Don't sell people an incomplete map and then blame them for getting lost. I've been sitting with that thought for weeks because the more I look around, the more I realize that many of the frustrations we carry as a society are not simply about unemployment, corruption, inequality or even money. They are about the stories we tell one another. From the time we are children, we are handed maps for how life is supposed to work. Study hard and life will work out. Get a degree and you'll find a good job. Work hard and success will follow. Save consistently and you'll become financially secure. Find your passion and the money will come. Marry the right person and everything else will fall into place. Believe in yourself. Think positively. Stay disciplined. None of these statements is entirely false. But none of them is entirely true either. The problem is rarely what they say. The problem is what they leave unsaid. Because what is omitted from a story is often just as powerful...
A woman chooses not to marry. Another decides not to have children. A third chooses to invest her energy into her career, or perhaps into travel, or art, or activism. These are simple personal choices—no different from a man choosing to remain a bachelor, or a man choosing to have children later in life, or none at all. And yet, in Kenya (and elsewhere), when women make these choices, the world often reacts as if she has staged a rebellion. Worse still, her decisions are interpreted not as choices for herself but as choices against men . Why is that? When Choice Is Misread as Rejection When a woman says she does not want to get married, it is common to hear whispers: “She hates men,” “She was hurt before,” or “She thinks she’s better than everyone else.” But when a man says the same? He is seen as independent, perhaps even smart for “avoiding drama.” When a woman chooses not to have children, she is told she will regret it, that she is rejecting family life, that she is “selfi...