A South African beer company has accused men of being bad fathers, violators of women and generally broken.
Carling Black Label wants to transform masculinity, and for customers to stop abusing their “refreshment beverages”, said company brand director Grant Pereira.
Father A Nation (FAN) founder Craig Wilson, speaking at the Carling Black Label Beer #No Excuse event held in Johannesburg at the weekend, said: “If we can heal men, we can heal the world, if we can restore men to be fathers, we can fix society.
“We are one of the worst in the world around gender-based violence (GBV) and there are reasons for that. The goal is not to have a single victim of gender-based violence, so we need to look at why is this happening. We cannot fix something if we do not know what the underlying cause is. GBV is perpetrated by men. Men need to come up with solutions. We cannot expect women to stand up and fix this thing because men are causing it.”
He said they were partnering with 40 local football association (LFA), FET colleges and taverns around the country to raise awareness on GBV. “No man is born an abuser. Something happens along his journey to adulthood where something goes wrong. We need to fix what it is and restore him.”
The campaign has already begun in Gauteng and Western Cape and will start in the Eastern Cape next year. It includes six-a-side soccer tournaments where booklets on masculinity are distributed. “We put on workshops for LFAs, and we got detailed action of what men need to do to change their lives. We are working with FET colleges and we will roll it out next year to seven other provinces.”
He said 100 men from each province will be taken for an in-depth workshop about becoming champions for change. “We also visited the taverns. They are predominately attended by men and are the centres where lot of GBV takes place. We hope to transform the way men in taverns think.”
Carling Black Label brand director Grant Pereira said: “We want to transform masculinity. If we need to address what it means to be a man, we need to start against gender-based abuse. Changing behaviour starts with changing attitude.
“We are trying to mobilise men in our community to become champions for change. We simply believe no excuse for abuse of alcohol. Carling Black Label does not want men to abuse our products.”
Social commentator Nolwazi Tusini said: “It is important to have these campaigns. Corporate SA and the private sector really need to come to the party in terms of being proper citizens of this country beyond just profit -driven entities.”..