Decade Blogs - Jesse Oguntimehin - On Gender Equality

Decade Blogs

Then, another mobile phone propeller head like Mister Mobility, Jesse Oguntimehin is probably one of three people I follow on Twitter that I would go to for advice about mobile phones, mobile telephony, apps and accessories.

He comes across as soft-spoken, knowledgeable, quite engaging and fun, yet, he mostly keeps to his core expertise with the occasional foray into life topics that would always attract interaction.

From my observation, he has probably made virtual friends in as many places as the Internet would allow freedom of access, he should hopefully travel the world.

Jesse Oguntimehin blogs at jesse.com.ng and his Twitter handle is @jesseoguns.

In his piece for my #YourBlogOnMyBlog Series commemorating my Decade of Blogging, Jesse tackles gender equality and the changing perspectives of the issue in Nigeria, in the face of a learned and practiced history of unrestrained patriarchy.

Blog - To Celebrate My Decade of Blogging

The changing roles of men and women in Africa has been a hard lesson for the dominant patriarchy with a tendency to male chauvinism to appreciate. As we discuss the issues, some highlighted in this article, we probably can begin to grasp what amazing talent and ability we have left untapped, unused and wasted where the need for such is critical and expedient.

What I have learnt about gender equality; ongoing discussion

It is easier for me these days to compose my thoughts in a series of tweets, than to open my laptop and compose my thoughts in a full article. In writing an article to be featured on Uncle Akin’s Blog, I have ruminated over different topics; and after seeing several awesome articles already written on his blog, I wondered if mine would stand.

The inter webs has shaped my life in the last few years—starting from 2010 when I got my first personal laptop and a USB Internet dongle. I got the laptop and Internet dongle after finishing my National Youth Service Corps (N.Y.S.C) posting with the intent of making money on the Internet as a blogger. I’m making the money now, and I have also been able to get a job through my blogging. What more, my thinking has been greatly influenced through the interactions I’ve been having through blogs, blog comments and on Twitter.

How I use to view Women

I grew up in Lagos, Nigeria. It is customary for women to be looked down upon and treated as a lesser human—this is what I have been exposed to. I have always thought the woman to be the lesser of a man. The man calls the shot and decrees over the woman at home, in the office, in the community and at religious gatherings—while I am going to leave that of religious gathering out of it, I will talk about how my thinking changed in the other areas.

It was my habit if someone was driving sluggishly I’ll say: it must be a woman driving. If she drives well and smartly, I’ll assume it’s a man that’s behind the wheel. Men have dominated the women for long, but women never stood up to challenge themselves until in the recent times.

Things have since changed. There are women bosses that do very great work and help businesses succeed; women are the breadwinners of some homes; women pay their own bill and live independently.

If a woman decided to rent her own apartment and live alone, leaving the home of her parents, it is frowned upon that she’s likely to start prostituting, or she’ll not get a man who’ll be interested in her.

If a woman is earning a good salary and living comfortably, men become scared as if that is going to make the woman head over them and they won’t be able to subdue her.

How my views have morphed

I started hearing about feminists and feminism when I became active on the inter webs. At first, I was often irritated by them and the ideas—women who do not want to subject themselves unto the headship of a man; that’s how I used to think about them.

Today, I’m seeing women who have risen to the challenge, accepted more responsibilities and build businesses, families, economy and societies. Women are contributing a lot to the conversation and the development of our societies.

I am now in support of equality of the sexes. How do I mean? A woman shouldn’t be stopped from aspiring to a certain height just because she’s a woman. If a woman wants to be a bus driver, allow her; if she wants to fly a plane—now they do—allow her; if a woman wants to work a nine to five job, allow her. Never say: because she’s a woman, she shouldn’t be allowed to do this or that.

What I am not changing yet

A man is the head of the woman—in the home/marriage setting. She’s to accept the man as the head of the family. A husband and his wife should therefore have an agreement about the role of a man and a woman in marriage before agreeing to be yoked together.

