I just read the story of a boy falsely accused of rape. The girl later dropped the case. I am a mother of three boys. All teenagers. They are the best things in my life. For this “selfish” reason, stories like this break my my heart.

One of my greatest future fears is that they will meet the wrong girl. A girl who is vindictive and who has the ability to accuse them of something they didn’t do. I speak as a mother and I will speak this as it bothers me.

Back in the day when I was growing up and abstinence was still a virtue, it was harder for rape accusations to happen. These days, anyone can accuse anyone of rape. Rape accusations has been weaponised and this is scary.

When we actually think of it, the weaponization of rape accusations hurts everyone. It hurts the cases of women who actually are raped cos only close friends and die hard women supporters will take the women’s word for it.

It hurts the men. Who have to live in fear and not get into relationships because they can’t tell what would happen if a relationship goes sour. This is turn hurts the women who will be looking for the good men who have been scared of from dating.

It hurts society cos men and women cannot just meet and be friends without fear. I have told my boys: never be alone in a room with a lady for any reason except she is your wife. You think this is extreme?

As I type this I am literally shaking from reading that boy’s story. I can’t imagine what he and his family had to go through. As long as false rape accusations exist, men need to find ways of protecting themselves too.

Even when you are dating a girl, better to have a chaperone. If you are going to marry her, you will have as much sex as you want. If you aren’t going to marry her the “hit and run” is not worth the pains or possible jail time.

And please please please, don’t be so inebriated as to not even remember what happened. *sigh. Please be careful out there.

One of our favourite quotes at Woman.NG is a line from Emeli Sande’s Read All About It; “If you’ve got the heart of a lion, why let your voice be tamed?”
This has inspired us to publish Nigerian women’s take on about everything. From conceiving a child to burying an old loved one and every life experience in between them - Nigerian women’s stories, opinions, issues, debates, advice, news etc. Read More >>

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