EDITORIAL: OUR FASCINATION WITH TOOLZ

What is our fascination with Toolz? Why does this BEAT FM OAP fascinate us so much? Why is she a constant topic of social discussion?

‘Thick’. The word is used to describe a woman who has a lot of flesh in the ‘right places’. One look at Toolz and she is full of it- the thickness that is. It can’t be missed and I guess if you stare for too long, you are just a typical Nigerian man behaving like an chocolate addict who has entered Willy Wonka’s factory.

With a high profile job like hers and a body to go, Toolz is easily quite noticeable. In fact Toolz makes it her job to be very noticeable with her tight fitting dresses. And with the way the mind of this 21st century Twitter twiddlers is wired anyone who is in the public eye whether accidentally or by grand design will eventually get shot down.

Since Toolz has broken into our public consciousness she is one of the celebs who has been battered with nasty tweets and malicious retweets. Last week she trended two days in a row. A picture of hers that she put up must have stirred the hornet’s nest again and the cabal went all out poking fun at her size. Cheap shots if you ask me, cheap shots of paraga.

Poking fun about someone’s physical feature(s) are just cheap shots from people who sadly feel insecure about themselves. Toolz is a lady that has come to terms with her body and is confident about it. From the look of things, she isn’t scared to flaunt what she has. This pisses many of her haters (fans actually) off. The teasing and taunting is reminiscent of kids in primary school and secondary school making fun of the skinny girl or chubby boy. What looks like ‘harmless fun’ at first ends up being very inhumane and straight up stupid. To Toolz’ credit she hasn’t had a public meltdown which the ‘Let Diss Toolz’ club members would love. That is evidence of someone who is at peace with herself.

Yet Toolz’ physical appearance just scratches the surface on why she has been the subject of a lot of barbs. The truth is Nigeria is a sexist society. Any woman that is independent, hardworking and successful will be shot down. Granted Toolz might not be the best OAP in the land but she puts in her shift to be one of the most recognizable. Her steady rise in Nigeria’s entertainment scene grates the old order of things which will prefer her to be grinding her goodies in a boring musical video than do something more meaningful. In essence, many people expect confident, sexy young women to be seen not heard and to always have a man to co-sign their grind.

It’s not only Toolz. Female celebrities like Tiwa Savage and Genevieve Nnaji go through this all the time. Tiwa Savage got engaged and some snickered and said that it was good she finally got a man to marry before she became old cargo. What kind of crap is that?! As for Genevieve, no matter her accomplishments there is always someone who has to remind you that she isn’t married. Thanks, we know. Can’t we just appreciate the grind and hustle of young beautiful women without putting an asterisk on what they’ve achieved? Must we know who Toolz is going out with to appreciate what she is doing?

This is the crux of the whole matter. The society we live prefers women to be an ‘attachment’ rather than fly solo and do their own thing. It’s a shame really. The bigger shame is that most of the critics of these women are women themselves who don’t know they are slaves of Nigeria’s parochial society.

Toolz is just an OAP doing her thing and by doing her thing she is at odds with Nigeria’s strongly chauvinistic society that would have women subservient rather than independent. Herein lies our fascination with Toolz (and other women like her) because she is flipping a finger at what the society thinks.

Written by Ayomide O. Tayo (@AOT2)