Wacha tuu ni confess, as a very very very bitter feminazi who has never seen labour ward or experienced excruciating labour pains , ata chapati sijai pikia mwanaume even though nimepikiwa chapo na wanaume! Ama I’m a man and I don’t know?! 
Lakini ata wewe ungekua bitter if you were a woman. Ama nikue lesbian ndio nipate kaslave Ka kunipikia?!
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If I Were a Man
—by Oyinna Ogbonna
If I were a man, I imagine my mornings would begin with a kind of inherited softness, a quiet, unearned gentleness that settles on the body like early harmattan fog — a privilege so naturalized it doesn’t announce itself, doesn’t need to. It simply exists, cushioning even the most mediocre man with the certainty that the world is his padded mattress, his Egyptian-cotton bedspread, his divine right to comfort.
And why wouldn’t it be?
If I were a man, I would wake up knowing that the simple fact of having a penis gives me unmerited authority in homes, in cultures, in governments, in churches, in bedrooms, in economies, in conversations, and in conflicts. I’d open my eyes in the morning and instinctively know that somebody — usually a woman — has already arranged my softness for me.
Before I lift a single finger, an entire ecosystem of unpaid female labor would have already paved my day.
And I would take it all for granted.
Not because I’m intentionally wicked (though some men are), but because I have been raised to believe that this is the natural order of things — the unquestionable design — the divine blueprint.
And while thinking about this, I remembered I Want a Wife, an essay written decades ago by Judy Brady, who catalogued the impossible demands men place on wives. When I first read her essay in undergrad, I laughed because it was absurd. Now, as an adult American Nigerian woman who has watched men gaslight women in real time, the piece reads more like prophecy.
And then I remembered the invisible benefits outlined by Peggy McIntosh — how privilege hides itself inside everyday life, invisible to the beneficiaries. Male privilege works the same way: men don’t need to know they have it; the entire world behaves as if they do.
So before you continue this essay, I urge you to read I Want a Wife — not because it inspired this piece (it didn’t; my lived experience did), but because it serves as a historical mirror. Her essay shows the global pattern; mine shows the Nigerian extension pack — the Premium Deluxe African Edition of male privilege.
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This essay is a guided safari into the ecosystem of male entitlement.
A documentary.
A satire.
A heartbreak.
A comedy.
A horror film.
A census of the free benefits men collect simply for being alive.
Let’s proceed.
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Morning Privilege
If I were a man, what exactly would I enjoy?
Everything.
I would wake up to a day prepared for me by a woman whose labor is invisible, thankless, naturalized as “duty.” I wouldn’t need to say thank you — society has taught her that gratitude is a luxury only I deserve.
I would enjoy a wife who wakes up at 4 a.m. to make meals for me.
A wife who prepares the children.
A wife who arranges the home.
A wife who ensures my day flows smoothly.
A wife who anticipates needs I have not articulated.
All this before I even brush my teeth.
And if she fails?
If she dares to be tired?
If she dares to be human?
I would be justified — no, entitled — to anger.
——
There is the pepper-soup hide-my-id saga in 2022; the wife who came home from work exhausted, unaware her husband wanted pepper soup. She didn’t make it. He called his side chick in her presence. The side chick cooed, “Come, baby, I’ll make it for you.” He left the wife and went to eat pepper soup with his mistress. The next day, the wife came online asking, “What did I do wrong?”
If I were a man, I would LOVE this benefit: the privilege of engineering betrayal and still being the victim.
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Money Privilege
If I were a man, I would enjoy the privilege of money without accountability. I could earn ₦60k while my wife earns ₦500k, yet society would insist I am the provider. I could demand her ATM card under the table at restaurants. She would slide it across discreetly so I could perform masculinity for waiters. Later I would brag to the boys that I “spoiled my wife,” even though she funded everything.
If I were a man, I could take credit for her car. Take credit for her degree. Take credit for land she paid for. Appear at events as “owner of property” she built. Refuse her access to her own income. Deny her the right to own property. Claim everything she has — her assets, her inheritance, her identity — because society tells me it is mine by default.
She would even write “Mrs. James Okoye” on deeds, erasing her actual name, and I would use that technicality to cheat her out of her own land. Men don’t build — they collect.