It will be a lot of stress on their marriage if a man who believes women are lesser men, gets married to a woman with can-do spirit; a woman who can make a lot of things happen by participating in many of the tasks that have once been reserved for only men—managers in big organisations, pilots, earning better salaries than many men, a woman who believes women should be treated fairly and equally with men—she’s not asking to be the head of the house, but to be given opportunity to do as much as the man.

Is there a man (married) among us, who will refuse the woman (wife) the opportunity to contribute to the upkeep of the house financially just because you think that will make you less of a man? Are you as a man of the opinion that the woman should not work, just because you do not want her to earn more than you and then have more power than you around the house?

The coming together of a man and woman as husband and wife means that two different people are coming together. They may share similar views in some areas and have different views in others. They must be ready to sacrifice and know how to make things work out for the two of them—be ready to be partners and not rivals.

In concluding, I am for women being allowed to do things that used to be reserved to only men without calling them women or judging them—that they’ve succeeded at it or failed at it because they’re women. The next times a woman drives poorly, try not to say: after all she’s a woman. There are men who are poor drivers as well.

Women too should stop looking down on other women. While should you as a woman say: he’s so slow, when he’s not a woman. Are women expected to be slow? Is slowness a function of gender?

While women should be allowed to pursue their interests—to include the one once reserved for me—we should not forget that the women still carry the babies; it is the women that menstruate; and there are many things different in the physiological make up of both gender...

Questions and further discussions:

• If we thus want equality of both gender socially, economically, and politically, why don’t we advocate for men to have paternity leave when their wives are pregnant too? Are we saying we should let the women go on maternity leave while the men can’t? Is that being fair to the men?
• A man is expected to open the door and draw the seat for a woman. Is a woman expected to do the same for a man?
• A man proposes to a woman. Are we going to change that too and ask that a woman should be allowed to propose to a man?

Obviously, there are things we can’t change. We can’t ask the man to choose to carry the baby during pregnancy: except there’s a culture somewhere that I do not yet know of. The woman doesn’t engage herself to a man; it is the other way round.

What are your thoughts?

Because I'm Happy

Pharrell Williams - Happy (Official Music Video)

It’s your thang!

Sometime ago, I decided to add the Our Daily Bread devotional feed to both my blog reading list and my Feedly news feed.

The devotionals are easy, life, perspective, and thoughts captured in a few short and easy to read paragraphs packing the potential of seed to full-blown and blooming tree in almost an instant.

Today the devotional was entitled The Night No One Came, as the story goes Johann Sebastian Bach was to debut a new piece of music as the orchestra gathered to play, there was no one in the audience to listen. Unfazed, Bach wielded the baton and the music began to play, it was not long before the church was filled.

Do your thang!

I write a lot as my blog of 10 years indicates and we are coming to the end of a 5-week residency of the #YourBlogOnMyBlog Series commemorating my Decade of Blogging where eventually 35 blogs would have been published as a celebration of telling our own stories in our own individual voices.

Blog - To Celebrate My Decade of Blogging

Then on Twitter, I find I have a following from a broad spectrum of diversity, too many to mention and those who dare to engage and I mean engage would almost always end up in some friendship. Yet, there are others of the hit-and-run variety, they come spoiling for a fight, railing with abuse and insult and tease out of me the typical slow poison of an English putdown.

Write your thang!

Integrity as some define it is what you do when no one is watching. I hope my writing passes that test, I write rarely for an audience or to pander to some interest, I do not get paid to do what I really enjoy, I just do it and sometimes many can find resonance and in other cases the piece is hardly read.

I do not because the statistics for a blog do not get a lift in the number of readers take down the blog in a huff because I am writing for myself, to myself, about myself and the views I have for myself.

This informs why sometimes I write something I do not think makes any sense, one of those crazy blog moments and someone leaves a comment or tweets at me saying they can identify and I am left wondering and leave it at that, glad that the gift keeps giving something back.

