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Conclusions
The Time is Now
These three stories are just a sample of how the ideology of
gender and racism can be legitimized through religion. There are
many other stories of origin and identity, which are not found in
religious texts, which also propound ideologies of inequality and
authorize marginalisation. All these stories, wherever and whenever
they are told, they present the reader/hearer with values that
make it acceptable to discriminate one nation, ethnic group,
people or women. That is, they normalize discrimination.
Since stories are central to our lives, and since they have structures
that protect them and continue to tell them—that is, to
ensure they inform and influence social values, identity and worlds,
how can we arrest their negative ideologies? Feminists and liberation
readers have given many suggestions and strategies. Some of
these are:
1. Readers/hearers must scrutinize and expose the ideology of
every story. That is, they must ask what values are propounded in
so far as race, class, age, ethnicity, gender and nationhood are
concerned. And where a text propounds a dangerous ideology, it
must be named and as such.
2. Readers/hearers/writers must allow those groups that are
often marginalised; those whose stories are excluded from official
documents and institutions, to present/write/tell their own stories
of origin, self-identity and power. This is because the stories of the
oppressed are often told by their oppressors, who seek to keep
them discriminated.
3. Socially empowered human rights informed storytellers of
our day (preachers, news reporters, editors, novelists, teachers,
singers, and poets) have an obligation to create new stories:
stories that respect and uphold the rights of all. This includes
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