The Male Gender Group and the Dangers of a Single Story
Amudipe Marcus
One of the numerous features that makes a story or narrative complete is when it is being told in a complete sense; well detailed, objective and devoid of sentiments. Today, we celebrate the international men’s day and the world toilet day, the sheer realization of this fact sends a cold shrill down my manly spine. The male gender is fast becoming endangered specie as the mention of the word “men’ or anything that comes along with it raises dozens of eyebrows. "Men this, men that," and all over the world the male gender suffers from one communal disease which is the danger of a single story. While we fight and consciously walk towards achieving a gender equal reality where both genders are given equal opportunity to thrive and succeed, the male gender has fallen down the ‘value ebb’ as it has been subjected to various forms of degradation arising from the consequences of single stories being told about it.
In the words of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie,”The single story creates stereotypes , and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story.’
Rapists, thieves, players etc are common terms used to describe when the world talks about the male gender, while we cannot deny the fact that this is true about a fraction of them, we must not forget that it will be an hasty generalization to conclude on these premises that the entire male gender can be defined in light of these descriptions. We do have amazing fathers and brothers who have risen above the 21st century perverse understanding of the male gender group.
While we get too quick to respond to incidents relating to perverse men in their internal working we must also remember to celebrate men who have chosen to be different, the ones who have chosen to remain committed to the classical ways of men which is built on nothing else but honor, dignity and chivalry else we fall into the trap of the dangers of telling a single story.