Clap your thang!

Then at church yesterday as we left the building, there was some music playing that I never really took notice of but recognised that it had to do with happiness.

“Because I’m happy,
Clap along if you feel like a room without a roof.”

Lyric snippet from Happy, Despicable Me 2 Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, Pharrell Williams. [Wikipedia]

The uplifting feel to the music resonates and I sought out the video on YouTube only to find that it was written and performed by the musical genius of Pharrell Williams, probably the Johann Sebastian Bach of our times.

With this amazing song comes the world’s first 24-hour music video at http://24hoursofhappy.com/ - Go there and have it on continuous playback, then read the lyrics and get into the flow.

What I have to say is this, find a way to put yourself in a happy mood, whether or not you have an audience, go out and do what you have to do and enjoy doing it, living life as if you have not one care in the world.

That for me is enjoying the pursuit of happiness, you might find someone to share it with when you start doing something happily, for me, it is writing and in the process, and I might find me a lover too.

Decade Blogs - Oyedeji Aderemi - Killing Ourselves Softly

Decade Blogs

Another doctor I successfully persuaded to contribute to my #YourBlogOnMyBlog Series commemorating my Decade of Blogging, who goes by the portmanteau English-Yoruba name of GreatIse [Great Work].

Blog - To Celebrate My Decade of Blogging

Indeed, I am proud to have such a brought spectrum of people from all walks of life, of all ages, accomplishments and in professions too diverse to mention.

Dr. Oyedeji Aderemi in the midst of the suffering and pain he encounters daily on Nigerian hospital wards brings a great sense of perspective, humour, humility and groundedness that enlivens Twitter with good humanity.

He is a friend to two very wonderful friends of mine and I look forward to meeting him in the not too distant future.

He blogs at iseoluwa.blogspot.com, and his Twitter handle is @greatise.

Through the eyes of a doctor in Nigeria, GreatIse brings us round to understanding what the Nigerian problem is, a clear diagnosis of we, the people presenting the symptoms of total chaos, disarray, dysfunction and an avoidable mortality rate. Our morbid reality might just reveal some truths about us. Read and reflect.

Killing Ourselves Softly

I think we are too angry as a people, and we direct our anger and bitterness towards the wrong people since the root cause of the problem is beyond our reach and sometimes when we find ourselves in their presence, we are mute, overawed by their presence and the power they wield.

That said, I started thinking some days ago about the state of my nation, and the continuous shovelling of the blame down the throats of our leaders. I decided to step back and take a second look and I started seeing that we, the followers, are the major culprit. But too many political talks out there, so I shall eschew from saying much about politics and my nation Nigeria.

I do not want to talk about the security situation of the State I live in, the spate of kidnappings of medical personnel and the killing of a senior colleague recently. Is it the pain and the sadness of my patients or the way healthcare costs as further impoverished them, the tales of many lives lost on bad Nigerian roads and the inability of the existing health infrastructure to give them a chance to live?

Two years ago, this year a dear friend died following motor vehicular accident injuries she sustained that the hospital failed to manage appropriately. The faces of patients I have lost due to none availability of appropriate medical equipment still haunts me occasionally, I remember each face, and it is not enough to tell the stories of men and women rendered barren, the families torn asunder and the orphaned children. The many abandoned children and the elderly dependant ones thrown into the bush because their family members believe they are evil!

While we die due to the non-availability of required equipment, we die from lack of appropriate manpower, bad road networks, fear of what the police will say if we help a gunshot wound victim and from our greed! Yes our greed kills us daily; it kills the unborn child, the pregnant women and the ailing elderly! The young energetic ones are not left out, amputated limbs that could have been salvaged. We kill ourselves in instalments also, daily with our habits, valuing the show of affluence over good health. It is our choices that kills us one choice at a time, daily we stare death in the face and we know it not!

