Change people’s mindset to attain women emancipation

Sustainable Development Goal 5 is about gender equality. This goal calls for gender equality and empowerment of all women and girls globally. According to the UN, “gender equality is not only a fundamental human right, but rather a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world”. Giving equal access to education, health care, decent work, and representation in political and economic decision-making processes to women and girls can usher in sustainable economies which in turn benefit humanity and societies.

In Uganda, our focus on women emancipation and empowerment is more theoretically successful than it is practically. This is the reason why we still have gender-based violence against women, discrimination by sex and also gruesome murder of women and girls in addition to injustices against women that are endemic in society today. Our communities strongly believe that women are “weak vessels”, a misnomer which renders them as primary targets in the minds of miscreants. The golden question, however, should be in what context are they are “weak vessels”?

I think that God created man and woman uniquely and differently, and placed them to occupy separate spaces. It must be unequivocally construed by all and sundry that the two don’t occupy the same space even when they live as husband and wife. Therefore, it is not proper to compare man and woman in terms of their physical strength and tag her as a “weak vessel”. The best comparison should be based on what each of them can do when availed equal opportunities.

Most of the injustices against women occur because the perpetrators imagine that they are stronger hence they shouldn’t let the “weak” be. They forget that each person occupies a different space. I believe that, changing the mindset of society members can make wonders in aiding women emancipation.

I am convinced that women in Uganda can do whatever men can do or even better if they are psychologically emancipated. Currently, most women emancipators are focusing on liberating women from a life of servitude by encouraging them to physically resist dominion by men. But without freeing women from mental slavery to attitudes created by “true African cultures”, abstractly established to facilitate servitude and subservience of women to men, the efforts will be in vain.
It should be noted, however, that servitude involves forced fidelity towards someone while in subservience, one’s fidelity is willingly given to whoever the person deems fit to receive it. Well, it is not bad for women to resist dominion by men, but in pursuit of a lasting solution, it is better to deal primarily with peoples’ “software”(mindset) before physical encounter.