Which are the Customs which lead to gender discrimination ?

Customs which lead to gender discrimination;

Are those which have their origin from the patriarchal societies

• Patriarchal societies are those societies which are organized and run by men; In these societies it is only men who are the decision maker and holder of the power over the women and resources. Patriarchal systems are common in many African societies including those of Tanzania. The system are now world wide strongly discourage because they favor males over females, and thus perpetuate gender discrimination

• Exclusion of women from decision making; In many patriarchal societies there has always been a common practices to exclude women from making decision on important social, economic, political issues right from the family level to national level. This practices has greatly affected women as most of the decision made by men lead to favor them at the expense of women.

• Paying of bride; The practices of paying bride price to the parents of the girl to be married is considered by men as the condition for buying that girl/ women. Hence the fulfilling of this condition means that the women are put under the control of that mantises.

• Denial of the right to property; In many societies women and girls are not allowed to own property or to inherit any property after the death of their of their husband or parents .As a result women and girl are left with no economic base, hence became dependents to men.

• Initiation ceremonies; Include "Jando" and “Unyango” for men and women .In these ceremonies base the teachings provided to boy are quite different from those given to girls. For example among other things taught to boys one of them is to educate them how to exhibit masculine behavior such as dominance, confidence, strength, competition and rationally while girls and women are taught to exhibit feminine behavior such as submission, caring nurturing, sensitivity and emotionally. As a result, these behavior are used to justify men holing most power position and women reaming in subordinate position

• Habit of food eating; In some tribe, women are forbidden form eating certain types of food. They are not allowed to eat chicken meat, eggs, liver etc, when they are pregnant. This was due to the fear, that the child to be born will grow too big to born in in a normal way .The effect of this was that, the health of the pregnant women and eventually that of the expected baby was affected. Institution which perpetuate gender discrimination.