This is supposed to be a happy write up to celebrate a man I have never met nor spoken to as I type this, but one with a passion for his country.

Sigh! I watch my sons play and I keep asking myself, does Nigeria have anything to offer them in terms of security, healthcare and education? So here we are, our health sector is in a shambles, our politicians jet out for medical treatment, the poor populace dies in droves, oppressing each other as they plunge to their deaths, oblivious that they aid in killing one another; one choice at a time.

Nigeria: From Basketmouth to Basket - Rape has no place in jokes

Those jokes are no jokes

Yesterday night a tweet came upon my timeline about crude, crash, rotten jokes made by Nigerian comedians whose following had for the laughs not particularly reflected on the depth of what they had heard or read.

Jokes are supposed to be light-hearted fun but they should not be used a cloak for more sinister messages of commission, omission or indifference causing extreme offence to our common and civil humanity.

Now, I choose the comedians I listen to with the expectation of hearing wholesome and witty stuff, jokes you could go back home to tell mother without looking for some rating that would leave certain people wondering the kind of company one keeps.

Jokes can be risqué, for adults only, suffused with dark humour but that in itself should offer no artistic licence to celebrate abuse, denigration or atrocious stereotypes.

Crossing the line

In this case, we must broadly agree that jokes about paedophilia, pederasty, sexual abuse, rape, domestic violence, disability, racism or the Holocaust cross the line of decency into otherworldliness.

No matter how good the joke is, we must have a filter that triggers when such jokes are played for laughs appealing to the basest elements of our humanity. That care and discernment not applied to what we entertain may mean we inadvertently acquiesce to and by unfortunate response appear to endorse the most reprehensible of views.

Rape has no place in a joke

One such occasion came about with a Nigerian comedian called Basketmouth who appeared to suggest that Caucasian girls are of easy virtue to be laid by the third date and that black girls who by the ninth date have not yielded to sexual advances should be raped.

Many excused this apparent slip and mistake, and probably it would have been excusable as a first offence but Basketmouth has form, there is a video of a joke where he more or less created the scene for the rape of a vulnerable old woman.

To date, Basketmouth and probably any other comedian that cannot appeal to wit but can do bawdry and off-colour humour to a willing and barely considerate audience has gotten away with this kind of talk and script pocketing the proceeds of their rottenness none the wiser about their conduct – a line had to be drawn.

What would our society condone?

Much as our society is still struggling to elevate the rights of the woman and the child, putting it on the agenda where abuse would not only be frowned upon but would face the full force of the law, one expects those with a platform to be at the forefront of progressive thinking rather than subscribe to a savage instinct because it is conveniently lazy to attract adulation.

With a comedian’s platform and one as popular as that of Basketmouth comes great responsibility, one that they should daily be aware of not to abuse and misuse that they do not become a channel for the bits of rotten cultural conditioning we are striving to rid ourselves of.

We cannot in this day and age appear to trivialise sexual violence against women, children, men, animals or whatever might sit well within the thresholds of depravity we can countenance.

More so, this trivialisation introduced surreptitiously in a joke is heinous at best and it must be condemned in the sternest terms.

What it says about us

Those of us who have for whatever reason been able to accommodate the depictions for laughs should again reflect and wonder if when we have acquiesced with laughter we might well have been conditioned to act the situation out if presented with such an occasion where opportunity and advantage might mean we escape sanction.

Having known abuse myself as a child and seen other children like myself abused, then by familial connection been affected by the rapes and the abuse of people known and dear, there is just none of the genes associated with humour in me to react with laughter to any jokes that celebrate low-life acts against our humanity.

We, as a society obviously have to decide if excusing barbaric behaviour in innocuous jokes is what we are as people or we have decided that every means possible be deployed to condemn, repudiate and correct such behaviour with the comedian going beyond just the apology to working with NGOs serving victims as a means of restitution and an example to others.

Comedians can source better material

I am of the opinion that Nigeria has enough talent to craft better jokes than puerile unwholesome rotten stuff. Being a Basketmouth is no excuse to have a basket brain and by that become a basket case.

