The African Man

Dear reader,

Thank you for sparing the time to look at this particular blog. I appreciate the time and effort that you take off to read my blog, although I am not the most reliable person in releasing these blogs. Nevertheless, thank you. I will not make a promise that I will be better and more consistent with my posts, but I can promise to try;

Now off to my usual rant and rumbling. Today for a change I am going to start off with a poem, which will make sense at the end of the post;

The African Man,

Seen as powerful, calm and unrelenting.

The African Man,

Unwilling to change, devoted to his ways and honest.

The African Man,

Who is he?

Why do you stereotype him?

What reason do you have to make him out to be what he is not?

I tell you, I tell you,

The African Man,

He is good, he is kind, and he is not quick to rubbish change.

The African Man,

He hates being called what he is not…

What does this poem mean?

For one, I have been in numerous conversations with various African women (friends and colleagues). Do you know what they all have in common? Sadly, it is the deluded conclusion that ‘all men are cheats. It is in their blood and DNA.’ That is what they say. Most times they have reserved and sad expressions when they are telling me this hogwash. Yes, ladies, I called this belief of yours hogwash. In fact, it is bull shit.

Yes, I accept that you have classic examples of men with numerous wives. It is easy for you to pick out your friend’s friend’s man who was caught with two other girls. It is even easier to point to the numerous posh cars of well off, married or seriously committed men that line up outside universities, picking up young and naïve girls for some fun. All this is basing on my little old dusty country where I too have witnessed men at their worst. In Uganda, it is not hard to find a man with more than one woman, all of them bearing his seed. You just have to attend his funeral to find out how many children he really has.

To make matters worse, this African society has since time in memorial engrained it on the minds of its male population that the more women and children you have, the more manly that you are. True that held water in the days past. True in some instances, more common than rare, it holds more water for young men who are making it in this world.

But despite all of this, let me tell you. It is not all lost. Why should you ladies assume that all men are this way? Where you have examples of cheating lowlifes, I too have examples of men who would willingly accept to love the one woman that they are with. I have seen it done. Not to brag or anything, I am doing.

Ladies, there are some men out there who do not take you for granted. Yes, you might be more than us, but these men will accept to stay with you because they, simply put, love you. I am tired of this whole notion that men are cheats and are meant to cheat. In the first place that might be why you will drive your man to cheat ladies. As men, we do not get into a relationship where we are serious to cheat on you.

Cheating is a choice. It has always been. In Africa it was never looked at in that way, but that was then. Right now. Today. In this world that is full of mistrust and uncertainty, no wise man would willingly play with what he does not need when he has the best thing already at home.

This is my humble appeal to women. Yes you say men are made to cheat. Yes the world has fashioned it that way. Yes you have your bloody examples. But…and this is a very BIG BUT, not all men are like all men. There is that handful of men that would rather die than cheat on you, if you are their lady or who knows, they might be more than a handful. There are men who would willingly love you and only you without sharing themselves with others.

So stop saying ‘all men are cheats and it is in their DNA.’

We are not.

Until the next time, thank you,

I remain your dream chasing geek.