I recently had a flashback to the defense a friend put up as being the reason for the training bias in the upbringing of the girl-child. According to him, it is a way of protecting the woman. In his words: ‘If a girl misbehaves, chances are her future is wrecked but if the boy misbehaves, he always has an opportunity at redemption. So, to salvage the situation extra pressure is exerted on the girl’.

This really caught me by surprise because the definition of misbehave here obviously meant her getting pregnant hence cutting her ‘life’ short. This makes me wonder: you train her to be a mother, she fulfils your dream and that’s wrecking? Lol.

The question is: who foster the girl’s misbehaviour? I mean if to misbehave is to get pregnant, who impregnates the girl? The last time I checked she cannot do so to herself neither can any other human of her gender, therefore, we are left with the ‘redeemable male’ who is the co-misbehaviour yet the one that gets saved.

I have come to the realization that even if getting pregnant was taken out of the picture; more attention will still be placed on the girl turning out perfect and the boy just being a man; whatever that means. Or what explains for the girl’s expected hobby from childhood being cleaning, cooking, caring and knowing how to take care of her body, and the boy’s being feeding (boys eats a lot), being playful and stubborn and being a man.

The girl receives so many corrections and advice and a great model-her mother however a man as modelled by fathers is the head of the family and by that he works and supplies money (sometimes the woman does), he has the final say in decisions of the home and society, he has an independent mind to also make a decision for himself, therefore, he is most respected and revered. This role is unquestionable even for mothers as they have also been raised to provide an enabling environment for their men to thrive.

We train our girls from home and leave out our boys to figure life out on their own. They receive their due training instead from outside friends, TV, social media etc. We exempt them from undergoing the various phases of growth and fast forward them to being men. We tell them weakness is not part of their make up as though they are not human. We push in them the ability to own and possess even if it is forcefully. We show them the girl is a threat that should be suppressed and oppressed. We even forbid them from crying because it is not manly. Whatever it means to be manly, I am quite sure it is far from these.

We have so much work to do if we want a saner society for the coming generations. It is high time we paid attention to training our boys. It is not to train the girl childless, rather to provide the same training ground for the boy. We should redirect the focus of training the girl from an end goal of marriage and motherhood and dare her to dream and achieve them.

Remember we are to TRAIN UP A CHILD not to train up a girl or a boy. So, all children regardless of sex should be well-groomed and cultured.