It does appear Basketmouth has issued an apology, which for me is neither here nor there. He was wrong in the first instance, he should have known in these times that such jokes were unacceptable and it should never have happened.

However, we are where we are now and I hope lessons are learnt by the comedian, other comedians and the audiences that lap up this stuff.

We are not a nation of rabid Neanderthals with poor taste and the absence of cultural refinement. I hope that we respect and treat with the dignity our fellowman; woman, child or any other person regardless of race, ethnicity, intellect, age, sexuality or disability. That is the bigger message, in a joke or in serious conversation.

Postscript: I decided not to dignity Basketmouth with a link to his profile and there was no reason to give his offensive joke more oxygen of publicity. Rather a bigger point was being made here about the content and context of jokes.

Decade Blogs - Roundup IV

I’m still here

I cannot have wished for more support and the honour showered on me with the 28 blogs that I have already shared on my #YourBlogOnMyBlog Series commemorating my Decade of Blogging. Four weeks with just one more week to run in what I thought I might struggle to get blogs to run until the end of December 2013.

Blog - To Celebrate My Decade of Blogging

Yet, it has been a rather busy week that straddled the turning of the year from 2013 to 2014.

One news story on Twitter about profligacy in Nigerian politics unleashed a torrent of tweets that I collated into a blog with a backstory and context notes.

Blog - Nigeria: The leaders whose success and joy is the pain of many

A demonstration of the gift that I have come to know I possess was the poem that I crafted in 4 tweets over 12 minutes, the last verse of the Walk Away! poem coming much later. Then a New Year’s Day blog recognising the gift and desire to do more with it.

Blog - Walk Away!

Blog - The Gift

Funmi Iyanda gave a keynote address to a youth event challenging them to think differently if we are to change Nigeria and make it a better place. I added an introduction, put in some links and made some callouts to pertinent things she said.

Blog - Funmi Iyanda: Write your own ending. Shape history

This was very good news, after months of indifference bordering on criminality, the system and institutions responded to the cry of dying HIV/AIDS sufferers who had been prescribed substandard drugs by government agencies.

NAFDAC withdrew all the drugs manufactured by one company nationwide, replacing them with drugs that hopefully will arrest the decline in health brought on by the usage of the poorly manufactured drugs.

Blog - Nigeria: Presumed Substandard Tyonex HIV/AIDS ARV Drugs Removed From Circulation

Our lives

The theme this week about life, pursuits, times, friendships, rights and history.

Here, for your pleasure are four weeks of Decade Blogs. To everyone who has honoured me in finding time to write for #YourBlogOnMyBlog, my thanks and more. I would find the words of appreciation and gratitude, eventually and they would still not be enough.

Decade Blogs – Week 4

Decade Blogs - Dupe Killa - The Broken Ones

Decade Blogs - Kola Akinola - My Friend

Decade Blogs - Chioma Agwuegbo (Chuka) - 10 Years

Decade Blogs - Henry 'O'Jew' Olamiju - Greatness - A Life Waiting Us

Decade Blogs - Olu Ximena - The Trade

Decade Blogs - Editi Effiong - Dear religious people, let's kill all the gay people

Decade Blogs - Saratu Abiola - On Nigeria and Why Writing Matters

Decade Blogs – Week 3

Decade Blogs - Sira Sokari - Writing is the Liberator

Decade Blogs - Abubakar A. Musa - Challenging the humanity in us

Decade Blogs - Japheth J. Omojuwa - The Power of Purpose and Persistence

Decade Blogs - Mister Mobility - Not all those who wander are lost

Decade Blogs - Annie Emmanuel - Loyal To A Fault And Daring To Do

Decade Blogs - Akin Oyebode - How Will You Measure Your Life?

Decade Blogs - Ayo Oyalowo - What exactly are we looking for?

