On ‘nakedizing’ women

A recently surfaced video showing a young man and his friends subjecting his ex-girlfriend to a distressing ordeal has been doing the rounds. Allegedly, the ex-girlfriend confronted her former boyfriend’s new girlfriend at a party hosted by the man’s boss.  Not only was the ex-girlfriend whipped, but they also forcibly shaved her hair. The man could be heard asking her to apologise to the new girlfriend and to promise to leave him alone. She was never to come to his house again, never to ask him to take her back, and so on and so forth. She was also ordered to post the video of her humiliation on social media.

I am against women fighting other women over men. Men are not toys that get stolen by mischievous women from whom the ‘real owners’ have to snatch them back.  And while the heart wants what the heart knows not, I don’t understand why anyone would want to be in a relationship with someone who doesn’t want them. I am also against violence and this sort of public humiliation. They even tore her blouse. The idea, one of the voices said, was to make her look as mad as she acted.

Some have since alleged that the video was a prank orchestrated by a comedian (the victim) to create content. If that’s true, it wasn’t even remotely funny. Perhaps she should leave comedy and try her hand at acting. Nollywood still dey expand. Anyway, regardless of whether it was staged or not, the points I want to make still stand.

First off, I’ve never understood why Naija folks like to strip women naked as a form of punishment. They catch a woman cheating, they rip off her clothes and stick a camera in her face. They catch a woman stealing an iPhone, same treatment. Not too long ago, a video went viral of a young widow who was stripped by her in-laws for whatever offence they accused her of. Her fellow women paraded her round their village, half naked, shaming her.  Haba. This obsession with gratuitously ‘nakedizing’ women is not new. Google “Nigeria” and “Woman stripped naked,” and weep. It doesn’t matter what offence the woman has committed: stolen an iPhone or kidnapped a child, the default mode is to tear her clothes off her and expose her nakedness to the world. Now, with social media, the humiliation doesn’t end with having people—even children—gawk at these naked women in real time, but they are filmed, and the videos are posted for folks to forward to others and for perverts to save on their phones.

The internet never forgets; so these recordings live on, presumably in perpetuity.  

What’s the correlation between theft and this default mode: forcibly stripping women naked as punishment? On the surface, there appears to be none, but once you recall the casualness with which sexual assault against women is treated in Naija, then the pattern seems almost inevitable. The common denominators are women and a sexual assault culture that protects its perpetrators. And what enables this culture? It starts with a P. I’ve written ad nauseam about this, even as recently as last week. But maybe the important things should be said over and over again.

As long as patriarchy remains unchallenged, its children will continue to thrive. A system that encourages the disrespect of women, that believes women are inferior beings, that women are nothing unless they can be objectified, and one that protects sexual assaulters, is a system in which using women’s bodies as a tool of ‘punishment’ thrives. How to dismantle patriarchy?

Education. I feel like every week I repeat myself, but educating our people – including doing so by making sure perpetrators face the consequences of their actions, and by using every platform we have to challenge the deeply ingrained social, cultural and institutional systems that uphold gender inequality and discrimination – is really how change will happen. Nothing changes simply by wishing it.

So, my people—all ye with common sense—pick up the baton. Let us, in however way we can, help put an end to this shameful, vile behaviour. One day at a time, one person at a time, is the surest way to win this battle.