It was a few years ago, at the
time citizen news reportage was gaining traction across the nation, that news
of masquerades meting out corporal punishment on miniskirt and trouser wearing
young ladies somewhere in the Nsukka
axis reached social media.
As usual, the Nigerian social
media reacted true to type with that outpouring of anger that occurs whenever
vestiges of the ‘devilish’ past of our ancestors appear to be in conflict with
the sacred untouchable manifestations of the new religion.
Caught up in outrage, most of us
missed the big story, which was not that masquerades enforced a dress code, but
that this dress code stemmed originally from the Christian church.
You see, the church in Igboland, because
of the colonial missionary inspired and now widespread belief that traditional
religions are of the devil (and the falseness of this needs repeating), has
tried severally to stamp out the practice of iti mmanwu—masquerading—in
Igboland and elsewhere. As such, it is commonplace across Igboland for church
going youths to spurn the coming of age rites that in the past were a mandatory
step in the road to adulthood. At the moment, having convinced the majority, in
principle, that the way of the cross is the one right and only way, the
church—especially of the Pentecostal variety—has taken the battle to the
physical manifestation of the old gods; destroying shrines, totems, sacred trees
and animals, wherever they are found—this is ongoing in today’s Igboland.
In the face of this history, one
wondered what an mmanwu was doing enforcing a dress code set by a general
misapplication of an Old Testament passage by Christian preachers. (Note that
it is the nature of the Mmanwu to enforce—in the glorious days of our father’s,
some varieties were used extensively as law keepers and enforcers.)
The answer is not as complex as
many may think. To get to this answer, think about culture, how it is said to
be dynamic, to have the ability to adapt and how without these attributes a
people’s culture stops growing, and dies. In this particular instance, the
Igbo, as many warned for years, have slowly, but surely, absorbed aspects of
the Christian Culture in such a way that even those who try to hold on to
cultural practices end up becoming
champions, albeit unknowingly, of these imported values.
If you consider how much of our
culture we have lost and how much of western culture we have imbibed, you will
understand the mindset that drove masquerades to enforce an archaic Christian value.
What holds for the Mmanwu
Society, does too for the Nigerian government, which finds itself the most
recent defender of a bible based belief: the one that holds that being
homosexual is against nature and thus offends God. It is now a crime to engage
in homosexual activities in Nigeria and jail terms of up to 14 years is
expected to be a deterrent—the new law echoes but does not replace a colonial
law that criminalises sodomy.
Once again, social media is
abuzz. Armchair critics are finding enough reason to back the government or
decry what they see as infringement on people’s fundamental human rights by a
backwards thinking government.
Once again, social media
activists stress points for and against the new law—depending on which side of
the debate the person falls on.
Many claim the government just
took us back to the dark ages, but I don’t agree. The government is hardly
living in the past, at least not the past that our father’s lived in, for those
ancestors of ours never claimed homosexuality was a crime against the gods. Yes
they saw it as an aberration, but beyond scorn, they never jailed or banished
anyone for homosexuality.
I still don’t understand how a
man can give up the beautifully contoured shape of a female in prime for the
male form but my thinking has evolved over the years and I believe people
should be left well alone to love as they please.
However, I know that the majority
of Nigerians support the government’s stance against homosexuality. As such, with
democracy in practice, the money bags in Abuja can be said to be heeding the
voice of the people. However, the question should be asked; do the people worry
about homosexuality enough for it to constitute a problem in need of a new law
to tame?
Looking away from the Nigerian state,
one notices that beyond imprisonment and other sad elements of the new law, we
are actually not too far away from the West when it comes to gay rights. In
America you can sleep with who you want but most American states are yet to
agree to gay marriage. Britain is a little ahead of America, but they are
missing the beat by forcing Christian ministers to marry gay people—the right
to ones belief should also be part of human rights, egbe belu, ugo belu.
On the question of where
homosexuality ranks within the realm of culture/custom, I think of nudity. Now
one hears claims of nudity not being part of our culture. Like our fathers
didn’t have sense enough to wear what suited the prevalent climate here: very
sparse clothing? It wouldn’t do to be alarmed, take a peek at old photos and
see if our fathers and mothers didn’t run around half naked.
For a fact, homosexuality is not
one of those western imports we always mention, but discrimination against gay
people is. The colonial government introduced the first anti gay law to what
became Nigeria; this new one is mostly a response to aggressive gay rights
activism from the west, and the counter of Western style Pentecostals, I reckon.
Therefore, like the masquerades
enforcing the church’s laws, we, our government, are actually enforcing the
norms of a culture alien to ours. We do this with all sense of righteousness,
the sort that comes from feeling you are defending the memory of your
ancestors.
Perhaps, what we need to do is
stop for a moment, to ponder: would our pre-colonial fathers stand with us to
punish men for being thus inclined? This is very important, especially as the
cultures from whom we assimilated the dread for homosexuality now say it okay
for like poles to attract.
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