Decade Blogs – Week 2

Decade Blogs - Monike Charles-Binitie - Taking the leap

Decade Blogs - 'Seyi Shimoshi - On Faith, Fiction and Friendship

Decade Blogs - Raymond Inkabi - Ten Years Of Blogging

Decade Blogs - Blossom Nnodim - The Guardians of the Future

Decade Blogs - Pearl Ijeoma Ezeokeke - The Employer Atrocities of She

Decade Blogs - Ikhide R. Ikheloa - This life, London, tribes, and the Internet

Decade Blogs - Bisi Alimi - 10 Years of Blogging

Decade Blogs – Week 1

Blog - Decade Blogs - Babatunde Rosanwo - The Market‏

Blog - Decade Blogs - Waffarian - Just Another Day

Blog - Decade Blogs - Emeka John Okoye - Welding Relations

Blog - Decade Blogs - Chikere Ezeh - Exhuming Blogs of Old

Blog - Decade Blogs - Nkem Ivara - The Power Of Words

Blog - Decade Blogs - Tolu Oloruntoba - Royalties at the end of a river

Blog - Decade Blogs - Feyi Fawehinmi - Daddy 2.0

Decade Blogs - Saratu Abiola - On Nigeria and Why Writing Matters

Decade Blogs

If it has not yet occurred to readers of my blog, one of the reasons why I thought of this #YourBlogOnMyBlog Series commemorating my Decade of Blogging was to encourage writing. Writing our own stories, in our own way, with our own voice, the best way we can.

I am proud to say that I have a few first time writers and some relapsed writers who have since revived their dormant blogs, then I have the veterans who write either for a living or for pleasure and we are all enriched by the experience.

Blog - To Celebrate My Decade of Blogging

I have known Saratu Abiola as both a voracious reader and an incisive writer, more so a very good reviewer of books, novels, texts, award shortlists and opinions. I am always in a mad rush to see what she has put up on her blog.

Besides maintaining a blog titled Method to the Madness she tweets with the Twitter handle @saratu and is the Political Editor for Nigerians Talk that “provides a Nigerian perspective of issues, and we feature opinion and analysis with a distinctive Nigerian point of view.”

The first paragraph of her piece here is a litany of the typical Nigerian story at any point in time, but as she weaves her thoughts into a narrative, we are given a perspective of what is the Nigerian psyche, our survival instinct and what writing does to give us a clearer perspective of things. This is good reading.

On Nigeria and Why Writing Matters

Another day, another scandal. Someone stole U.S. $50 billion from the crude oil account mere months after someone bought two armoured vehicles that seem to be covered by an invisibility cloak since no one has ever seen them. Let’s not forget, of course, the many days in which schools have been closed, the number of days since the constitutional review process has been abandoned, the impending nationwide strike by doctors, the number of heists pulled that we do not yet even know about. [Reuters] [Vanguard Nigeria] [Vanguard Nigeria] [Premium Times Nigeria] [Premium Times Nigeria]

There is a lot that ails Nigeria and if one reads the news daily or even engages with one’s political environment at all it is sure to be overwhelming. So out of step are our collective reaction to our national malaise that it is tempting as someone who writes – be it fiction or on a blog – to dedicate one’s life to attempting to find the right words to shaking ourselves out of our collective national slumber. What, then, brings about the impetus to write?

There is a recurrent conversation in circles that I orbit about what exactly our responsibilities are to our country as politically-conscious, young Nigerians who want better for Nigeria in creating the country of our dreams. It is a good question, and one worth asking in a country where we are all complicit in the mess that we find ourselves in.

I’m quick to shrug off any moral and/or ethical responsibility ascribed to me, because I know I owe neither a group nor a narrative any room in shaping my life. But I do understand that when you’re in a situation as dire as Nigeria is, with a leadership void as wide and as open as the hungriest mouth, the desire to mould yourself into what is missing in your environment even if it means bending yourself well out of shape.

