Breastfeeding puppies: Don’t use it to attack African values
Jun 04, 2009
THE breastfeeding of puppies might not be such a big issue elsewhere as Ugandans think. I have seen animal lovers or animal rights activists who might argue otherwise. What Ugandans might call bestiality is practised by pet lovers in the West, for example
By Jenn Jagire
THE breastfeeding of puppies might not be such a big issue elsewhere as Ugandans think. I have seen animal lovers or animal rights activists who might argue otherwise. What Ugandans might call bestiality is practised by pet lovers in the West, for example, the kissing of pets, etc.
Of course as a Ugandan, I take a big issue with a woman being forced to breastfeed puppies. In addition, I do not condone violence against women, either by husbands and jilted lovers through acid attacks, the political system, relatives or simply the physically or financially stronger people. However, to blame Nathan Asoloi’s action of forcing his wife to breastfeed puppies solely on the culture of bride price might be limiting.
There may be other reasons for Asoloi’s power action. His action was particularly troubling because it gives those who believe that nothing good can come out of Africa the opportunity or moment to justify their stereotypes.
The Western NGOisation and internationalisation of African women’s rights actually denies grassroot African women the voice that they are looking for. It was Alupot who took the initiative to speak out about her bad relationship with her husband. It was also her experience. But right now Alupot’s situation has suddenly been NGOised and internationalised so that other perspectives are coming out of it.
The attention, the seizing of, or appropriation of Alupot’s voice is driving out her potential as a subject to claim agency to address her situation meaningfully. Why were these NGOs and international organisations, who have all the facilities for research not in a position to prevent something like that?
A representative of an international agency from a Western perspective will start generalising the culture of Alupot’s people as primitive to justify a civilising mission.
Suddenly, someone has suggested that because Abraham Lincoln who was a white man ‘freed’ Black slaves, it should take a man to free a woman. This is problematic in many ways.
African-Americans will be shocked to read such a statement published in Africa. If Abraham Lincoln took the initiative to sign into law the outlawing of slavery, it must have been because of the resistance that the former slaves put up against slavery.
The resistance of the former slaves should be held dear by anyone who reads race into the attitudes of those who take messianic credit for ‘liberating’ slaves. Such a statement about the power of whiteness in liberating Black African slaves should be most demeaning to Africans or their descendants everywhere.
People are free to think what they want, but such thoughts should not continue reproducing what colonialism or imperialism had universalised as the ultimate knowledge for everyone on the planet earth.
Bride price may have its limitations as we have debated before, and many people, especially Africans recognise so. But, should it take a person with a Western perspective to forcefully show us how to change it? Don’t we also need an African or local solution to what Asoloi did to Alupot?
Where is our independence from colonialism? It is quite tempting to agree with pan-Africanists that those international organisations, whose representatives in Africa are from the West, still have the agenda to reproduce differently what colonial projects did not have time to complete effectively.
As Africans, we have to decolonise our minds, so that we do not speak about our people, what even most white supremacists do not have the guts to speak. We should not simply say things that make us look like we hate ourselves, even as we anticipate funding for development activities on the continent.
The writer is a Ugandan living in Ontario, Canada
THE breastfeeding of puppies might not be such a big issue elsewhere as Ugandans think. I have seen animal lovers or animal rights activists who might argue otherwise. What Ugandans might call bestiality is practised by pet lovers in the West, for example, the kissing of pets, etc.
Of course as a Ugandan, I take a big issue with a woman being forced to breastfeed puppies. In addition, I do not condone violence against women, either by husbands and jilted lovers through acid attacks, the political system, relatives or simply the physically or financially stronger people. However, to blame Nathan Asoloi’s action of forcing his wife to breastfeed puppies solely on the culture of bride price might be limiting.
There may be other reasons for Asoloi’s power action. His action was particularly troubling because it gives those who believe that nothing good can come out of Africa the opportunity or moment to justify their stereotypes.
The Western NGOisation and internationalisation of African women’s rights actually denies grassroot African women the voice that they are looking for. It was Alupot who took the initiative to speak out about her bad relationship with her husband. It was also her experience. But right now Alupot’s situation has suddenly been NGOised and internationalised so that other perspectives are coming out of it.
The attention, the seizing of, or appropriation of Alupot’s voice is driving out her potential as a subject to claim agency to address her situation meaningfully. Why were these NGOs and international organisations, who have all the facilities for research not in a position to prevent something like that?
A representative of an international agency from a Western perspective will start generalising the culture of Alupot’s people as primitive to justify a civilising mission.
Suddenly, someone has suggested that because Abraham Lincoln who was a white man ‘freed’ Black slaves, it should take a man to free a woman. This is problematic in many ways.
African-Americans will be shocked to read such a statement published in Africa. If Abraham Lincoln took the initiative to sign into law the outlawing of slavery, it must have been because of the resistance that the former slaves put up against slavery.
The resistance of the former slaves should be held dear by anyone who reads race into the attitudes of those who take messianic credit for ‘liberating’ slaves. Such a statement about the power of whiteness in liberating Black African slaves should be most demeaning to Africans or their descendants everywhere.
People are free to think what they want, but such thoughts should not continue reproducing what colonialism or imperialism had universalised as the ultimate knowledge for everyone on the planet earth.
Bride price may have its limitations as we have debated before, and many people, especially Africans recognise so. But, should it take a person with a Western perspective to forcefully show us how to change it? Don’t we also need an African or local solution to what Asoloi did to Alupot?
Where is our independence from colonialism? It is quite tempting to agree with pan-Africanists that those international organisations, whose representatives in Africa are from the West, still have the agenda to reproduce differently what colonial projects did not have time to complete effectively.
As Africans, we have to decolonise our minds, so that we do not speak about our people, what even most white supremacists do not have the guts to speak. We should not simply say things that make us look like we hate ourselves, even as we anticipate funding for development activities on the continent.
The writer is a Ugandan living in Ontario, Canada