"Culture"

Friday, 8 December 2023

By: TB Obwoge

Culture; cul·ture/ˈkəlCHər/ the customs, arts, social institutions, and achievements of a particular nation, people, or other social group.

Simple practices and beliefs cause such strife and devision, simple things. Muslims have a practice of not using their left hands, not when greeting, not when eating. Because the left hand is widely considered the dirty hand, in Muslim and Arab countries.

No one ever told me this, about West African countries, especially a country which claims to be majority Christian like Ghana. I was unaware in the country that I had lived in for almost 8 months before an American informed me.

A viral video of a Ghanian influencer who travels Africa caught my attention. Even though I can't stand him or his content because he films women, without their knowledge and post their private parts and sexualizes them.

However in one of his videos, he's eating, there are 4 people, 3 men and 1 woman, the woman was from Zimbabwe and she picked up her food with her right hand. He screamed at her, he told her she would be smacked if she was in Ghana. Then he told her he almost got up and left the table. His fake outrage was seen as an alright thing for Ghanians, while other Africans didn't see why he took an issue with her.

She's not Ghanian, she's not in Ghana and she wasn't doing anything to bother him. They weren't even in his country, he behaved like a savage. Instead of kindly teaching her his cultural practices in Ghana.

Tribal marks and marking babies faces in African countries.

The concept of cutting your babies face, so severely that it leaves a lifetime scar on their faces, is a practice that Africans still partake in today. Modern laws, of cutting the face of a baby mean nothing,

I've even heard some Africans proclaim that child abuse is a "white man's creation" that no Africans have committed child abuse.

Punishments such as depriving a child of food, sometimes for days isn't considered punishment, because culture comes first.

Making a child kneel on rice for hours, isn't considered abuse to some, again culture is thrown around so easily to excuse these cruel acts.

In a viral video on Facebook, a mixed race child is screaming at her mother. Neighbors called the police because they heard screaming and things being thrown around. In the comment section Africans decided to talk about how this child deserved to be physically beaten.

One woman said that Africans are well behaved and don't have any mental health issues because they were beaten as children. Africa has the highest rate of suicides, higher than any other continent, reading this from her was very heartbreaking.

When the United States expelled 4 Gambian diplomats, one was expelled for abusing his daughter had he been an American citizen he would've been facing legal action. Instead he and his family were sent back to The Gambia.

From an abstract found on the internet, there is this claim that African culture isn't holding Africans back. However the culture is what creates tribalism, discrimination and racism in Africa. Smaller tribes in many countries are treated poorly, a common practice seen in Ghana.

This discrimination shows itself in the rampant xenophobia spreading across he African continent. Where South Africa is being called out by most, Ghana and Nigeria are ignoring their own xenophobic issues as well.

First, many scholars argue that Africans' communalism hinders an individual capacity to innovate and therefore restrains developmental capacity. However, similar cultural traits are found in many advanced countries around the world.

Many scholars hastily claim that African culture impedes development; however, this is an invalidate claim. First of all, culture is continuously evolving according to circumstantial factors internal and external to the country, and it is unclear how much culture affects development. For example, external influences such as geography, colonialization, and the global system contribute to underdevelopment far more than culture. In this paper, I will begin by defining culture and development. Then, I will explain how third (circumstantial) factors could impede development and culture. The following sections will show two of the common mistakes made by scholars who attempt to argue that African culture harms development, and I will address flaws in those arguments.

Source Undergraduate Journal of Global Citizen

If this below isn't child abuse, I don't know what child abuse is then.

December 2023, is exactly a year away from the elections in Ghana, so far tribalism, xenophobia and religious intolerence has already shown it's head in the country. During the 2020 elections 8 people were murdered during the elections, Akufo-Addo refused to investigate these deaths.

A man who only intentified himself as Enock, Enock a Ghanian spoke to me in length about tribal marks. He said that the people from Northern Ghana's tribal marks were so severe, that he believed this is why so many of were now blind.

He asked me if I noticed this from the people begging for money on the streets of Ghana, he thinks they were blinded by their cuts made to make their scars.

He spoke about how deeply the marks were made on the faces of the infants, that years later it possibly leads to vision loss. He said the marks which go from the cheeks to the upper portions of the face, he thinks caused the blindness later in life.