Writing has helped in seeking answers to this question, but it has also helped to re-centre priorities to more personal aspirations in important ways that I don’t always see. In the daily hustle and bustle of my life, as I jump from one project to another, it is easy to forget that in our pursuit for a better Nigeria, it is important to first seek a better us.

My writing allows me time and tools to process my thoughts; it is my way of keeping my brain-space tidy. I write infrequently, so the jumble of thoughts in my head is like a tornado just swept through it, so the pressure is on each piece of writing to count. Not always a good thing, as it adds undue pressure, but here I am.

Nigeria is very much like that tornado, because it is easy in the aftermath of yet another week of not having light [In Nigerianese, light and electricity supply are synonymous.] or a trip somewhere that makes you wonder why more people are not taking up arms and throwing rotten tomatoes at every government official they can find, to feel the pressure bunching up in your shoulders that must find a way to be released. For me – and I imagine it is so for many bloggers – writing is it, even if it what I’m writing about is not ostensibly about politics.

A friend said to me once: “Saratu, we are all surviving o. Even rich people! IBB [Ibrahim Babangida] and OBJ [Olusegun Obasanjo] and Otedola [Femi Otedola] and Dangote [Aliko Dangote], they are all merely surviving. Look at how we are all scrambling to get all the money we can possibly get, as if we need it to hibernate in winter! If they were sure that they would never be broke and that even if they were less rich it won’t be the worst thing in the world, they’d stop stealing. But that’s not the country we live in. Money rules all. Nothing else matters.”

In a country where we are all in survival mode, the most important relationships we have are transactional ones that help ensure our survival. But what if the urgency we feel about this need for survival was translatable into other less tangible, less capitalistic pursuits? What if we found that our hunger for relevance, for respect, for pride, could be sated in other less avaricious ways?

The urge to write always serves for me as a constant reminder of a more personally fulfilling goal that I could attain from a well within myself. Knowing that it is there and knowing what it does for me is invaluable.

Decade Blogs - Editi Effiong - Dear religious people, let's kill all the gay people

Decade Blogs

Editi Effiong approached me to write a blog my #YourBlogOnMyBlog Series, having no clue about what he intended to write about, since we do have a good rapport on Twitter, I was quite grateful for the offer.

This piece one after my heart, it pertains to the struggles of a now visible community that has always existed in Africa, but have been denigrated, maligned, prosecuted, persecuted, harangued, abused and murdered by fellow Africans.

Our religious leaders and politicians have fanned the embers of barbarous lynch mobs to take the laws into their hands to find justification in acts too heinous for words.

I am so grateful to Editi that the email below was my response to him on receiving his contribution to commemorate my Decade of Blogging.

Blog - To Celebrate My Decade of Blogging

Thank you very much for the blog you have written for #YourBlogOnMyBlog Series, I am really touched by your sense of justice, compassion and humanity. Not many people out there are able to speak for minorities so diametrically opposed and different from them in more ways than one, especially a straight man speaking up for the right to life and the pursuit of happiness of gay people.

Before your eyes glaze over with unaffected indifference, please hear him out.

Dear religious people, let's kill all the gay people

Last week, we got the news that two men were murdered somewhere in Nigeria, having been caught having homosexual sex.

Apart from a small bubble from a minority corner of Nigerian social media, the event was hardly reported in mainstream media. This was unsurprising. After all, gay people got killed doing what, according to Nigeria's Parliament, is an unforgivable sin. It is not hard to see how big a national priority the gay problem is - it has been fast tracked through the National Assembly, in order to protect “our culture and way of life”.

As it happens, the “Gay Marriage Law”, which has NOT yet been signed into law by the President, has already claimed victims. Instead of the suggested 14-year jail term the law prescribes, our people may have decided to cut the process short, and take the law into their own hands by eliminating the ‘evil’ people from our society.

