The Dangers of Western Feminism to African Women | Elma Akob | TEDxUniversityofPretoria

is western feminism dangerous to african women as a young woman who was born in west africa and has lived in south africa for 13 years the term feminism remains uncharted waters for many it is rebellious seen as taboo and in my home country cameroon it is a word that every mother hopes to never hear her daughter say because it either means she hates men men hate her or she'll end up not getting married but why what does feminism mean to african women is feminism un-african but most importantly is feminism dangerous to the safety and empowerment

of african women growing up like most girls i went through the phase of hating boys because you know boys have cooties and books before boys because boys bring babies but my friends thought i took this a little bit further when i decided to call myself a feminist after watching videos chimamanda ngozi adichies we should all be feminists being at the top of that list and reading publications from the fierce woman who called themselves feminist i was ready to take on this role as my own and so when i stepped into a room i would introduce

myself as elmer acob the radical feminist whenever there was a conversation pertaining equality empowerment and gender roles everyone knew i would be involved and i would be brutal in fact if people saw me approaching and they were having a conversation they would quickly change the topic because they knew i would call them out on their sexist ways and do so unapologetically as a pan-african citizen and a black woman who spat on the face of patriarchy and hated misogyny i thought i was qualified enough to call myself a radical feminist but i was wrong there were

certain aspects of radical feminism that i did not align with such as what seemed to be the innate hate for all things male and masculine and so i decided to call myself alma the liberal feminist i was passionate about the liberation of women and what the core definition of feminism was the equality of sexes freedom from oppression and gender equality not the extra bits that keep getting added on every single day when meeting other feminists i would always have my feminism questioned as though there was some sort of a checklist or a mold that i

needed to fit into to be called a feminist then there was the feminist jargon a series of highly intellectual words that even with my high education i still find it difficult to keep up with i then found out about the racial injustices associated with the founders of feminism and so i decided to call myself alma the intersectional feminist but then of course the other feminists always told me look if you're not going to be 100 feminist then don't be feminist at all so i started introducing myself as elmer the feminist but at this point i

was told i had watered down the movement so much and that i was using it for clout and so now i am alma an individual who is appalled by the injustices faced by women is an advocate for women empowerment and understands or rather stands for gender equality now why is the story important because this is the narrative faced by a number of people who have tried to associate with the feminist movement feeling ostracized and not welcomed by a movement because they don't fit into this mold especially the minorities those who don't understand the language those

who can't relate to mainstream feminism those who can't just take off their bras to make a statement those like me we don't fit this mold but were we meant to was feminism created with the black woman struggle in mind was feminism created for african black women now although black women and white women share commonalities of oppression the latter have experienced privileges since history during colonialism white women or rather women in general were characterized according to race class and social status white women were housewives whereas black women and women of color were colonized the creation of

the domestic housewife meant the white woman's withdrawal from a very male dominated and a male creator society she was meant to look pretty and take care of the home and not participate in anything else such as politics and leadership or getting a job and thus the foundations of feminism were founded on the principles of a white woman no longer wanting to be a housewife she wanted to run for office she wanted to drive a tractor but that same femininity that was afforded to white women was completely stripped away from black women black women were seen

as aggressive sexually perverse and capable of doing any sort of labor hard labor or soft labor note that in comparison to the black woman the white woman was already superior emancipated privileged liberated free thus all she wanted was the equality of sexes black women on the other hand saw empowerment as something completely different empowerment to black women meant so much more it was fighting against racism fighting neo-colonialism fighting socially economic mechanisms they were fighting for their life and so black african women the early african feminists were reluctant to align themselves with this term of waste

and feminism because they believed that it focused solely on the white woman making her at the core of this movement and it ignored the marginalization and the plight of the black woman also remember that white women participated in the enslavement of black women so it makes sense to me that a movement that empowered one race of agenda and oppressed the other race of agenda is not welcomed by everyone so my question is was african hopeless before feminism i mean did we completely disregard women's rights now i remember growing up and hearing the stories about the

matriarchs from my of my village rather in ocean cameroon the women who spoke and thousands listened now they were the advisers to chiefs they laid kingdoms alongside their kings they made a difference they had influence i not only heard of this but sought myself when i visited my village and saw the women of the count of the compound rather who made the decisions there respect was granted according to age not gender so the oldest woman in the compound known as avo would be granted the highest level of respect by every man woman and child these

were the fierce african women that we had never heard of growing up and that's the problem the fact that these narratives are not documented and so these women had never heard of the term feminism in fact feminism doesn't even exist in our dialect but they were happy and they were living a life that today would be seen as oppressed and that's something that i still can't sit with the fact that our grandmothers who are uneducated are currently labeled as oppressed or currently labeled as enslaved whereas they were doing their hardest and sacrificing for us to

