What determines indecent exposure?

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Sometimes when I read the newspapers, I get a very strong feeling that it is dangerous to be a woman.

Sometimes when I read the newspapers, I get a very strong feeling that it is dangerous to be a woman.

Inside Track with Grace Mutandwa

When women are not being raped, beaten up for failing to cook meat for their husbands or being verbally abused by in-laws, they are being arrested for having a bit of fun or even daring to earn a living through dancing.

It seems even fighting side by side with men in the war of liberation failed to convince some of our men that we also have rights and that we are capable of making decisions for ourselves.

More than 30 years after independence, women are still expected to venture out at night only in the company of men and even then, it seems they have to explain themselves to the police if they are in male company.

Not only are women out on the town alone considered potential prostitutes, the way they dress is also up for vetting.

Why is it that policemen think that all women frequenting nightclubs do so for the sole purposes of soliciting? It is primitive that women should be expected to be behind closed doors by 6pm just because some men will it.

A group of young dancers should not be arrested for wearing short skirts, which in all fairness are an important marketing tool and quite in keeping with their chosen trade.

Dancers are in the entertainment business and the last time I checked, that was not a crime. We have no law that tells us how long, wide or frumpy our clothes should be to meet some of these police officers’ requirements.

Independent women don’t dance to men’s whims

Indecent exposure is defined in the Criminal Code but does not specify length or style of your dressing and it is only after you have been arrested that the courts can determine whether or not you were indecently attired.

A judge makes a value judgement using subjective factors if you do go to court. But these cases rarely ever go to court because the women accused of indecent dress or soliciting are harassed into paying admission of guilt fines.

In most cases some of the women do not even get as far as the police station as everything is settled between the nightclub and the nearest police station.

The fact that not many women are willing to go through the pain of challenging the police when accused of soliciting or being indecently dressed encourages the police to continue persecuting innocent women.

Dancers have the right to wear costumes that are perfectly in character with their chosen profession. They are professional women just out to make a living and that right should be seen to be protected under the constitution.

If you are offended by the way dancers dress, then do not attend the places where they perform. There are people who might be equally offended by police uniforms but they do not go around harassing policemen.

Men who find any particular style of dressing offensive must not be allowed to enforce their misguided cultural values on women who have nothing to do with them.

They can force their own daughters to shop from tent and canvas but they should not expect independent women to dance to their whims.

As long as we fail to challenge some of the abuses we are put through, we will continue to be second-class citizens in our own country.

[email protected]/Twitter:GraceMutandwa1