Of Women and Career Preferences

(By Joy Isi Bewaji) – This meme is everywhere sha.

I have a problem with it, because it addresses absolutely nothing...

Just a vague idea of what a woman should do or be before greatness can be determined.

What is greatness anyway? How do we determine another woman's greatness?

This mission to drag all women into a boardroom has become ridiculous. Does she want to be in a boardroom?

We have moved from dragging women into kitchens, now that seems old-fashioned. The new trend is to create the desire to be room-ed away from the typical rooms suggested by society for women.

Why should it be ok for me to like boardroom activities, but not ok for the next women to like kitchen room activities without judgements?

We should not be tempted to design badges of greatness for women based on our own ideas of what greatness is.

Beyond the conventional utterances of Buhari... there is something great in being a housewife, working within the important rooms of kitchen, living room and the other room.

At the least, children are fed when a kitchen is put to good use.

And a husband... well, in a proper society with effective laws to protect the woman, the family can carry on the conventional method of nuclear family lifestyle where one parent tends to the home of emotional, spiritual, psychological needs... and the other tends to the financial needs.

Both run careers recognised by the state. To be a homemaker is a career... else why do we employ others to tend to our home if it can run itself?

A pretend society forgets that a proper home is one where one parent is present in the daily activities of domestic life.

It is actually unhealthy for kids to have both parents working boardroom careers. This is a void where maids fill in. And who's going to trust a maid to love a child like s/he deserves in this era of constant child abuse?

It is unhealthy for the relationship too. One adult has to have a more flexible career to make up for all the lost hours their romance suffers.

We all cannot be in the boardroom.

Single parenting is an exception, but it is a tough exception.

The idea is not to get all women into a boardroom. The idea is to accept all women as they are.

Nigeria, as a patriarchal society, doesn't accept anybody- male of female as s/he is. For women it is twice as tough.

That is why people believe it is impossible to be a feminist housewife... because the little knowledge they have of the movement is that it aims to deploy all women from kitchen to boardroom.

Why? Money.

Money plays a big deal in power sharing.

This society does not recognise the power of a working woman within the structures of a home (until she holds a bag and an ipad, her greatness is questioned). She gets kicked out the minute another woman is kicked in without as much as a pin to her name after, say, ten years in marriage.

Proper societies protect domestic working women... so there is no fear or insecurity as they spread their legs to meet the needs of a husband. They are protected. The state ensures when he needs to fuck someone else, she gets, sometimes, half of all THEY have worked for.

Nigeria is not the society to be referred to for any sensible argument relating to the benefits of housewives and homemakers.

The narrative should be that women should be allowed to live their authentic lives. Find your genuine self. Breathe.

If a woman wants to be a mechanic, breathe into it.

If she wants to be a home-maker, with the grace and diligence of one building an importannt unit that affects the entire community... breathe into it (well groomed children can never go out of fashion).

And if she wants to be a scientist... go get 'em baby!

There are too many failed parenting, anyway. Homemaking is a career we need to take seriously.

And another thing, this obsession to be the "best in what you do". To be number one... this shallow competition amongst women.

Go suck on a pacifier.

Be the best version of yourself. Period.

Win. Period.

And rest.

All of the attention to clinching a number one position is paved with the kind of bitterness that will crack an egg by means of hate emissions coming out of body pores.

Accept your body (or work on it). Accept your path. Accept your strengths. Accept your limitations.

Live without accepting any definition of greatness that doesn't consider your peculiar choices or circumstances.

I think.