have the basic necessities even today we see women who decide to be housewives being looked down upon by the feminist movement as not being strong enough and a settling for less so is feminism on african well i'll let you decide that question but here's something to think of mainstream or rather current western feminist ideology is based on the concept of i how can i free myself from oppression african community ideology is based on we how can we empower ourselves for the benefit of everyone i am because you are with strong family values the problem with

feminism is that it is individualistic it tries to be representative of an entire gender group and the truth is as women we're completely different we differ from our cultures our traditions our norms our histories even our oppression is different and that's why you would be able to differentiate between a nigerian feminist and a south african feminist because of their histories and their cultures and their traditions and what they say is norm so to answer your question the manner in which feminism is defined with such strict borders that do not accommodate tradition the fact that african

culture is looked down upon as oppressive and the fact that women who choose to be housewives are seen as less and most importantly the fact that council culture doesn't even allow us to have a broad overview on the subject of feminism i don't think it is suited for the african narrative now let's quickly chat about cancer culture and i'm sure this is something you can relate to because it's very prevalent in our society today the fact that someone can say something and be completely cancelled for it and someone will say the exact same thing and

society will say it's okay unfortunately feminists have been seen at the forefront of cancer culture socially charged guardians of galaxy who get to decide if we are woke and correct and good or bad and not even capable of being seen as worthy human beings canceled culture associated in the feminist society is violent it's dangerous it weaponizes words people are scared people are afraid to talk afraid to have opinions afraid to breathe wrong in case you have the council culture vultures breathing at the back of your neck the problem with cancer culture is that it stops

the ability of learning the ability of educating and i know what you're thinking alma there's google there are resources out there and everyone should be able to educate themselves but when you sign up to be an activist you sign up to educate you sign up to empower and you sign up to make a difference so it is our role to keep on educating it is our role because if we do not educate then progress will not be made in society now let's discuss the dichotomy between feminism as a concept and feminism as it relates to

african women last year i remember looking at two articles back to back and the headlines were the horrendous effects of female genital mutilation and the other was the german nudist culture it was at that moment that i realized that what the west sought to be as feminism is not what i so to be as feminism as african women we are fighting for so much more we have bigger fish to fry we're still fighting the clasps of female genital mutilation the fact that we have children who are being sold off to child marriages we have six

slaves we are fighting a war here we're fighting for our lives we don't have time for the pleasantries of a nudist culture we don't have time to enjoy the privileges and the perks of feminism and so i can no longer relate to feminism i can't relate to the nudist culture i can't relate to any of that because what we are facing is completely different now this does not mean we should wave the white flag it doesn't mean we should accept patriarchy as the norm currently in south africa where i live we are facing another pandemic

known as gender-based violence where a woman is raped every 30 seconds now i can't discredit the victories of the feminist movement thus far i can't discredit what the likes of chimamanda ngozi adichie have done for gender equality but i think it's time we re-evaluate the cause it's time we found african solutions to african problems because we are still 50 steps back we're not at the level of freedom and equality that the women in the west face and so we cannot adopt their movements as our own we need to find our own movements we must remember

that before colonization before the existence of feminism we had female matriarchs fierce leaders who knew what to do and we can still do that now i recently heard the term womanism as coined by critically acclaimed author of the color purple and she stated that feminism did not encompass the beliefs and ideas of black women but womanism did as a social construct womanism separated itself from feminism feminism differentiates from womenism with three different levels of oppression feminism focuses solely on the equality of sexes whereas womanism focuses on racism sexism and classism so i think we should

expand or rather research on womenism and see what it means to us as african women as a movement that we can adopt to end off i come from a family of five with three girls a mom and a dad who wanted nothing but the best for us as a doctor and a vice chancellor my dad has always said that education is non-negotiable and it is for that reason that both my mom and my two sisters are currently completing their phd and i'm completing my master's degree at 22 years old now my dad never yearned for

a son at no point did he ever make us feel less for being girls in fact the way he treated my mom every single day he would say that he would be nothing without her and that he is who he is because of her and he had to work so hard to get such a formidable woman it's because of things like that words like that that we are the empowered young women that we are today my dad was never taught feminism in fact i don't think he's heard the term except from me but he was

raised in a typical african home where he saw the respect for his mother and the love for his sisters and the love of god and that was the foundation of who he was and how he raised us and though i know it sounds cliche but i think that's where we should start at love because love conquers it all right for the longest time african children have not received love do not know what it is and do not know how to show it and that could be one of the reasons why there is gender inequality love

of all passions is the strongest because it works simultaneously with the mind the heart and the senses so alma who are you now i'm alma acob an individual who is appalled by the injustice injustices faced by women is an advocate for women empowerment and believes in gender equality thank you you