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Financial Privilege
If I were a man, I would love the financial arrangement of marriage. It is a pyramid scheme where women invest labor, time, money, bodies, futures — and men collect the profits.
In Nigeria, a man can earn crumbs while his wife earns comfort, yet he will be called the provider. She funds her own life. She funds his ego. She funds their dates. She funds family emergencies. She funds the future. He funds nothing but vibes and audacity.
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Control, Isolation, and Policing Joy
If I were a man, I would enjoy the privilege of policing every joy my wife experiences that does not directly serve me. Her hobbies? Frivolous. Her friendships? Suspicious. Her outings? Disrespectful. Her happiness? A threat.
I could cut her off from her best friend of fifteen years. Tell her not to go to the movies. Stop her from dancing. Forbid her to travel. Monitor her phone. Dictate her wardrobe. Inspect her wigs. Tell her that long nails are for “ashawo.” Remind her daily that a married woman should not be too fancy.
Pastors would support me. Aunties would support me. Her mother would support me. Even she herself would wonder if maybe I am right.
I would also enjoy the privilege of smear campaigns. I would insist, “Don’t tell a third party what happens between us,” while poisoning the public against her. And if she dared defend herself, society would call her mad, bitter, disrespectful, demon-possessed, in need of deliverance.
——
Pregnancy and Resentment
If I were a man, pregnancy would be the best scam ever invented for my benefit. Women die every seven seconds while giving birth, yet I would collect children, lineage, identity, legacy, inheritance, social capital, bragging rights — while contributing zero physical risk. I would sit on the couch with my swollen belly of nothing but beer and audacity while she vomits, faints, swells, tears, and almost dies — and still complain she is “lazy.”
My father used to say, “Is she giving birth to Jesus? Why is she acting special?” Men from a certain tribe did say it everywhere, home and abroad. They didn’t believe in making a wife feel loved and cherished unless when it has to do with praising her wife materialness—for being a long suffering wife and mother to an absentee husband and fatherless children. Being married to a married single mother is the most rewarding feeling. Imagine the power I have over another individual. Mind fucking her makes me feel so masculine. Watching her pray and cry over my excesses makes me feel so good.
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If she produces girls, I would roam the streets with my wandering penis, depositing my Y-chromosome fantasies into anyone available. If she cannot conceive, I will never consider that I might be the infertile one. Society will defend me. Doctors will lie for me. Pastors will pray nonsense over her. Her own family will blame her womb.
If she tells the truth? Elders will whisper, “She lacks wisdom. A woman must protect her husband’s dignity.” Women will join them. Pickmes with gele and microphones will amplify it: “Don’t ever mention a man’s infertility. Take the blame.”
Destroying Her Life and Still Being the Victim
If I were a man, I could burn my wife’s clothes. Burn her degree. Take her children. Cut off her access. Tell them she abandoned them. Turn her community against her. Claim innocence even when I engineered everything. I could lose a child and still be online celebrating my new love. I could impregnate multiple women while using my wife as a placeholder womb. I could deny her access to her own children for years — and the world would still call me a good man.
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Deadbeat Father Privilege
If I were a man, I could be an absentee father, an irresponsible father, an uninterested father, a violent father, a cheating father, an uninvolved father — and women would still bully my children’s mother to allow me access. I could contribute nothing. Abandon them. Disappear for twenty years. The moment I resurface, society would say, “Forgive him. He’s their father.” My children might blame her too because men inherit empathy even when they do not earn it. If the children fail, she gets the blame. If they succeed, I get the glory.
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“I Can Unalive You and Nothing Will Happen” Privilege
If I were a man, I could silence my wife instantly with one sentence:
“I can kill you and nothing will happen.”
And the culture would nod. They will say I love her when I am on my worst behavior. Do you know how powerful this feels?
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Death and Corpse-Water Accusation Privilege
If I were an Igbo man, I could live recklessly and die from my own neglect. She could have bought my vitamins, paid for my health insurance, begged me to go for checkups, prepared healthy meals, raised alarms, pleaded, warned — and when I die—even on top of my sidechick, she will be investigated. She will be blamed without trial, judgement or convictions.The children will accuse her. My siblings will accuse her. My mother will accuse her. Even strangers will say she nagged me to death. She will be asked to drink my corpse bathwater to prove her innocence.
Her own family will weaponize this against her—scapegoat her into silence and loneliness. She. Can’t. Win.
