Negative culture is the root cause of gender based violence

Cases of violence against women are still on the rise even after passing tough laws that would help reduce such cases .Have you ever asked yourself why these cases are still on the rise. Have we ever taken a moment to know the root cause of violence against women?  Well the solution to ending violence against women is understanding the root cause of the problem then address it.

The root cause of violence against women is actually culture. Culture is the way of life of a people and is usually passed from generation to generation. Culture is diverse and it varies from region to region. Most cultures here in Kenya don’t favor women.

A good example can be derived from the Somali, Maasai, Kuria, Gusii, pokot, samburu among other cultures which support female genital mutilation. Our culture justifies the beating of women in marriage in the name of she will become more disciplined. Almost all cultures here in Kenya belittle women and see them as brides and a tool for giving birth. It is our culture which states that the man will always be the head and the woman the tail.

Yes we have passed tough laws but it is doing little to avert this problem. We have to understand that before the law existed, there was culture which people in the society used to practice. For us to win the battle of eliminating violence against women, we need to address culture.

Culture is usually passed from parents to their younger ones, their younger ones will later pass it to their kids when they grow old and it goes on and on. We need to stop the spread of negative and bad culture. We can do this by encouraging parents to teach their children only positive cultural practices. Once we do that, we are more likely to see more change and progress. We can also introduce alternative culture to the society like instead of female genital mutilation we can introduce a program where girls go and learn about woman-hood and later graduate and be called true and mature women.

It is high time that we the people of Kenya stopped being slaves of negative culture and be slaves of positive culture that promotes development for all. A positive culture is a good catalyst for development but a negative culture slows down development. You can compare and contrast countries that practice positive cultures and countries that still practice negative culture. In terms of development the one that practices positive culture is ahead of the other.