FGM in Africa from Religious Leaders to Christians

I've written about the fight in The Gambian, where Imam Fatty wants to continue the outlawed practice of Female Genital Mutilation in The Gambia. The Imam is claiming this is a serious practice of Islam, even though the government has made it illegal.

Every year during the 16 days against violence campaign, organizations around the world, including Lacey's House, begs men to treat women with respect. To stop beating, raping, cyber-bullying, street harassment, FGM and more.

Men will counter this by saying, 1 in 7 men are the victims of abuse, it's always a counter to the issues women are facing. Men aren't being raped the way women, girls and boys are.

Reading a post in group for women, a man posted about feminism. He slammed his young, girlfriend for not cooking and cleaning for him, he had no idea what the word feminism means. He just cared that this young lady, that he's not married to was refusing to be his slave.

In the comments African men called him a true son of Africa because he threw the woman out of his home. He sent her home, her parents continued calling him, begging him to take her back. Women joined in and proclaimed that "their gender" was an embarrassment to them.

All because on woman, who he said was young, refused to cook, clean and wash his clothing.

How African Men define “Wife material “. 🤓

Image Via Twitter: @Agyariba1

Click the link above to find the source, which was OMG Voice Nigeria.

Looking back at the example of the abstract paper I've linked earlier, where the person clearly doesn't believe culture is holding Africa and Africans back. Here is another portion from that paper.

What other possible explanation for Africa’s under-development?

Many scholars hastily criticize Africa’s individual cultures, however, there are many other consequential factors to explain Africa’s under development. I will argue that circumstantial (third) factors such as geography, colonialization, and global system impede Africa’s development. First, Africa’s geography could be a disadvantage to the development because its tropical climate is more vulnerable to natural disasters. Renowned American economist Jeffrey Sachs argues that tropical climates are vastly more underdeveloped than temperate zones.21 In fact, twenty eight out of the thirty richest countries in the world are located in temperate climates. A possible explanation for this outcome is that tropical climates are less productive (due to high soil erosion and high incidence of pests, and exhaustion under rain forest conditions) and infectious diseases are more prevalent; therefore, life expectancy is lower, labor productivity is lower, and education levels are low.

So this author believes that Africa's climate for all these years are to blame for the lack of advancement. UAE built Dubai in the desert, 50-year later the country is like heaven on earth.

Also I might add UAE isn't low on the gender-gap scale the way several African countries are, with the exceptions going to Botswana and Rwanda. These 2 countries are among the top 12 countries in the world that are advancing gender equality. I might also add they're advanced when compared to other countries in Africa.

One person claimed it was because Botswana didn't have several tribes.

Africa is filled with the "culture" of discrimination, colorism, xenophobia, child abuse, bulling, rape, religiosity, racism, anti-Blackness and sexism. None of these thigns are spoken about on a grand scale.

In Ghana Akufo-Addo held an entire foreum for reparations to be paid to African and Africans, without ever addressing the issues in Ghana. I've written so much about Ghana, showing examples of the widespread and ignored "culture" of segregating, harassing and targeting anyone who's different, even their own citizens

infectious diseases are more prevalent; therefore, life expectancy is lower, labor productivity is lower, and education levels are low.

Education, countries in Africa where education isn't free and available for everyone, this isn't the fault of anyone but the governments. There is also this "culture of blame", which was the topic of the reparations conference.

Once again Akufo-Addo blamed the failures of Africa on the trading of Africans which his ancestors were a part of as well. As if this was the reason why Africa hasn't developed.

The writer of this absract claims that culture is always evolving, which is true the world around but is this true in African cultures? I mean surely where was homophobia in African history?

How far has the treatment of women come in Africa, while even in countries that have outlawed polygamy it's still practiced. Kenya which claims to be a majority Christian country and statistically is, practices forced polygamy.

Ghana which outlawed the practice, has a proud polygamists running for president. How in the world can a man who's openly breaking the law, run for the highest office in the country?

In countries like Burkina Faso, Senegal, Kenya and others countries with legalized polygamy households are the most impoverished. Note that these countries allow men to have more than one wife, yet sexual defilement of girls is also higher than normal.

Culture is holding Africa back in so many ways it's almost an insult to humanity. This is why so many are fleeing the continent.

Thank you for reading 🙏🏽 Please consider buying a coffee for Lacey’s House efforts in Gender Equality & Children’s Rights as it tries to move international.

©️TB Obwoge 2023 All Rights Reserved