Equal sexes the answer

By TONY LUCOMBE
| Tue, May 01, 2012 - 12:00 AM

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It is barbaric, it is ongoing; it is one of the ugliest of domestic and not so domestic altercations here. And yet it seems violence against women is not as nationally abhorred, as it is apathetically accepted.

We would’ve thought that in view of the regular and worthy CBCTV advertisements that plead to end violence against women, voices and attitudes would’ve became more decisive in condemnation. Alas, not so!

It was disturbing to read Esther Phillips’ column Word View in the February 12 SUNDAY SUN, wherein she gave a rather dispassionate account of watching a man beating a defenceless and submissive woman, as it seems, in high daylight, publicly, and “without let or hindrance”, as a crowd of men and women gathered to watch the execrable spectacle, but without any voice of protest against the one-sided violence, nor seemingly worried about the raw emotional violence and behaviour to which her small child was exposed.

Sadly, this was not an isolated incident. Phillips concluded her article saying that what kept haunting her was the woman’s attitude of submissiveness; and asked: “Was this learnt behaviour?”

Sure it is – and on both sides of the sexes: a gender-biased ideology of male dominance and subordination of the female, endorsed by the perpetuation of society, hammered into our psyche by unquestioned chauvinism, abetted by religious dogma.

To eliminate this dastardly habit from our society, the acceptance of equality of the sexes becomes paramount, aimed at those men who are still resistant to the concept because of age-old traditions.