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Beliefs and attitudes towards male domestic violence in South Kivu

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par Ndabuli Theophile Mugisho
University of KwaZulu Natal - Master 2011
  

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4.5 Men's attitudes of domestic violence.

4.5.1 Men support domestic violence

By supporting domestic abuse, men in this area gave different attitudes on the very issue:

Bitu: Man will always correct his wife because he is her husband. I may not manage well my emotions when I am decided to `touch' on her. No man hates this; and you, I am sure, you don't. `Correcting' women and children is not bad at all [claps and whistling in the room but the pastor shakes his head, tugging at his chin]. Yes, and education...but anger and reaction are not a matter of education. I am educated but when family members annoy me, they know. Emotion has no limits and it is not concerned with education even if educated people don't beat. They return home too late, refuse financial assistance, etc. Open violence is not good but hidden one can be ok sometimes. I sustain a man who reacts to evils.

Dira: Women need corrections and this without pity. To redress a woman is very easy and I can't wait as I am the man. We, uneducated men, react violently just as anyone who is defending oneself. Even some leaders are violent in their homes, we all are men and react the same when we are provoked. But the people who studied do not do exactly as we do. Not the same but they use other techniques; I can beat for instance, but he will abuse in a different way.

Dondo: When they disturb me, they expect me to put them right. It is impossible to tell men to never put right their families who do not carry out their social duties. This is normal in family life here.

Tongo: Men here should love their wives and if they abuse them, they should ask for forgiveness. Applying violence to family members should not be supported, this is abomination. My attitude is that it would not be good to use violence in the home because the members are united, they are like one.

Fikiri: There exist many religions here but I have never seen a woman preaching or reading the mass because they are not allowed to say the word of God in front of men. And you too, you know that God has no wife and he has never used women, his son was not married and he had no woman disciple.

Golo: Fikiri, you are totally wrong. Women can preach but up to now we do not have those who can do so. When they will be able, they will be allowed. If they were bad as you think, God would not have created one for Adam. If they do not preach here, elsewhere they do.

Discussion

The attitudes of South Kivu men who back domestic violence are contradictory. It seems that the proponents of violent attitudes have either once been violent or would like to abuse their wives. However, the attitude of domestic abuse was opposed by some informants in all interviews. All the participants were men but they did not behave as `men'. Thus, in an in-depth interview, Golo and Tongo share the same position as they oppose making family members, particularly the women and children, suffer abuse. Golo believes that women should not be abused in the home but rather be valued. He supports that family members should not be held responsible for their husbands' violent behaviours and that husbands should be able to handle their emotive attitudes even if they were in a drunken state. Tongo also rejects violence in the home and for him, this will occur because there is lack of love among the members. This infers that the abuser may apply violence but he will feel remorse, which may lead him to apologise. The abuser may be forgiven but the abuse may reoccur in the following days. The opposers of domestic abuse argued that `violent attitudes and actions are never unwilling but lack of love towards the victim.' In fact, this explains the reasons why domestic violence is cyclic even after the abuser has vowed to never repeat it toward the victim (Hatari, 1999:75).

During a focus group interview, Dondo does not hesitate to argue that any family member who fails to do what society requires deserves correction. It is in this context that Mirindi (2003:48) confirms that some men assault their wives under the pretext of not respecting their traditional duties. In the same group, Tongo's position is that it is possible for men to eschew violence in the home provided that these men do not hide behind social traditions and customs to infringe voluntarily family members' rights. Cherniac (2007:73) concludes that men will always develop more coercive attitudes in the home due to society. The respondents revealed that men applying domestic violence are not really to blame. To Tongo, both tolerance and forgiveness can help to bring family members together. This point of view is fundamental since domestic violence toll in the DRC and particularly in South Kivu province is on rise (Ruhamya, 2007). All in all, we find that the majority of South Kivu men who are fond of using violence in their homes are very influenced by the environment in which they live and they neglect their personal effort to unite their families.

Domestic violence can be perpetrated by educated as well as uneducated people. Vuningoma (2003:6) found that applying domestic violence does not depend on the individual's level of education. The respondents in this interview agreed that being educated or uneducated, man will always be man. In the same vein, Bitu adds that even educated people are the most abusive men because they do not do it openly. Such a category of men have their own way of abusing wives. South Kivu educated men prefer `clandestine' abuse but the uneducated commit `open' violence.

In his argument provided in a focus group discussion, Fikiri admits that in all religions of South Kivu, no woman is a Priest, a Pastor or an Imam. For him, if churches want men to treat women softly, they must preach it by examples and not by words. He adds, `I am Catholic but I have never seen a religious sister say the mass'. Golo, who is a protestant pastor, opposes this and he believes women do not appear in church services because those who can do this do not exist in the region.

In addition to the above arguments, Fikiri confirms that what is worse is that some pastors who should be models `beat their wives, rape and pregnant the neighbour's daughters'. Paluku (1998:70) underscores that an individual religious beliefs cannot change completely their violent attitudes in the home. The Pastor's family members will never leak information about the violence they live in the home because this would bring shame on the Pastor and the whole family and culminate in his exclusion from his church, which ultimately will engender more suffering than violence in the home because the church in the DRC and South Kivu in particular has become the source of financial resource that feeds families. Besides, the Pastor's excommunication may create more conflict in the church and this may lead to hatred and even open fight.

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