Today on Twitter (as it often happens) a person was outed as a sexual predator. This isnt the first time outings of this nature have happened. Only six months ago, a popular twitter socialite and erstwhile businessman who used twitter as his primary brand medium was exposed as a serial sexual predator, threatening women  with rape and social suicide to ensure they had sex with him. He was shamed by a few, defended by a larger crowd of men who asked for everything under the sun as proof of his criminal activity even after photographic evidence was provided. But mostly everyone kept quiet and let him continue to quietly harass women in exchange for possible discounts on Agbadas.
Today’s culprit is an even bigger socialite and has ingratiated himself with a lot of influential women on and off social media. But there’s a twist; his victims were mostly men, homosexual and heterosexual. His lure was simple; offer them the catch of a lifetime, a rich Nigerian based abroad but visiting the country, willing to pay dollars for wild sex. The catch; photographs of his victims penises, preferably with a hairy crotch, preferably in a pose he creative directed. Of course there was no woman and there were rumours of him using edited versions these conversations to paint himself as heterosexual and the subject of unsolicited sexual attention.

When the news broke, it was broken by a woman and women provided the evidence affirming the claims even though men were the victims of his criminality. Only one man spoke up to directly affirm these claims. The response these women got however from the larger male population was startling.

These men rejoiced that this person (I am not going to say his name because it is not my place to out him) had been exposed as homosexual, and laughed that women had flocked to him thinking he was heterosexual. More women for them. Then they turned on the victims of this episode and proceeded to insult them, make lewd tasteless jokes about them, then insinuate they are gay. It didnt seem to matter that these men were solicited and deceived by a person they trusted. If they sent their pictures they must have secretly wanted to be manipulated by sexual predator.

Now here is the thing; I’d dare say 90% of the men doing this are part of the ‘Not All Men’ brigade. A group of men who are always ready to speak out when women begin to discuss issues of oppression that affect their gender, accusing them of a one sided narrative. When women who were raped told their story, these men said men had been raped too and didnt come to Twitter to ‘complain’ about it. They did the same for equal pay, sexual harassment, patriarchy; you name it, they did it. They said all they wanted was men looked out for too, “Not All Men” they said.

Now they have a chance to advocate for men sexually harassed, lied to and tricked to offer sexual favours by another man, but instead they  chuckle publicly about perceived homosexuality and suggest these men deserved what they got. The Not All Men really doesnt care about you, they care about upholding the partriarchy, upholding the privileges their sex and assigned gender gives them. They will sacrifice everything, even men who are victims for a laugh, a chance to assert their own heterosexual masculinity.

Das sad.

Editor