Quizzical answers to questions
Women’s daily struggle is well entrenched
THE GOVERNMENT declared August Women’s Month and August 9 Women’s Day.
The struggles of South African women are well entrenched in the country’s history, dating back to the heroics of our Struggle heroines who staged a march at the Union Buildings on August 9, 1956 to resist the pass laws.
Today, women are continuing with the struggle. It manifests in many ways and has pervaded the socio-fabric of our society.
Women face hardships every day at work, at home, in business, in taxis and in clubs. They struggle everywhere.
Conforming to undesirable traditional norms like saying the place of a woman is in the kitchen has further exacerbated the disempowerment of women.
Security of tenure for women on farms goes as far as the contractual lifespan between the farm owners and their spouses.
As soon as their spouses die or get dismissed, they often face eviction.
At work, women face sexual harassment and gender bias manifesting in many instances, such as the gender wage gap.
The tentacles of patriarchy are still long. Men also need to stand up and help the government create a conducive environment for women to prosper.
Legal recourse is there and men need to engender a propensity to assist in helping society to uphold the rule of law.
Laws such as the Extension of Security of Tenure Act by the Department of Rural Development and Land Reform, national gender policy and the Eighth Principle Action Plan for Promoting Women’s Empowerment and Gender Equality in the Public Service need to be enforced to protect our women at work, on farms and in all the walks of life. THEMBA MZULA HLEKO Pretoria CONGRATULATIONS on the Daily News high school quiz competition.
Although long out of high school, my wife and I enjoy putting our memories and general knowledge to the test. I would like to discuss a few questions from last week’s edition.
The first concerned India, which is celebrating 70 years of independence and the follow-up question concerned the country’s president.
The answer given was Narendra Modi, but the president is Ram Nath Kovind, with Modi the prime minister – a common mistake for which I’m not going to take you to task.
The second question comes from the entertainment category and concerned a female celebrity who liked her men “nicely manscaped”. Having had to Google the term, we wondered if the question was age-appropriate, but then remembered Muslims begin “manscaping” on reaching puberty, so the term would have been familiar to some pupils.
In any event, with condoms to be distributed in primary schools, who are we to comment on what is age-appropriate these days? A HUDSON Durban