Before making any arguments on this unfortunate issue, I have to state a few facts: I am a heterosexual man, married with child, a practicing Christian, and a teacher of children. I also hold the belief that marriage is a union between man and woman - this is based on my religious beliefs.

I am also a believer in the right of adults to make personal decisions, as long as those decisions do not affect me, or my own rights. As such, if two men or women decide to have consensual sex, then so be it. Is it against God’s law?

I know exactly what the laws of the Bible say, and it is that judgement belongs to God. If gay sex/marriage is against the laws of God, then people engaged in it will be served their judgement along with everyone else on the last day, just like the rest of us imperfect souls.

Aside from the above, I am friends with a few gay people.

That manifesto done, I will ask the question: Why do we think attacking gay people (and even murdering them) is in anyway humane, righteous, or even regarded as a considerable action in a modern society? What have gay people done to us? Isn’t the right to life fundamental?

Gay people just want a right to life. Just like the one we've granted the actual criminals in our government.

They want a right to just live and exist in their own country. And they are not queuing up on the streets with placards asking to be allowed to marry (and even if they were, don’t they also have the right to?).

They aren’t even asking for decently reasonable pieces of the national cake like armoured BMWs, or presidential pardons. They're not threatening to burn down the country if one of their fellow homosexuals isn't made president by 2015.

Gay people aren't asking to be allowed to have sex with 8 year old kids, and marry them.

Gay people are not the ones stealing one-third of our oil resources in the Niger Delta, or asking for the right to operate illegal refineries. They are not skimming off billions of dollars’ worth of national wealth in form of falsely tendered oil sales balances.

No, those rogues are not gay people. Those demands and outright takes are from God fearing ‘straight' people, most of them ministers and prominent people in local churches and mosques. And before you claim homosexuality is a Western import, remember that our prisons are filled with people having sex with same gender. By our prisons, I mean Nigerian prisons.

But we must kill all those gay people. Because they're the sole, significant source of our national problems. What's more? The Holy Books say we should kill all the gay people. Or don’t they? Because God, in all his might, can't make judgment on his own anymore, and needs our help. And God had also recently declared that we should stop loving our neighbours as ourselves, as that's just old school stuff.

Luckily, that part of the Christian holy book that said "Thou shalt not kill" survived the new world order. A prophetic rewrite left that verse completely whole, with just a tiny clarification clause added. For our pleasure, Genesis 20:13 now reads "Thou shalt not kill, except if gay".

We are a holy people, Nigerians. We are so holy, we could have stoned Jesus for not being holy enough. So we have decided to fight God's wars for him. Since God has decided to not exterminate gays, we will show Him how it should be done.

One of grand inquisitors confronted me on Twitter with a couple of tweets, after I wondered in my tweets how much allowing gay people to live as they choose has affected the economies of Western countries. I decided to save this gem:

@eseblogger: @EditiEffiong We Shld therefore allow them to have their in humane way of live? Wht is the correlation btw nations Prosperity and being gay

In English - We should therefore allow them to have their inhumane way of life? What is the correlation between a nation’s prosperity and being gay?

I have no disagreements with Mr Ese. I’m only begging for mercy. Just like he was shown mercy, after he was dropped on his head as a child, leaving him per viable, with clear danger of growing up brain damaged. But he was shown mercy, and allowed to live. Look at him today! He's not only overcome his early life misfortunes, but is even able to construct complex phrases like "inhumane way of life".

(Disclaimer: my highly prejudicial investigation of Ese’s life history comes from nothing more than a disdainful glance at ONE tweet from him. Sort of the way we pronounce people guilty and deserving of death, only on account of being perceived as gay).

Ese, you represent the moral pillar of our generation and I applaud you for keeping the torch burning. I hope His Incorruptible Eminence, Rt. Hon. David Bonaventure Mark, is proud of you.

Before we all rush out with flame torches and pitchforks, knocking on door to door to execute God’s judgement, remember that the next gay person to be ‘brought to justice’ may be your own blood. How strong will your convictions be then?