The Real Reason Nigerian Feminists Are Mad At Falz

The other day, I was on Nigerian Twitter and reading tweets – mostly from women – that were insulting Nigerian rapper/actor/comedian, Falz. Apparently, he had said something that was demeaning to women. I did not know much, but I dug deeper and found out that it was mostly about Falz’s song, “Talk” from his new album, Moral Instruction, in which he said something about women who use their bodies to make money. First of all, watch the video below, and then let’s meet again at the bottom of the video to discuss.

Instead make you work, you dey find Alhaji

Eh, eh, you dey find Alhaji

You come turn your body to cash and carry

Eh, eh, cash and carry

Falz (Song: Talk)

The lyrics above are the lyrics that are causing this fight. Before I address the infamous, let me first list some other issues that this song also talks about:

1. Politicians who need us during the election but not after.
2. EFCC
3. The President’s unending holiday in London
4. Senators literally fighting during their assembly
5. Employers who don’t pay their employees
6. Salaries that cannot support the employees
7. Rich pastors who own private jets that their congregation paid for but can never fly in
8. The hypocrisy of the church
9. Tribalism
10. The double standards that are making the rich richer and the poor poorer
11. The silencing of the citizens of Nigeria (they’re suffering and smiling and hoping)
12. Unemployment/bad economy
13. Hunger/strife
14. The missing President
15. The weak Aso Rock
16. Insecurity
17. Bribery/corruption
18. The lack of law, order, and accountability

By the way, who came up with this hyphen-shaming word? Fat-shaming. Sex-shaming. Period-shaming. Food-shaming. Slut-shaming. I’m asking because apparently, that is what Falz is basically being accused of. He is slut-shaming women for being sluts. Considering all the other issues he mentioned in the song, should there not be more protesters on Twitter? Should Pastors not accuse Falz of pastor-shaming? And should Buhari not come out and claim president-shaming? The rich can join the club and demand that rich-shaming should stop too. And there are many more: EFCC-shaming, employer-shaming, church-shaming, private-jet-shaming, senator-shaming, and of course, tribe-shaming.

Now, let’s get back to the issue at hand: Nigerian feminists on Nigerian Twitter. According to many tweets I read, the issue is that Falz is a man who claims to not like transactional sex and is condemning a woman’s right to choose what she wants to do with her body and how she wants to make money. Also, there seems to be a belief that Falz has probably engaged in transactional sex anyway, one way or another. I did not come across any tweet that made it clear that this assumption was a fact, not just an assumption.

Here’s the problem with feminism, the reason why nonfeminists sometimes completely misunderstand what feminism is about: our message is not unified. Granted, all feminists do not have the same fight because we all have different demons. The type of feminism a feminist fights for depends on what area of her/his life society is trying to repress. For example, there are feminists who are fighting for women to be able to get a job and not be turned down because they are women. There are also feminists who are fighting for the right to rent an apartment they can afford and not be asked to provide a husband or father who supports their mission to live alone. Then, there are also feminists who are fighting to free their nipples on Instagram. Oh, let’s not forget the ones who believe that women wearing pads/tampons during their period is period-shaming. I would personally refer to some of these as ibelibe – foolery – but I will not withhold their rights to fight for them.

No human should decide what another human being can do with their body. Period. This is why we (women) get upset when a bunch of men sit down to discuss our access to birth control. But every human can, if they so desire, have an opinion on anything. What they do with said opinion is their prerogative, and there are many options. Sharing that opinion is an option. Shoving it up where the sun does not shine is also an option.

Falz has a right to decide whether or not he likes and/or respects transactional sex. And he also has the right to share that opinion. The problem (sometimes) with minority groups is that they are sometimes unable to give back the tolerance that they demand, and their vision becomes so myopic and single that they see their fight in every situation, even when it is not there. Everything is not about gender and women’s rights.

Some of the tweets even said that Falz was an ugly person and a terrible rapper and an unintelligent person. I squinted my eyes and cocked my head and I still could not find an ounce of ugliness in Falz. Still, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so everyone is allowed to think of him as fine or not fine. Whether or not he is a great rapper also depends on the one who is listening, but he’s clearly securing his bag — with a backup law degree, too.

When you forget the issue at hand and instead focus on attacking a person’s looks, then you are no different from their toddler president, Trump, and from where I am standing (sitting actually), that is never a good look.

