Nollywood actor Jim Iyke has expressed his views on modern feminism, describing it as a movement that has deviated from its original intent.
In a recent interview with the EchoRoom, the 48-year-old actor claimed that the concept of modern feminism initially emerged as a marketing strategy by a leading women’s magazine aimed at increasing sales by resonating with women who felt marginalized in a male-dominated society.
Iyke explained that the original goal was to empower women and amplify their voices. However, he argued that subsequent generations have distorted the message, turning it into a radical ideology that now champions female dominance over men.
“I call it a crime, an assault of sorts. The perpetrators of this… I would not name the magazine, obviously, for certain reasons that push this agenda and campaign; they wanted to sell papers. The foremost female magazine that you and I know came out with a brilliant campaign to push more papers,” he said.
“So they came out with an ideology that who are our chief readers? Women. How can we drive a certain conservative that would subjugate women to a certain ideology where they can compete with men in the same space. And some of them were feeling belittled, disgruntled, they were not up to par because that was the age of male superiority, patriarchy for lack of better terms.”
Iyke explained that while early feminism sought to address genuine issues like gender inequality and emotional neglect, the movement eventually spiraled into what he sees as an unrealistic belief that women do not need men.
“And some men took it overboard obviously, and it was beginning to border on enslavement and negligence of the female emotions. So they gave them an opportunity to have their voice heard. This was a campaign that went overboard, and certain women bought into the ideology and made it their own,” he added.
“They decided that this whole ideology of ‘we do not need a man, anything a man can do we can do better’. It was a campaign. Generations after took it to a different level, escalated it, and blew it out of proportion. Now it has been adopted as a way of living, as a new cultural standard.”
The actor criticised what he called the “two-faced approach” of modern feminism, arguing that true harmony between genders comes from embracing natural roles rather than competing against each other.
“The double standard of it all is what makes me question the ideology in the first place. Like, do you not understand the fallacy, the falsehood of it? The two-faced approach to it? You can only be in your natural God-given, and the men stay, so that when you come together, it blends and becomes one. That is what they are yet to understand.”