I recently wrote a paper for a southern African journal
of feminism and although I am not at liberty to share the contents of the
article on my blog, there is one nagging issue that research for this paper
brought to the fore. It is the issue of sex education in young people.
One Billion Rising was a campaign that sought to bring
the issue of violence against women front and center of discourse and to bring
it out from under the umbrella of feminist issue to a humanist issue. This I
firmly believe is the only way in which violence against women will be
eradicated; when it becomes a human rather than a women’s issue. In other words
women may be at the fore front of campaigns to end rape and domestic violence,
however men need to be visible in this fight in huge numbers. In fact, I am now
of the firm belief that women can find quick ‘band-aid’ type solutions to the
problem of the violence that threatens to annihilate them, but I believe it is
men who will ultimately push the frontier so that violence becomes an anomaly rather
than a cultural norm.
In thinking about the issue of rape, it also occurred to
me as I wrote this paper that sex education is practically non- existent. By
this I mean that an education that seeks to assist girls and boys in
understanding that they are sexual beings, and that sexual activity is supposed
to be pleasurable to both men and women does not really exist.
For example in
initiation ceremonies across the globe, young women are taught that they are to
be good wives and that their bodies are for the sole pleasure of their future
husbands. In fact many have no idea what their external (let alone internal sex
organs) look like or what each part is for.Girls are not taught that their bodies, the vagina, with its glorious nubbin of millions of nerve endings called the clitoris, are actually there, not for some boy or man to take pleasure from, but for themselves as girls/women to give themselves pleasure.
The media bombards girls with images and story lines like: "10 ways to keep your man begging for more". The result is that many girls truly
believe that in order to be popular they must give the best oral sex to boys
(yes here in the States girls as young as 11 have been caught giving oral sex
to boys on school buses and feeling very pleased with themselves for delivering
“the best service”). The topic of masturbation is one which
even in so called liberal societies still make people cringe. But I would argue
that if young women were brought up to be totally comfortable with their bodies
and also to know how to pleasure themselves, we might have less of the
martyr-esque sexual liasions that young girls often find themselves engaged in,
all for the wrong reasons and with awful consequences to their self esteem.
The same would apply to boys, however the standards as
usual are different. Boys masturbate and it is an accepted albeit frowned upon
(or not openly discussed fact). What would be real education are classes in
which boys were taught the anatomy of women and also the fact that sex is not
meant as a selfish “let me get mine “ act, but a give and take in which they
should consider the satisfaction of their partner. If boys were taught to view
girls as human beings with the same sexual urges as they have and to understand
that sex is more fulfilling when it is reciprocal, I like to think that we
would have less violent sex towards girls and less degrading scenarios in which
girls are used as sperm receptacles and nothing more.
What one would then hope to cultivated in young people is
a mutual desire to see the other fulfilled and therefore sexual experiences
that take into account what another might find unacceptable, desirable or
downright painful.
Many boys first encounter with sex is through watching
porn, which has become more and more violent in its depictions of women. If
this is where boys are learning about sex between men and women, and girls are
being taught that their sole purpose in life is to give pleasure to their
future husbands, then is it any wonder that boys don’t really know what rape is
and girls think that once a boy is turned on then they have to consummate the
sex act whether they like it or not?
My point is this: we cannot teach young people what rape
is unless and until we teach them what is NOT rape. Until there is a clear
understanding that women are sexual beings with the same needs and desires as
men, then the culture in which women are brutalized for male satisfaction will
continue. Until a woman understands that it is critical that she knows her body
and knows what turns her on before she places herself in the hands of another,
then she is at risk of becoming victim to what the other thinks is good sex,
and this is a standard over which she will have no control.
Until boys are socialized to see that it is normal,
acceptable and desirable to show an open interest in issues affecting women,
then we continue to breed men who have no understanding of what it is to be a
woman and therefore have no empathy for what women need or do not want. Until
society stops mocking and vilifying boys for enjoying what are considered
feminine pursuits and until society breaks down the gender stereotypes that
define maleness as aggressive, non-crying, non- emotional, hard and tough, then
women will always be vulnerable to men who do not have the ability to step into
their shoes and get a feel for what violence does to a woman. Until society
stops creating these gender distinctions whereby “girls cry, girls are weak and
fragile”, then once again women remain vulnerable to the brutish boys we are
breeding.
I think one of the most important issues to come out of
the OBR campaign is that of authentic sex education, and initiation rituals
that edify and strengthen the position of girls rather than weaken and cripple
them, rendering them victims before they have even begun their sexual lives.
Female genital mutilation is one such initiation practice and it has to GO!! It
serves absolutely no purpose other than to remove that which would give a girl
or woman sexual pleasure, thereby denying her this basic and fundamental
biological right forever. There is nothing more heart breaking than to meet a
woman of my age who has had 3 children but has never had an orgasm, or even a
tremor. There is nothing more demoralizing than to meet 17 year olds who dread
their first sex act because they have been infibulated and live with a visceral
fear of marriage and bearing children. I meet these women every week and every
week I hear variations to the same horrific stories about lives damaged by FGM.
As we tackle the issue of rape, let us also work to
educate girls and boys about sex and reciprocity before the porn industry with
its current objectification and degradation of women gets to them and sets the
standard. We cannot lose our children to violence and if we do not get in with
good education as parents, mentors community leaders and schools, then violence
against women and the broken men that perpetrate the violence are here to stay.
Oh and perhaps we need a new name to replace the word masturbation. How about: Self- centric pleasure?
