Loose cannon: Robert Kirby
Like a lot of other South African men, I was pleasantly amused by Suzanne Daley’s often humorous quips about how diffident we South African males have been when it has come to keeping up with the life-needs of the ladies in our midst (“I’ll Have To Ask My Husband”, October 16 to 22 ).
This opinion certainly seemed to be at the heart of the interesting case Daley – bless her heart – was forwarding in her piece last week.
Suzanne Daley is a journalist. In fact, she’s the newly-appointed South African bureau chief for the prestigious The New York Times.
We South African men are very lucky to have her here. For a start Daley is very pretty and, although that shouldn’t distract us from what she was saying, it does add a bit of extra zizz to things. There’s always room for another Jani Allen, I always say.
Daley’s article not only had a playful title, it was a treat in itself.
Having apparently happily managed the sudden continental shift from New York to Johannesburg, Daley told how she came a bit of a cropper when she first started meeting typical South African men.
One such example was the foreman of the furniture moving company who insisted only the male “boss” could sign the delivery note.
Later it was some wiseacre lawyer who had a way with the Coke-dispensing machine and liked to make silly jokes about how it was so like a woman.
Daley was to meet another exemplary South African male in the form of Mr Nelson Mandela who, in one of his Buddha-like pronouncements, wittily told Daley’s male supervisor that he should feed her better.
It didn’t stop there. The new supreme commander of the South African National Defence Force, field marshal Mangosuthu Buthelezi, also had a humiliating tilt at Daley’s gender – but then perhaps Daley doesn’t understand that Buthelezi is a Zulu and we all know how Zulu lads feel about women shaking free of their traditional fetters.
When it came to hiring a car, signing contracts and opening bank accounts, Daley soon realised that South Africa is still direly in need of some no-nonsense chain- saw feminism.
Clearly Nina Romm and Frene Ginwala (now there’s someone Mandela doesn’t need to make insensitive bulimia jokes about) have failed miserably in their task of winching South African menfolk into the early 20th century.
South African men have far more urgent emotional balancing needs, like owning up to the fact that some of their fellows prefer to do the bold thing with … you know … well … other fellows.
Acknowledging that homosexuality not only exists, but appears to be entrenched in South Africa – certainly in Cape Town – has been a terrible trial for South African men.
They need a little time to adjust and gather their thoughts before having to deal with even more far-out ideas like letting women run bank accounts without the male right of veto sitting on their shoulders.
But where Daley got it totally wrong was in her tantrum at the established South African dinner party tradition of easing the good wives out of the dining room after the pudding has been served so that the men may light up cigars and talk about global affairs in peace.
I am a firm believer in this tradition, but mostly because I know that the real reason we ask the girls to leave is actually so that we may talk about subjects no real lady would ever wish to hear.
Affably suggesting that the women should go and powder their noses is, in fact, a token of our deep consideration for their feelings.
No real lady really enjoys listening to dirty jokes and seedy gossip about which one of the typing-pool damsels gives the best head. It’s very gauche to expect ladies to stay behind and be embarrassed like that.
Sorry, Daley my dear, but you mis- read us badly on that occasion. It’s all very well for you to demand equal rights for women, but you cannot seriously at the same time ask us to forget that we are gentlemen.
Speaking as a man, I don’t for a moment doubt that the whole feminist issue is a very serious matter. So Daley deserves our genuine thanks for showing us that there’s a lighter side to it.
After reading her article, I put down the paper. It certainly made me ponder and I realised that behind all her jesting, Daley was telling us something about ourselves, above all helping us to laugh at ourselves.
For that Daley deserves our deepest gratitude.