Our girls need to know their self-worth!

Finally, I have also seen clips of the Koforidua sex scandal which went viral on social media some weeks ago and I am in no doubt that the incident raises concerns that as a society, we must address with urgency, on character, discipline and consents.

Humans are sexual beings and are allowed to indulge in sexual fantasies, but certainly, not sex that degrades another person, takes advantage of them and violates their right to decency— and those were exactly what the young man did to his victims when he videoed his sexual experiences with them without their consent.

I say he must be brought to book when arrested.

Concerns

But beyond the violations, other concerns also come up. For example, in one of the videos, one of the girls was able to stop him from having sex with her at his first attempt. In a second video, which featured that same girl, she was lying on the guy’s mattress in his bedroom and allowed the guy to strip her naked to a point. When he began to penetrate her, that was when she started to object and managed to push him away again.

However, what completely surprised me was the fact that she went back to be with him as if nothing was at stake - as if the guy wasn’t still sitting right next to her on the mattress, naked, and eyeing her for resisting him in his attempts. I wondered why she wasn’t leaving and I came to the conclusion that, probably, they were dating! And if they were, her mindset was, why should she leave her boyfriend’s room or house just because she didn’t want him to have sex with her!

She belonged there - she wasn’t in danger! I assumed those were her thoughts and the only reason she could actually go back to bed in a room which occupied a man, who was forcefully trying to have sex with her without her consent. It was sad to see that she didn’t think she was in danger and I think it’s about time we emphasised to our young girls that whenever anybody tries to have sex with you without your consent, you are in a danger zone and you must stand-up against such acts.

Empowered

Such a picture clearly raises concern about the kind of young girls growing up in communities today. Do our young girls know their self-worth? How familiar are they with concepts such as women empowerment, what it means, dignity, courage, discipline and importantly how these concepts when studied and understood can help empower them to stand against violations such as the kind this young man perpetuated on his victims in the video.

This girl in the video whom I assumed wasn’t above 16 years, didn’t even know that she could get up from that room and walk away. Even if she did, in that moment, nothing was telling her that it was the best decision she could make— but I believe sound empowering education, if she had any of it would have instinctively inspired her to know that she deserved better and in fact, she could walk away from such an abusive situation.

Girls such as her represent the majority of untrained, uneducated, naïve young girls in our society today. If this assertion is true, then you can imagine the number of girls who are being abused and inappropriately touched every day by unruly young men. Worst are those who call themselves their boyfriends!

Know your rights

Many of these girls fail to consider that what is being done to them is wrong and abusive. And if you are a parent who isn’t close to your girl child, advising and encouraging her, chances are that she already is a victim like these girls we have all seen in the videos, being manhandled by young boy who calls himself her boyfriend because she doesn’t even know her worth. The moral lesson here:

Pay attention to your children; the girl child - educate her on rights, privileges, responsibilities, and self-esteem; self-development, confidence and the courage to stand for something and for themselves, to speak up.

The same must be done for the boy child who will eventually grow up to become the man. We can’t afford to have a deteriorated society. Our formal and informal education must encapsulate all of the above points.

We are tired of the lip services offered in our schools and learning centres instead of world class, empowering sound education which must be going on; our young girls are dying low self-esteem, enduring degrading situations and sometimes, literally, giving themselves to it because nobody is teaching them they deserve better and they can choose better. I call on the gender ministry and all related stakeholders; let’s do more to empower our young girls today!