In the quest to fight for women’s rights, some of you have become angry, and you do not even know what you are angry about. I think what tends to happen is that someone gets angry, rants on Twitter, gets retweeted and lights a fire. But most of the people fighting do not know what they are fighting about. From the outside, it looks like a few sheep leading many sheep. Feminism is about the collective good and progress of all women, not about who wants to make money on their back.

Speaking of making money on their back, what exactly is this anger about? Are Nigerian feminists angry that prostitutes are being called prostitutes? Or that the one who is looking down on their job is a man? Why don’t I read/hear the same outrage when artists call women hoes and bitches and say that we are only good for fucking and rearing children? Are Nigerian feminists doing that thing where Nigerians can insult Nigerians, but non-Nigerians better park well?

Prostitution is probably the oldest profession known to man, and I have no idea who started it first. Did it start when a man demanded that a woman spread her legs in order to get something back? Or did it start when a woman willingly used what she had to get what she wanted? Is there a demand for prostitutes because prostitutes are available? Or are prostitutes available because there is a demand for them?

No matter what you call them – prostitutes, ashewos, sluts, harlots, hookers, tramps, Jezebels, call girls, whores, runs girls, hoes, sex workers, akunakunas – they all have their reasons for being in this business. Maybe they had more mouths to feed than money; maybe it’s their side hustle while they chase their dreams; maybe it’s their only skill; or maybe they just like dick and money, and this is a way to kill two birds with one stone, but whatever it is, everyone has a story, and I would personally like to know their stories. I’m actually serious.

Question for the angry Nigerian feminists: if your daughter were to come to you today and say, “Mommy/Daddy, I want to become a prostitute,” which one of you would respond by saying, “Great choice, my daughter! Your body is yours, and you have the right to use it any way you want to. If you want to be a prostitute, make sure you train and get certified and become the best damn prostitute you can be. In fact, let me call Uncle Emeka to be your first customer. That man loves some good pussy!” Which one of you would respond this way?

I think that most of the people who are angry at Falz over this song are just angry and bored and want to jump on the cool bandwagon of feminism. And frankly, most of you need to see a therapist to discuss what is really bothering you. This reminds me of when Oprah said she would be uncomfortable if she weighs more than two hundred pounds and people threw their arms up because Oprah was fat-shaming women who were over two hundred pounds.

You need to learn to not take things so personally, and you need to learn that other people’s lives and choices are not always about you. Falz does not like transactional sex, but why is that a problem? Has he sewed up the pussy of a prostitute and rendered it impenetrable? Or has he hijacked the penis and wallet of her potential customer? If you like transactional sex – as the buyer or as the seller – then go ahead and transact and be happy.

If a careful investigation is carried out, I will not at all be surprised if some of the angry Nigerian feminists have already slid into Falz’s DMs because that is just the way the cookie usually crumbles. Also, some of the actual sex workers who have heard this song have probably reached out to Falz to sell their market. Oh, you don’t like what we’re doing? (they’ll ask). Well, come and meet me and let me show you. You’re complaining because you have not had it good. A trial will convince you.

The sex workers that you think you are fighting for are looking at you, yimuing their nose at you and wondering, what is doing this one sef – unless, of course, you are actually fighting for yourself, which would make sense and eliminate some therapist fees since you already know what your problem is, but a disclosure would be helpful to the rest of us, so that people like me will not bother writing a long epistle like this one, all in an attempt to be the voice of reason and make prostitutes’ lives great again.

You criticize our artists for not being deep enough in their lyrics; you accuse them of singing only about women and sex and money and cars and alcohol and parties. But when people like Falz come out and sing about the important issues, you criticize them for singing about the wrong gender. Do you think it is easy for a person to publicly criticize the government in Nigeria? In fact, is it even easy for anyone to do anything in Nigeria? Some of you are angry at men because they were born with the privilege of a dick. Dick has privileges. Pussy does too. Find yours.

Being an angry Nigerian woman does not make you a feminist; it only makes you an angry Nigerian woman, and you are certainly within your right to be that. But your anger is being displaced and projected, and the rest of us are becoming casualties of your misplaced anger.

P.S. I know that male prostitutes exist, but I’m focusing on the female ones because those are the ones the song mentioned.

P.P.S. I don’t even say words like dick and pussy in my regular vocabulary, but you people have me out here talking like a sailor. That ain’t right, Nigerians.