Make it hard for ‘trash’ to exist, say experts in fight against GBV

In a webinar on gender-based violence, particularly focused on violence against black women’s bodies in post-apartheid South Africa, the University of Johannesburg, in collaboration with the Centre for Sociological Research and Practice and the department of sociology have brought forward issues surrounding gender-based violence (GBV) to reflect on the violence on black women from all levels of society.

The conversation hosted by Professor Kammila Naidoo, alongside Theodora Modise, research Professor Pumla Dineo Gqola, Malose Langa and Nomfundo Mogapi was to not only to reflect on the sensitive topic but have a conversation on the historical violence on black women from all levels of society, where the state and its organs appeared to enable it.

The discussion interrogated the dangers of heteronormativity and toxic masculinity in violence against all women, including those in the LGBTQ community. The conversation was also to identify what the responsibility of intellectuals in terms of sharing the discourse on GBV.

Research Professor Pumla Dineo Gqola said understanding GBV required that we understand it as institutional and strategies going forward require that we shift engagements with history.

“Gender-based violence requires that we understand that it is institutionally sanctioned. We have to move away from popular notions of violence, as attitudinal. It is institutional, it is structural. This is not enough, we have to pay attention to the patterns.

“We need to recognise that it’s not a new phenomenon. To recognise that it is institutionally sanctioned allows that GBV be looked at” as a language.

“Who owns the language?” asks Gqola, who argued that the rape of black women had become commonplace in the society in creating stigma, meaning when black women are raped, it may in some instances be received as less extreme.

“What is it about universities that replicates GBV?”

Malose Langa agreeing with most of what Gqola said, added that the definition of GBV needs to be looked at and be explicitly tabled.

“We need to be very explicit. How law enforcement responds to any form of violence against a non-gender-conforming individual as opposed to a woman who is classified as heterosexist,” highlighted a missing middle in understanding the term GBV.

“[GBV] is institutionalised. We may need to name the problem explicitly. I’m of the view that some of the terms used do not give us a clear picture. When you talk GBV, a response from men is likely to be ‘men are also victims of violence’, highlighting the resistance.”

Elaborating on how men should respond to GBV, he argues there’s a need for men to participate in gender work.

“We need feminist men, that men should not see feminism as an enemy. We should all be feminists.

“In our engagement with men, we should also listen to the pain that men suffer as a result of patriarchy, we should also create a space for men to talk about their fears and anxieties.”

Gqola reiterated that men were already in the GBV discussion, but those men who were not trash needed to approach the discussion differently.

“Interrupt the trashiness, and show up in ways that make it harder for the trash to continue” to exist.

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