Global efforts to attain gender equality and women empowerment failing
Global efforts to attain gender equality and women empowerment seem to be failing, with a new study indicating that more people in developing countries approve of the beating of women.
This year's “Because I Am a Girl” report launched by Plan International revealed that 65 per cent of participants from Rwanda and India agreed that a woman should tolerate violence in order to keep her family intact.
With the theme “What About Boys?,” the report further revealed that another 43 per cent agreed with the statement that there were times when a woman deserved to be beaten.
However, the revelations are not in line with the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) number three which pledges to promote gender equality and women empowerment by the year 2015. The report blamed the social pressure placed on men and boys to be "Real men": Tough, providers, aggressive; while women and girls were "Real women": caring, humble and submissive for fuelling stereotypes in both developed and developing countries.
According to the report, “paradoxically, boys are on the losing end as they drop out of school at a faster rate than girls while also doing less well academically. For example, in the US, the average grade-point in high schools is 3.09 for girls and 2.86 for boys”.
The findings also indicated that young men aged between 15 and 19 who adhered to traditional views of manhood in the US were more likely to engage in substance abuse, violence, delinquency and unsafe sexual practices. Moreover, arrogance overshadowed wisdom among men and boys as 60 per cent of those aged between 15 and 24 did not have accurate and comprehensive information on HIV and how to avoid transmission.
The result also indicated that, due to the way they were socialized to be men, young men had the highest death rates through traffic accidents, suicide and violence in Jamaica, Brazil, Colombia and parts of Sub Sahara Africa. Deaths from such causes were higher than in countries at war.
Research has shown that men who are positively engaged in the lives of their children or step children are less likely to be depressed, to commit suicide or to be violent. Instead, they are more likely to be involved in community work, supportive of their partners and to be involved in school activities.
etvghana.com
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