Within the space of days two high profile domestic violence
court cases were resolved.
A few weeks ago athlete Oscar Pistorius was found guilty by
South African court of culpable homicide, what we refer to as manslaughter
here. In February last year he shot through a bathroom door in his house
killing his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp.
Closer to home this week Jacqueline Uwera was found guilty
of the murder of her husband Juvenal Nsenga. Nsenga was killed when Uwera run
over him at the gate to their home last year.
In both cases the accused did not deny killing their
respective partners. In Pistorius’ case his defence team were able to plant
enough doubt in Judge Thokozile Masipa’s mind to allow him dodge a murder conviction.
Uwera was not as lucky, though she was spared the death sentence. She was
sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Below the breath taking drama of the two cases, they and
several other lower profile cases make us wonder about the state of our
domestic relations.
From an evolutionary stand point men and women come together
to perpetuate the specii. The state and
religion have stepped in to regulate the practice a reflection of the
institution’s importance in controlling power.
The traditional view has been to put the man at the head of
the family because he was the bread winner. A hangover from a time when the men
went out to hunt and protected their homesteads suing the force of their
masculinity.
"A combination of issues not least of all the improved earning power of the woman and our slowness, on both sides of the gender divide, to adjust, is causing unprecedented friction...
Futuristic author Alvin Toffler suggested that power, who
wields it and how it is projected has evolved over time. In the beginning the
strongest man in the village, or the king with the largest army called the
shots. But with money and commerce the power shifted to he who had the money,
because not only could he enforce his will by force if need be (he could
finance armies) but where coercion failed he could buy consent. But the richest
man was soon surpassed by the one with access to information. Information or
knowledge is the basis of all wealth so not only did this new power broker know
more, he used this knowledge to generate wealth which in turn gave him control
over the instruments of violence as well.
The world has moved on from the information age to the
conceptual age, where it is the man who can create new knowledge who runs the
show.
With universal education, the industrial age and the second
world war women joined the work force, where the nature of work is increasingly
intellectual narrowing the difference in contributions to the society between
men and women.
These shifts while they go on around us are still being
resisted at the level of our individual relationships.
In the home environment we continue to pander to the notion
of the supremacy of the man. A notion which is coming under threat openly and
surreptitiously.
A combination of issues not least of all the improved
earning power of the woman and our slowness, on both sides of the gender divide,
to adjust is causing unprecedented friction.
Some couples have decided to freeze their relations in time
with the women staying home despite their ability to earn or if she goes to
work she surrenders her earnings to her spouse for him to dispose of them as he
sees fit.
In the circumstances where the woman has exercised her right
to go to work and disposes of her salary as she wishes, the ensuing tension is
mitigated either by the woman adhering to tradition and subsuming herself to
her spouse (religion and tradition do a good job of encouraging the façade) or
by keeping her income a secret while surreptitiously building her own capital
base to safeguard her future and that of her children when push comes to shove.
When the pressure in the relation mounts bad things can
happen to good people.
