“Accidents happen. They are unforeseen, unwanted and unexpected outcomes of acts of omissions or commission beyond human control.”
The year 2020 came with it’s fair share of mishaps. At times I wish it never happened but that’s beyond my control or comprehension. The year itself is a human construct being there’s no clear indication of when the count started, by who and how they decided to start counting. That’s beyond my comprehension and I wont try to. On the other hand, with the year a viral disease outbreak started in Wuhan, China that have disrupted every aspect of our lives. From trumping President Trumps’ presidential bid as it is to school closures among many others, we’ve had to bear the burden of it. On the flip side, it came with a convenient and suitable excuse for almost anything that befalls us this year.
As a people, we have adopted and embraced the victim mentality in dealing with the pandemic and its consequences. Victim mentality doesn’t help us. It only serves for us to shed responsibility and assert our entitlement. I don’t this contributes to anything meaningful in the end. In the early days, following school closures we were faced with a surge in cases of teen pregnancies. In the wake of this, advocacy groups have been up in arms from one corner to the other calling on government responsibility over the same. The only thing we forget is that we are part of the community responsibility for impregnation of these girls. It’s not a far away call at all.
This evening I had a critical jolt from the news of a father who had to take her daughter to procure illegal abortion. The basis being that the daughter is in school and shouldn’t get pregnant thus the easier way to erase the problem was an abortion. Unfortunately and sadly, the lady is no more. My heart bleeds for the ladies who lose their lives in the name of terminating and unwanted pregnancy “the accident” as we term it. I’m left to wonder whether it really is an accident.
We are in a society where the easy way out has always been to relinquish responsibility and play victim. This compounded by moral superiority in the sense that we want to fulfill the societal expectations of us, we seek quick fixes for life changing moments in our lives. In the case of the lady who lost her life, I’m left wondering who prescribed that a school girl can’t carry pregnancy once it has happened? Don’t get me wrong here, I am not pro-teen pregnancies at all. It’s a vice but adopting an even worse approach to it doesn’t validate it. It’s commonplace to hear people term unwanted, unplanned pregnancies as accidents. It’s hilarious because from my understanding of an accident, it means that it happened beyond your control. This is considering all risk mitigation measures were put in place upfront.
I can’t wrap my head around the accident in pregnancy where two individuals consented to have unprotected sexual intercourse, neglected the option of using long term hormonal contraceptives and after the act decided against the emergency contraceptive pill. Is that an accident or negligence? I think I’d term it a consequence of irresponsible behavior. This is in the sense that you don’t bump into someone, have unprotected sex and get them pregnant just like that. (This exclusive of the cases of rape that’s peculiar and a vice by itself.) In the case of consensual sex, it’s our undoing as a society, me included. The most common scenario is a man denying responsibility for the pregnancy, the public judging the lady and everyone takes a stand, most often not in the best interest of the lady. Instead of accepting the fact we find ways to point fingers and shift the blame.
It’s time we faced our demons and decided to act right. It’s time we acknowledged how much harm we have caused and decided to make amends. We must acknowledge the fact that people are having sex, enable them to make the right choices i.e. educate them and provide them with contraceptives and beyond this in case of unwanted pregnancies, the person needs to acknowledge they had options thus take responsibility rather than run from the consequences of bad choices. With this we have to establish a culture of mutual responsibility and nurture our people to embrace the reality of their circumstances. Let’s relax our expectations on others. Life doesn’t have a rehearsal, we didn’t come with a manual and post our death I doubt their is a marking scheme to assess how we fared in this journey.
Responsibility is a coat of honor. As men we need to learn to take responsibility not because it’s easy but because it is the right thing. It’s more than enough to be hoping to make amends when we can’t do so and know frankly that we are not doing anything for it to happen. It’s on us to care deeply, feel the pain of those we’ve lost and make a conscious decision to not go that direction anymore.
“Life is an unscripted play. Don’t make corrections. Instead live it on its own account making the best of every moment till the last day.”