Fashion Entrepreneur, Motunrayo Agusto Writes Insightful Post On Why Marriage Is Not A Favour Done To Women
Fashion entrepreneur, Motunrayo Agusto who is also passionate about women issues, education and healthcare, is of the belief that men need to stop seeing marriage as a favour done to women.
Sharing an interesting conversation she had with a 60-year-old man on marriage and why men should change their thoughts on the subject matter, Motunrayo wrote in this lengthy piece;
”A few days ago, I had an amazing conversation with a 60-year-old man about why Iâm married but not changing my surname. It was just the beginning of a broader and longer conversation about women in our society.
I havenât met many people, across any generation, who seek to understand views that are different from theirs and particularly, who open their minds to understanding a womanâs right to choose. I thoroughly enjoyed talking to this lovely man who Iâd refer to as Mr. F going forward.
Mr. F started by asking me âWhy?â
I explained, âchanging my name is not a natural inclination of mine. Itâs not something I have ever really considered doing or aspired to do. Itâs just not my truth.â
What I didnât tell him is that, at age 16, I didnât even want to get married. I wanted to be President and my good friend Mr. A, who is from the Niger Delta region, was going to be my running mate because that would reflect Federal Character. Clearly, I didnât fully understand how it works LOL! Plus, letâs not get into the ironic course of my young adulthood. Anyway, that was the future I envisioned. That was my truth.
There are probably women everywhere who have looked forward to getting married since they were 16, and fantasized about being called Mrs. XYZ. They might value the cohesion of their families sharing one surname or maybe just donât think of this as a necessary topic of discussion because the norm is the norm.
Whatever their reasons, this is their right and it is their truth. Women do and should always have the right to choose. Thatâs why I define feminism as a womanâs right to choose.
READ ALSO: Dear MIMsters: Pressured Into Marriage To Be Called âMrsâ, Look At Where I Ended
Genuinely, Mr. F had never heard of a woman who didnât change her surname after marriage. He had heard of hyphenating, but not changing anything at all?! He was speechless, but eventually mustered the words, âand your husband allows this?!â
This might have been the point where I sat down. I said âmy husband doesnât get to âallowâ me to bear my own name, just like I donât get to allow him to bear his. He gets to have an opinion or feeling on the issue, that we can discuss as two consenting adults and then come to an agreement.â I believe that customs like changing womenâsâ surnames play a subconscious role in shaping the way they view themselves, and the way society views them.
They are not allowed to be themselves and just live their lives without considering the man and family to which they are going to end up belonging to. Marriage needs to stop being viewed as a favour being done to the woman.
I believe that such customs also play a causative role in cultures where the male child is considered more valuable than the female child. It is believed that whatever she accomplishes (if sheâs âallowedâ to) will be attributed to her husbandâs family not her fatherâs. Notice how the mother doesnât even feature. This has subsequently affected the willingness to invest in the education of girls in many societies.
On a lighter note, I told him about a friend of mine who was asked when she cut her hair, âwhat if your future husband doesnât like it?â She didnât even have a boyfriend at the time.
I talked to Mr. F about matrilineal societies around the world and how the concept of taking the manâs name is a social construct that actually goes against nature. When a child is born, the only parent that is indisputable is the mother, yet itâs the norm for children to inherit their fatherâsâ surnames. Ironically, weâve heard the stories too many times about how, when a wife falls out of favour with her husband, so do âherâ children ????.
He admitted that he would feel insecure if his wife had kept her surname, and would feel like she wasnât fully committed. Another similarly-aged man in the room mentioned that he had insisted that his wife put the title âMrsâ on her business card. I still donât know how to respond to that but decided to focus on one battle at a time.
Mr. F then said, : âyouâre very lucky. Your mother is âaje butterâ*. There are many Nigerian mothers who wouldnât allow their daughters do thisâ. Whoop! My turn to ask a question!
Motunrayo: Please Sir (pronounced âsahâ) do you have a daughter?
Mr. F: Yes
Motunrayo: So if/when sheâs getting married, she says to you that sheâs not changing her name. You tell her you donât approve, and she thanks you for your opinion but doesnât change her stance. What would you do about it?
Mr. F: *long silence* Youâre right. Thereâs nothing I can do about it. Sheâs an adult.
âGo figure Mr. F!â, I thought to myself.
He then proceeded to say that heâd also ask her if her husband, mother-in-law, father-in-law, sisters-in-law (I think I interrupted him at this point) are OK with it. He was about to say that if itâs fine with them, he would be fine with it.
READ ALSO: Okechukwu Okey Bakassi, Dishes Marriage Advice; Cautions Bachelors About Equality
My turn to speak again Mr. F, âI have a sister-in-law, and I am not entitled to a say in what she calls herself. In that same vein, no one is entitled to a say in what I call myself.â
Except for my husband and I. There are only two people who count on this issue- the husband and the wife. Marriage is about compatibility, so let the man who thinks his wife must change her name, marry a woman who thinks she must change her name; let the man who thinks his wife shouldnât work, marry a woman who doesnât think she should work, and so on. Itâs sooo simple.
This part of the conversation reminds me of a woman who messaged me about this issue and said something to the effect of, âDid you do this because you already had your fashion brand in your name? You are lucky because most Nigerian men and their families would not allow this. They would say that they have paid your bride price.â
Hereâs my response to that:
I donât think of myself as being lucky for marrying someone whose values are aligned with mine. I think of myself as an adult who willingly opted into a marriage with that person. I am not property to be bought and sold, and so if I discover that the family of the person I am dating is of that opinion, it is within my right and ability to opt out of that relationship.
