when i was a pre-teen Pirates stories were the rage. I still remember watching “The Princess Bride” for the first time. All that sailing ships into misty fog…
One Monday - it was my day off - I wandered into Pirates of the Carribean and Capt. Jack Sparrow brought it all back. Seems pirates are back! (don’t bother with the sequels - just stick to the original Jack Sparrow movie: The curse of the Black Pearl. or, find a copy of The Princes Bride and catch up on lost time…)
But there’s a new pirates story that is emerging on the west coast of Africa…
Have you asked yourself why are somalian pirates risking their lives taking hostages from ships passing the horn of africa? Well, yesterday I discovered some stats that begin to answer the question.
Try compating the mortality rate of children under the age of 5 - in Somali, my home country South Africa and for comparitive sake, the United States:
Comparative mortality of under 5’s (per 1000):
Somalia - 143
South Africa - 59
USA - 8
Next, consider the comaparative income of the average population GNI per capita (Gross National Income divided by the number of citizens in each country):
Comparative GNI per capita (2007):
Somalia - US$ 140
South Africa - US$ 5760
USA - US$ 46040
(Check the graph on the right to get the full effect of these numbers.)
stats courtesy of UNICEF (studies conducted in 2007)
Another factor is presented in this articel from thefreelibrary.com:
The reasons behind piracy: piracy off the Somali coast has been headline news, but the media have neglected to say why the pirates do what they do. Massip Farid Ikken reports.
Of course, I could just be soft… we can always send in the big guns… Check out the alternative solutions as presetned by Grant Walliser on his High Voltage blog.
The Medical Research Council (MRC) in SA published shocking findings after research conducted amongst a representative sample of men in south africa. the research was done in the Eastern Cape (where I live) and also in Kwazulu Natal (where i used to live).
The results suggest that 1 in 4 men surveyed admitted to having raped a woman.
(you can read an article about the findings here: Mail & Guardian article)
I sat stunned as I read. I’ve always heard statistics about rape and violence against women in south African society, but this statistic left me reeling. What is wrong with us? What is wrong with masculinity? Even old-fashioned ideas about maleness suggests it’s the mens role to “protect” the so-called weaker sex. What kind of protection are we offering?
I am not in the 1 in 4 category. I have not raped a woman. Which puts me in the 3 in 4 group… But there’s no comfort in being in that group for me. I’m asking myself, what have we 3 done to make it possible for the 1 in4 to do what they have done?
How have we colluded with questionable ideas about being “men”?
How have we failed to speak out against attitudes and actions that are not respectful of women?
How have we failed to act - holding our fellow men accountable for their actions?
How can it be that 1 in 4 men have raped a women, and the other 3 know nothing about it? What is our (what is my) responsibility?
I keep asking myself what am I going to do?
- I’m calling men to kneel with me. Not to show their “might” but to humble themselves and show their heart!
- I’m going to organise a meeting where men can listen to the experiences of women through the eyes of a person working with rape victims every day.
- I’m going to prepare a talk entitled “why I am a feminist.” and present it before National Women’s Day in August.
But these things are not enough. the threat to women is too great to simply talk about it.
Pray tell me, what can we do?
[Click on picture to view enlarged version]
as a minister i participate with and serve a congregation that meets in a church building that is over 110 years old. it’s acutally stunning gothic architecture. but because I really believe that God’s church is built of living stones (1 Peter 2:5) i had to find another word to refer to the church building… so “church” refers to the body of people who make up “St John’s Methodist Church” and “sanctuary” has been the word that i most often use to refer to the beautiful old church building where we worship.
this morning we baptised Thomas. he was delightful. crawled around the carpet in the front of the church and played with hsi brother during the service. It struck me that the word “sanctuary” could be a part of the reason why some people don’t like children to make noise and interupt worship. If sanctuary means a place of safety from noise - then obviously there will be many who are excluded (e.g. young Thomas who is not even 2 yet, a young woman who is autistic and who somtimes gets quite verbal, a person who really loves rock music played as it should be played - LOUD etc…)
But there could be another way of thinking about the word: sanctuary could refer to a place of safety from condmenation. I would like to think that the Sanctuary of St John’s is a place of safety where everyone is welcome and safe from any kind of condemnation or exclusion…
and as regard noise in the Sanctuary i prefer Jesus take on that one: “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” (matt 19:14)