{"id":3094,"date":"2019-09-05T14:14:03","date_gmt":"2019-09-05T14:14:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gracamacheltrust.org\/?p=3094"},"modified":"2019-09-05T14:14:03","modified_gmt":"2019-09-05T14:14:03","slug":"break-the-silence-time-for-real-men-to-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/featured\/break-the-silence-time-for-real-men-to-act\/","title":{"rendered":"Break the silence \u2013 Time for Real Men to Act and end Gender Based Violence"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Real men need to have courageous conversations – that will end gender based violence<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

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Real men where are you? Why are you quiet? Who are you waiting for, to safe our women and girls? South Africa is spinning out of control at the moment, our beloved country is making international headlines for all the wrong reasons. In 2018, a number of media reports<\/strong><\/a> and government statements<\/strong><\/a> reported the increase of femicide by 117% in South Africa between 2015 and 2016\/17. Bafowethu, this is completely unacceptable, we cannot be modest about this recurring barbaric act. Let\u2019s treat foreigners, girls, and women with great respect, they are human beings likes us; they don\u2019t deserve this.<\/p>\n

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This week I listened to so many news reports that show that our moral fibre is broken. The week started on a low note with news of Uyinene Mretyana\u2019s murder, a young girl with so much promise. Just before I recovered news broke of four innocent children killed in KwaZulu Natal and Leighandre \u2018Baby Lee\u2019 Jegels, a young female boxer with so much potential shot to death. Before I caught my breadth, I witnessed horrifying images of people attacking and burning shops in the township that they said were owned by foreign nationals. The constant in all these cases are some men who think by butchering the very women and children they are supposed to be protecting, they are solving the problem. I looked around me and felt very embarrassed because I am also a man.<\/p>\n

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This is personal because I want my daughter to grow up in a safe country – Richard Montsho<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

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I want my daughters, my wife, my auntie, my sister, my mother, and any other person to walk freely anytime anywhere in South Africa without any fear of rape, murder, physical harm or xenophobic attacks. Do you want the same? Now, why are you silent? In fact, why have I been silent? It\u2019s about time we have man \u2013 to \u2013 man talks with these fellows who are killing our sisters, daughters, mothers and aunts because they are misrepresenting us. We know them, because some of them are members of our social clubs, some of them drive our taxis, some of them are members of our political parties, some of them are working with us, some of them are members of our churches; and some of them are our brothers, cousins and friends. So, why are we silent? When we find out some form of abuse happening in our circles or the men actually brag about something horrible they have done or are doing, why do we choose to look the other way? I ask myself what role I could play in addressing these issues more and in doing so save that girl who could be the next hashtag or headline.<\/p>\n

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Real men can no longer turn the other way!<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

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I think the time is now to have face \u2013 to \u2013 face conversations with those men; whether in a tavern, at the church, at the taxi rank, at the gym, wherever we interact with them let pass this message to them, \u201cenough is enough \u2013 hands-off our girls and women.\u201d But above all, let\u2019s ask them what goes into their minds when they harm an innocent woman, when they rape a hopeless girl, or when they resort to violence to solve a domestic dispute. Brothers let\u2019s do this for our little girls and their mummies who have become scared souls experiencing sleepless nights. Guys this is too much, let\u2019s stand up to eradicate violence against women and children in our respective corners. I am saying it\u2019s no longer enough to be angry and create hashtags when yet another woman or girl is killed or raped or violated. I am therefore calling on all real men to join me in a \u201c365 Days, 7 days, 24 hours of Activism for No violence against women and children.\u201d This is now an emergency and we cannot have a modest reaction to an abnormal situation. It is also time for real men to train the next generation of men, our boys on how to become more responsible and not cause harm to women and girls.<\/p>\n

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Eish bafowethu – Enough is Enough – sokwanele!<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

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Brothers, in case we forgot it is our moral obligation to promote and protect the rights of women and children. We can only achieve this if we show them respect, love, care and support. Break the silence!If you and I are indeed real men, it is time for action so that we will never again have a Uyinene Mretyana, Leighandre \u2018Baby Lee\u2019 Jegels, Janika Mallo, Meghan Cremer, Karabo Mokoena, and many others whose names never made it to the news who died before their time. Enough is enough Bafowethu, it\u2019s time for Real Men to Act! Otherwise history will judge us harshly if we don\u2019t act now.<\/p>\n

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Read more on our Children’s Rights<\/a> and Women’s Empowerment<\/a> work.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Real men where are you? Why are you quiet? […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3106,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"_rtcl_gb_attr":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[119,4,81,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-childrens-ryt-highlight","category-featured","category-highlight","category-womens-economic-and-social-advancement-highlight"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.gbstudio.co.za\/gmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}