Supporting Chris Brown: How SA gained a reputation as rape capital – SABC News

Women For Change have created a very important petition calling for the cancellation of the upcoming Chris Brown concert.

Chris Brown has a long history of abusing women, with the 2009 abuse of Rihanna being the most notable example. The Women for Change petition is polarizing, with some celebrating activism and support for women even though it seems “unpopular” to do so. Others rushed to social media to defend the American singer and shared their excitement about attending the concert.

The sad reality is that the Women For Change campaign is unlikely to succeed as tickets sell out within hours. South Africa prioritises profit above all else, above social welfare, above the protection of vulnerable groups, its own state agenda or other important social factors. But this is an important campaign because it raises awareness and holds a mirror up to our society, and reflects the lengths we will go to defend patriarchy.

Understanding structures of patriarchy from a radical feminist perspective

The overwhelming support for Chris Brown in a country that has been labeled the rape capital of the world shows that we are unwilling or unable to understand how we have acquired this shocking reputation. Patriarchy is at the center of it all, radical feminist scientist, Sylvia Walby offers a deeper discussion about patriarchy. Broadly speaking, patriarchy is a social system that prioritizes men and views them as superior to women, and is rooted in the oppression and marginalization of women.

Walby identifies six social structures and practices that create or reinforce patriarchy, namely;

• Household production encompasses everything from the hierarchy of importance within the family, with women’s roles often seen as inferior and unpaid domestic work.
• Work, where women are excluded, discriminated against and/or paid less.
• Culture, which brings with it ideologies and practices that portray women as inherently inferior, a view often reinforced by religion, media and even language.
• Sexuality makes women’s sexuality or sexual expression more controlled, while men have more freedoms. Women have less bodily autonomy and freedom of choice.
• Violence, gender-based violence and sexual abuse give men power over women, making women submissive and fearful.
• Finally, the state and related structures such as legal systems, policies, etc. have a long history of perpetuating systematic and direct violence against women.

Intersectional politics and patriarchy

These six structures of patriarchy rarely exist independently of each other; it can even be challenging to tell them apart because they are so intertwined.

A single event may involve one or more of these structures. Therefore, in part, it becomes difficult to ensure justice in individual cases or even to dismantle patriarchy as a whole to protect everyone (including men) from the harm that patriarchy causes.

Intersectional scholars and activists such as Audre Lorde, Kimberlé Crenshaw, bell hooks, and Patricia Hill Collins help us further understand the complex cocktail of oppression when patriarchy is responded to by other social identities that are perceived as negative, including; race, class, religion and so on.

These two theoretical approaches provide society with a lens through which to understand gender and various forms of oppression so that we may be able to better address them.

So if a black woman in South Africa experiences oppression in a white male-led, highly respected workplace, and the abuse and bullying ultimately leads to the black woman being driven out with some reputational damage, in this particular case it is clear that different structures of patriarchy are involved, and that there are intersectional politics at play.

Intersectional politics helps us understand the racial and other social nuances such as age and others that were used as a basis for marginalizing this black woman. In this example, multiple structures of patriarchy come into play, namely labor, because the oppression takes place in the workplace.

Sexuality can also play a role, depending on the type of abuse the black woman experiences, and because this structure of patriarchy also includes bodily autonomy and the risk of being sexualized at work, based on rigid ideas about how one should behave worn or dressed.

Culture also plays a role and shapes the view that the workplace has towards black women who are seen as incompetent and unskilled and who do not belong in that space. And even the state and related structures are also involved in this oppression, in the absence of stronger legal and policy protections that would prevent these types of workplace abuses.

Many of these reported patriarchal acts of violence are generally not considered illegal and are at worst welcomed and celebrated, or at best seen as unfair or bordering on unethical.

Connecting to Chris Brown’s Boycott

I give this example because it’s a relatable example that most women have gone through, even those who have fiercely defended Chris Brown.

Whether you are a domestic worker or in one of the ‘most important’ roles you can fill within your industry, followed by national and global recognition, we have all experienced some form of gendered oppression in the workplace, in relationships and in society. as a whole.

The structures of patriarchy that operate in our seemingly more recognizable systemic oppression and lives as South African women are exactly the same, even if the events and experiences of abuse appear to be different.

It is the same structures of patriarchy that oppress us every day, that enable and empower artists like Chris Brown, P Diddy, R Kelly or Harvey Weinstein to achieve such fame despite being known abusers for decades. By protecting and celebrating these people and systems as we have, we are perpetuating and defending the very oppression we endure in our daily lives.

We’ve seen some very influential celebrities and leaders we love and look up to support Chris Brown or criticize the boycott of Women For Change while attempting to compartmentalize abuse as separate from the artistry and work of Chris Brown.

This is not true, many of the men mentioned above use their workplace to express their terror. Through their connection to the media and their ability to shape and inform culture, they normalize their violence or discredit the victims. We believe them because we are moved by their work and don’t want to believe that such talented people can be so mean.

South Africa has its fair share of these types of demonic perpetrators who prey on women for sport. The problem with our division as a country (and especially as women) over issues like this Chris Brown boycott is that we believe we are different and therefore have transcended some of the patriarchal oppression.

You could be a young, poor woman, wearing next to nothing, who twerks for a living in a hip-hop music video, or a church woman and a highly respected member of your community, married with children and a thriving career in what is seen as a major industry, patriarchy doesn’t care. It treats us all with the same brutality. We must understand that these intersectional politics interact with patriarchal structures to create shared oppression and violence.

We need to see ourselves in the experiences of the women who oppose artists like Chris Brown, because it could easily be any of us. In the rape capital of the world, this threat of violence follows us everywhere: in churches, our homes, at work, at school, and even in everyday places like the post office.

Author: Dr. Nombulelo Shange, Lecturer in the Department of Sociology at the University of the Free State