Compliments of the season guys from the motherland-Cameroon and welcome to my blog as I share some thoughts about chicken gizzard. This is one part of the chicken that is highly cherished by men in my village.
This part of the chicken is like a machine tank found between the intestine and the liver of a chicken. This is the part where the chicken stores hard food and it helps to break down the hard food into the body.
Tradition holds it that this part of the chicken is only eaten by men. Women are forbidden from eating this part of the chicken. It is believed that it is the hardest part of the chicken and signifies honour.
This aligned with the patriarchal system highly practiced within traditional setups where it is believed that women are “…weaker sex” while men are tough and powerful. It is believed that because it is the hardest part of the chicken, only men can eat it. They believed that when a woman eats it, you automatically loss your fertility to bear children.
We all know how African men value children to the extent that they go in for polygamous homes just to bear more kids. This is to show their strength as men. Growing up as a kid in the rural area, I witnessed women being bitten and sent packing back to their parents house because they served their husbands chicken without the gizzard. Men considered the act as disrespect and it is not tolerated.
Nowadays, it is a common meal eaten everywhere by everyone. This kept me wondering🤔🤔🤔, and asking myself questions. “What happened? Why do women eat chicken gizzard today and it does not affect their fertility? Does it mean that men were simply looking for means to continue to suppress women with traditional beliefs to continue to be in power?.
Of course, I'm not against tradition but I disregard the bad aspects of tradition that dehumanized another fellow being. Today, I realised that all the beliefs about chicken gizzard were myths and not true. I can go to the coldstore and buy a basket of chicken gizzard and eat to my satisfaction and still be fertile to bear kids.
It was just a myth created by men to continue dominating women and showing supremacy, control and dominance over women. Nonetheless, modernization has help to break this stereotype though still uphold by many elderly persons in the society but most women do not uphold this belief anymore.
In sum, chicken gizzard has no negative effect on women. It is a protein and can be eaten by anyone.
This is interesting, I grew up as a kid to see that any time chicken is cooked the gizzard is reserve for my father and the anus too, I was wondering why it is being served with it but was not bold enough to ask why!
So has I reach adulthood I learnt that gizzard is only meant for men but as times goes I started seeing my sister eating it and my other siblings and I join them.
Gizzard can be eaten anywhere and anytime as far as you have the money with you, it's that part of chicken that most people rate at high esteem and they love eating gizzard.
Thank you for this knowledgeable article you have shared with us today, I greatly appreciate and enjoy reading, especially your detail explanation.
Keep it up Ma,am with you to read and learn.
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What baffled me is that the gizzard does not even taste good for me as the chicken laps or the wings. The narrative has changed with the coming of modernisation except in those remote areas that they still uphold cultural differences between men and women. In advanced societies, everyone is equal and can enjoy any part of the chicken. Thank you for engaging.
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See as I am laughing very loud as I am reading through your post, this is because this very topic is what I experienced in my grandmother's house where I grew up. She never allowed me touch that part of chicken (gizzard) she said it was not for children, and it wasn't just gizzard, she practically stopped me from eating boil egg, saying that it will make me spoil, that any little child that eat full egg will definitely become a spoilt child, I wasn't bold enough to ask her the reason, I just believe and leave that way.
But in my father's house, when my mom prepared chicken, she will be the one to eat the gizzard and sometime cut it for us and my father will not even bother to ask about the gizzard or even place any value on it.
The same thing goes to fish head, people normally says that it the man of the house is permitted to eat the head of a fish but that's never applicable to my father because he doesn't eat fish head or make it a big deal.
It is true that all this rules and myth was a set up from elder men from the society to keep oppressing women and dominating over them as you've clearly stated... And I thank God for modernization, if not we would still be be leaving with this stereotype, meanwhile some part of Africa society are still upholding unto such myth, I pray may God deliver us.
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