———-
Meanwhile, if she died, my family would tell me to remarry before her body gets cold.
Conclusion
After reading all this, what other privileges do men enjoy?
Because once you understand these as privileges — not rights, not culture, not nature — you will understand why men call women like me bitter, ugly, old hag, jealous, unmarriageable. They are protecting their inheritance — the inheritance of unearned power.
I have seen women carrying the world on their backs: women in markets with babies strapped to their spines, women feeding husbands who feed their mistresses, women aging under the weight of thankless labor, women blamed for everything, women punished for existing.
——-
Men inherit softness without sacrifice.
Women inherit suffering without compensation.
And the greatest irony?
Men claim being a man is hard — yet not a single one is willing to be a woman. Not even the ones who are in non heterosexual relationships. Male privilege is woven deeply into almost every single thread in the fabric of the world.
That is the paradox that keeps patriarchy alive.
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Final Thought – The Worship Economy of Manhood
Another benefit of being a man — a benefit I would clutch with both hands if I were one — is the worship. The unearned, unrequested, unquestioned worship. The kind that drapes itself around men like lace, like velvet, like hereditary royalty. Women kneel to serve their husbands. Sisters, wives and lovers call men “my father.” Wives give men the biggest piece of chicken, the choicest morsel of meat, the first serving from every pot.
Women receive gifts after childbirth and use the money to cook for the man who did nothing for them. A man impregnates his wife and announces, “I am pregnant too,” because he suffers “money sickness.” During her postpartum pain, he claims her healing foods for himself.
Prayers are poured on him like libation. Warnings are whispered to her: pray harder, seek peace, endure, be wise. Even when the man sets the home on fire, the wife is blamed for the smoke.
Five minutes of worship from the men women love— a mere crumb — has kept women in ten-year marriages, twenty-year marriages, thirty-year marriages. Women gave men unreciprocated love, devotion, fidelity, income, wombs, sex, youth, bodies, sanity, children. Men collected it like taxes.
If I were a man, I could be fat as a cow, wide as a house, shaped like three trimesters stacked on top of each other, with stick legs and a disappearing third leg. I could look like a collapsed bag of cement, yet beautiful women would still call me odogwu — simply because I am rich or aspiring to be. I would still be hailed as a good man. A kang.
If I were a man, I could even get away with unaliving women — and sometimes their children — whether intentionally or “by mistake,” and society would still twist itself into pretzels to explain why she brought it upon herself. They would say she provoked him. She talked back. She stayed out too long. She didn’t submit enough. She didn’t pray enough. Her character was bad. Her mouth was sharp. Her attitude was disrespectful.
Because in patriarchy, a woman’s death is her fault.
A woman’s pain is her fault.
A woman’s fear is her fault.
A woman’s survival is her fault.
A woman’s existence is her fault.
Being a man must be an intoxicating experience that never ends and you want a man to give that up?
This is why we have the silent “good men” gently crawl out to admonish and gaslight victims and readers in the comments—generalizing familiar accusations similar to Eve giving Adam an apple, but worse. They will now join in debating and discussing women for being disloyal selfish women who claim victimization all the time.
The backup singers will pull up dancers, mammies and pickmes—they will start talking about “my gender.” Then the openly good men will start teaching “feminism and modern women.”
The hot takes is a nonstop whirlpool of dramatic debates.
The perpetrator is forgotten and everyone moves on. The perpetrator gets away with it.
Meanwhile, a woman can lose her husband to hypertension, to drunk driving, to armed robbery, to self-neglect, to his own recklessness, and he instantly becomes the sainted victim. His death becomes her crime. His passing becomes her accusation. People gather to whisper, “Women are dangerous. She must have stressed him. She must have nagged him. She must have killed him with her wahala.” As a man, even in death, I would be wrapped in innocence — and she, the living, would be wrapped in blame.
———-
This is why men rage when women speak. This is why they stalk our posts. This is why they call us bitter, tag our husbands, compare their photos, demand that men “control” their wives. They want us silent because silence is worship.
Manhood is a throne.
Worship is the altar.
Women are the sacrificial goats.
Do you see what I’m saying?
Like—feel me?
I am not carrying any of this patriarchal debris into 2026. I don’t know about you.
We should all be dropping that nonsense where it belongs — in 2025.
Can I hear an amen?