The #WomenForChange campaign is the clarion call we shouldn’t need in 2025, but is much needed for men to start behaving differently towards women. As men, we need to start having hard conversations with ourselves and our sons about holding space for women, writes Gasant Abarder in a new column.
Cape Town has among the best comedy talent in the world. Last week, I was lucky to be in the audience to see Stuart Taylor’s polished stand-up show, Odd Man Out, at the Baxter. His material is real and raw and touches on the uncomfortable differences between men and women. A few weeks earlier, Marc Lottering was in a similar vein, sharing a deeply personal journey in Marc Eugene Lottering.
South Africa needs comedy. We have a mad way of laughing at challenges many other nations find insurmountable. What isn’t funny is laughing at the ambitions of young girls and dismissing the constant threat of Gender Based Violence.
This, I guess, like Stuart Taylor, makes me an odd man out. I saw a well-followed male content creator on TikTok questioning the merits of the #WomenForChange campaign against GBV ahead of the G20 summit. Male privilege is real, and if you can’t see it, then rather don’t go onto a public platform to expose your ignorance.
The rather unfortunate content was followed by a serving of absolute crap on Facebook that trumpeted how 75% of at least three international women’s cricket teams were gay. So what? Does it make them bat, bowl or field differently? Are men held to the same standard?
To further call out this nauseating theme was Shafeeqah Isaacs, thought leader and award-winning sports marketing and development guru, the founder of Abena Sport and the platform ‘The F-Bomb’ that promotes women in sport. Shafeeqah lamented the sexualisation of women athletes in marketing campaigns.
She posted on her brilliant LinkedIn page about the Dos and Don’ts of sports marketing for women: ‘It’s always great and appreciated to see effort put into campaigns for women’s sport. But done wrong, it can cause more harm than good.’
Shafeeqah went on to encourage brands to ‘back women’s sport with real investment; to build pathways and not once-off moments; to centre skill, discipline, leadership and intelligence; to showcase the endeavour and pressure of training and the wins nobody knows or thinks about; to bring women into the room shaping the message; and to treat women athletes as athletes first’.
She then listed the Don’ts (guys, in 2025, it really shouldn’t be necessary to say but it bears reminding): ‘Don’t sexualise women athletes to make a campaign “pop”; don’t reduce women to beauty, vibes or “sex appeal”; don’t pair GBV messaging with language that objectifies women; don’t make fashion and beauty the headline when the performance is the real story; don’t use the same stereotypes that have held women in sport back for decades; and don’t forget that every word and visual shapes how the world sees these athletes.’
It’s frustrating. I’ve been involved in junior girls’ football for a decade. I’ve often arrived as the coach of a girls’ team to play against boys. Not only did the boy opponents laugh, but their male coaches did too.
I’ve seen social media posts amplifying the errors of women footballers as comedy, but their prowess is rarely shown. I’ve loudly revelled when a girls’ soccer team thumps a boys’ team. The latter has happened often.
The only conclusion I draw about men who post such content is that they feel threatened or envious. Women’s sport is on a dizzying trajectory, and there are vast opportunities for women in sport. I always think that out of 1 000 boy footballers, you’d be lucky to find one who makes it big. That statistic is vastly different for girls.
Men need to look in the mirror and ask: while others laugh, can I be the odd man out? Can I hold space for women when we men have been taking up all the space since the beginning of time? Can we men help to raise confident daughters and reassure them that their ambitions are as valid as those of our sons?
Or do we continue the rape and GBV culture and tropes? Where a South African woman is afraid to walk alone across a basement parking lot, can’t take an early morning run on her own, or fears for her life when using an e-hailing service?
Sometimes it takes comedy to help us introspect. But not at the expense of the women who are changing the game in a world where the odds are stacked against them. That’s no joke.
· Stuart Taylor’s brilliant Odd Man Out at the Baxter ended on Saturday but resumes at the Theatre on the Square in Sandton from 18 November. Book at Webtickets.
· Marc Lottering’s Colleen the Musical runs at the Baxter from 29 November to 7 February. Book at Webtickets.
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Picture: Supplied
