Cultural Change

There are cultures all over the world with which the people of a particular
group are known with. There are good ones which everyone is happy
with and always eagerly expecting to come because they add to the
day to day happiness, therefore healthiness, of the community
involved. There are also ones that are considered bad, the
reason being that they make the people sad and unhappy,
because they bring grief and suffering to the people.

The good cultures are welcomed and encouraged by everyone. People want them to continue as long as there is existence. Such good cultures include Marriage and child celebrations, masquerade ball in Europe, Halloween, football in America, Masquerade dance in Africa [though some people want to spoil it when they involve the use of charm], New yam festival, just to mention a few.

On the other hand, bad cultures like Human slavery, killing of twins, Suffering a widow [with one ridiculous law or the other], Killing of albinos, Human inflicted insanity, breast ironing [done to  suppress the growth of breast in teenagers], teenage marriage, etc. are discouraged and been rejected by people because they cause unhappiness to the people. The modern society discourges these aspects of culture, in fact they consider the practice an abuse of human rights. 

In Europe, America, and other part of the world bad cultures are phased out and replaced with modern laws and practices. But In Africa, the progress in stopping these bad cultures seem to be very slow. One may wonder why this is so? I think the answer to this question can be found in the facts that:

(i) General Attitude of the people, in that they hold too strong to their fear and are reluctant to make move to stopping them even when they know that those practices are bad.

(ii) Primitive nature of our people in that they still hold belief to cultic way [Native doctor way] of seeking for solution to their problems. This has made them to feel reluctant to fight against any bad about such medium. They may be Christians or Muslims but once they experience any slight problem they run to native doctors for solution.

(iii) Genuiness [Business-mindedness] of our religious leaders: Most of our Christian and Muslim leaders [sorry to say this] are not genuine. Some of them enter the practice purposely because of the money. Some take up the practice after searching for job for many years and did not get, the best, simple solution is to enter ministerial service or simply open a church. It is heard that some of the Religious leaders even seek favour and miracle charm from native doctors in other to boost their church business.

(iv) Money Mindedness is another problem because the people are too anxious to make it quick in life. No body want to wait for tomorrow. So they look for easy way to become rich which may include going to native doctor for charms, even robbery. Part of the problem being because of the fact that Africans so value wealth not caring how the wealth was gotten.

(v) Our Elites, also, are not helping matters. They have acquired western knowledge, and maybe become rich, but the fear of death or loosing their wealth make them to run to occult for powers and security. It is said that the orìm society members [Tarok people of Northern Nigeria] visit the houses of the retired generals and other influential figures at night to cement the bonds between them. It is also said that The Ogboni society [western Nigeria] take special interest in initiating influential people and that most of Yoruba elites belong to Ogboni.

Read Also:

When Maltreated - What Are My Rights Good Cultures - More Insight Bad Cultures - More Insight Insanity - D Untold Story