continent-Bended-Femi-Akomolafe-ebook/dp/B08FGZNJ5T
On Booknook.store: https://booknook.store/product/africa-a-continent-on-bended-knees/
My other books on Amazon
Africa: it shall be well: https://tinyurl.com/sn64ocd
Africa: Destroyed by the gods: https://tinyurl.com/vglfk7w
Get a FREE Chapter of ‘Africa: It shall be well’ here: http://alaye.biz/africa-it-shall-be-well-a-free-chapter/
Get a FREE Chapter of ‘Africa: Destroyed by the gods’ here: http://alaye.biz/africa-destroyed-by-the-gods-free-chapter/
Kindly help me share the books’ links with your friends and, grin, please purchase your copies.
Comradely,
Fẹ̀mi Akọ̀mọ̀làfẹ̀