Gender Identities Between Women And Women

Let us not forget that gender is something that is so embedded in our social institutions, actions, beliefs and our desires that it appears to us to be completely natural. Research has shown that gender power inequality in relationships and intimate partner violence places women at a high risk of HIV infection especially in the African continent. Men’s behaviors tend to show high violent and sexual risky behaviors. Raewyn Connell’s notion states the hegemonic masculinity and reflections on emphasized femininities to argue that these sexual, and male violent, practices are rooted in cultural ideals of gender identities. In our country gender identities show diversity, the dominant ideal of black African manhood emphasizes toughness, strength

We argue that the goals of HIV prevention and optimizing of care can best be achieved through change in gender identities, rather than through a focus on individual sexual behaviors. In countries in the sub-Saharan Africa with a predominantly heterosexual HIV epidemic, the prevalence in women is sky rocketing in the late teens, which is five years before this occurs to men. Understanding the difference between women and men is critical in the prevention of HIV. Gender differences in sexual socialization is more important in influencing who women and men partner with and when and under what circumstances. There are differences in men and women and how they position themselves and in the way the act as social being, i.e. differences in socially defines and constructed ways of being a man or woman. It is gender that influences more than sex in behavior, gender differences take many different forms in different setting, there is large evidence in the gender of power inequality in relationships, is sometimes the cause of intimate partner violence which places women at enhanced risk of HIV

In effort to try and explain why the partner violence and relationship gender power inequity places women more at risk for HIV infection, research has been done with men , it has shown that men in South Africa who have been physically violent towards their other halves( partners) are more likely to be infected with the HIV virus which puts their partners at risk because some men don’t share their status with the women in their lives because of fear of rejection but continue to put them at risk by not condomising with them. In conclusion women are seen to have to be more feminine and always please men and that is why they are always the ones at risk because the gender inequality in the country gives the men power to do what they want and women should always except and be submissive to that especially in black