I do in fact think of myself as being lucky for meeting my husband, but I resent the idea that a woman (in my position of course, because letâs be real, socioeconomics, religion or culture prevent 14-year-old girls who are married off from even knowing that they have options) is helpless or without a choice as to who she marries, or whether she gets married at all!! Every relationship does not have to end up in marriage and you always have a choice.
This video of Judge Lynn is an amazing way to think about dating, and it shouldnât stop in your 20s! There are so many people, consciously or unconsciously, who donât believe that a woman should have a choice, opinion or say as to her life or how it turns out. My conversation with Mr. F made me realise that I have never heard of a man being referred to in the context of what his in-laws would or wouldnât allow.
So I told him, âin my opinion, one of the biggest problems with marriage in our society is the imbalance in raising boys and girls.â
He agreed completely. âGirls are raised to be perfect, and boys are raised to be rich.â Somewhere in the future, when two people raised under these circumstances (quite literally) find themselves married to each other, the woman- who is likely more worldly, better educated, better skilled, more knowledgeable, more responsible and more dependable- is expected to submit to the man as âthe head of the familyâ who at best is more successful or richer.
See AlsoIn reality, money isnât everything and people have varying strengths in which gender is not a determining factor. Trying to fit into a caricature or mold that has been created just breeds insecurity, resentment and people who are not maximising their potential for their families. Of course, there are also exceptions to this, but letâs be real-Â not having money is the only crime a Nigerian man can commit.
There is an unusual, unrealistic and unnecessary financial burden placed on men when they get married, and the elders reinforce those expectations as a matter of fact. âIf the rent is not paid, you are to blame. If there is no money for food, you are to blame.
When you have children; if the school fees are not paid, you are to blame.â In return, men are not held to any moral standards. In reality, being able to support a family on one personâs income is a luxury, and men who are loving fathers and primary caregivers to their children shouldnât be shamed because they donât have a lot of money.
Sadly, both men and women perpetuate this. Men also suffer from the patriarchy! They should be fighting for feminism too. Anyone who belongs to a family knows that value is provided in different ways- providing money is just one of them.
The role of raising kids, which is traditionally assigned to women, is one that doesnât get compensated but is extremely valuable. Some would even argue that the role of raising children is equally as important as providing money. If this is the case, why should either gender be shamed for being primary caregivers?
At some point in the conversation, Mr. F asked âWhen you have children, what would their surnames be?â I responded, âwe havenât decided. Weâre both comfortable with his surname or both of ours hyphenated.â
My very traditional mother pounded the table in her signature dramatic fashion and said âThat is when you would know who Seniâs mother is.â Now it was time to tell them a story about my mother-in-law.
I had taken my mother-in-law to a seamstress in Lagos to get measured for an outfit and when the sales assistant asked her for her name, she responded with her first name. The room was quiet and the sales assistant stared at my mother-in-law in confusion, waiting for a name she could actually write. My sister and I burst out laughing. My sister said to her âMa, in Lagos, your name is Mrs. Sulyman o.â
Relieved, the sales assistant wrote âMrs. Sulymanâ. Mrs. Sulyman laughed at all of us! You see, she lives and works in America. And in many circumstances, she said, even a ten-year-old could call you by your first name. Itâs a society where no one knows your family name or history and quite frankly, no one cares.
It forces you, she said, to be humble and look within yourself and ask what value you are bringing to the world and how people benefit from interacting with you. For the average person living in a foreign country, you donât get to hide behind big titles or forced traditions of showing respect. You earn respect by being a respectable human being.
My mother then said âyouâre just going to give your children an identity crisis.â I responded, âan identity crisis is my lack of knowledge about my motherâs rich Benin culture and history. An identity crisis is the many adults in Nigeria today who have never been to their hometowns and have no connection to their heritage on either parental side because theyâve lived in Lagos their entire lives. What an identity crisis isnât, is my children also bearing my name.â
The funniest part of this conversation was when Mr. F tried to wayo* me and said that when I introduce myself publicly as Motunrayo Agusto, men might think Iâm available. I humoured him and said Iâd tell them Iâm not and thatâs that. He refuted. I said âSir, there are men in this Lagos, that even if I take my husbandâs first and middle names and put ten rings on my finger, wonât be deterred from trying.â We all burst into laughter and agreement.
Mr. F explained to me that I couldnât afford to make mistakes in life, because things like not changing my name would be identified as the root cause of any slip ups. I laughed and nodded. Having thought about it now, I love all the mistakes and messes Iâve made. They have made me the woman I am today. I have and will never live life so cautiously, that I might as well not be living at all.
Mr. F conceded and said, âat the end of the day, the truth is that your husband is very secure in himself and does not need the validation.â ÂŻ\.(â˘ÍĄ.ĚŽâ˘ÍĄ )./ÂŻ Where are the lies?
When I hugged him goodbye, he put his head against mine saying, âmy parents did not pay for as good an education as yours did. Iâm hoping some of your brain rubs off on mine.â
Mr. F is a 60-year-old Yoruba man. Things are changing. And culture, they say, is whatever is being practiced at any given time. It evolves.
*aje butter- a pampered person
*wayo- to pull a fast one on someone.”