Image description: A man dressed in a white shirt and wearing a black facemask is signing a pledge to end violence against women on a flipchart. Pledges to end violence were signed by men in a training organized by the Foundation for Male Engagement Uganda (FOME) during 2021’s 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence. Kampala, Uganda (Minority Africa) — After an hour’s walk from the primary school he teaches in, Samuel Abong usually gets home at about 7:00pm. As is routine, he checks his children’s school books and helps with the remaining chores in the household. His mornings are busy too. Abong makes sure the children are bathed and ready for school, something his wife used to do. Although this comes easily for him now, it has not always been so. “It was challenging,” Abong says, laughing. “But the more I did [house work] the more I got used to it. Now it is something normal for me.” The 29-year-old father of four living in Moroto district in the northern region of Uganda has been following this routine since March 2021 after going through training on gender equality with MenEngage Uganda, a social network organization that focuses on working with men and boys on issues around gender justice and equality. “I would drink alcohol and go home around 11:00pm and disorganize everyone’s sleep, causing confusion,” Abong says. “Now I am home by 7:00pm.’’ “Men feel like when they beat a woman, they have solved all their problems, yet, they have inflicted pain on someone. They will ask where the food is, and if it is not there, kiboko!” he adds, explaining the norm in his area and referring to the local term for a cane. Since his training and from engaging in house chores, Abong has adopted a new way of thinking that does not ascribe to gender roles. “I don’t even hold a stick anymore,” he says.“Before I joined this training, my children would see me coming and take off, but the life we have now is different. There is no violence. If there is a problem, we sit down and talk.” His wife Agnes Namer agrees. Namer, who is a survivor of gender-based violence, has witnessed the change in her husband’s character. She says she knows two faces of Abong – the man before the training and the man after. ‘‘When my husband would come home and find no food, it was trouble for me and the kids, but now, he can put money on the table and say, ‘Get the children something to eat,’” she says, adding that her husband and children help with chores now, which lessens her burden. Yet reconciling these two faces and accepting that change was not easy for Namer. Growing up and living in rural Uganda, widely held social perceptions and norms made her believe that the kitchen was a woman’s place in a home. “I felt like he was trying to remove work from me,” she says about acclimatizing to her husband’s new behavior. “I wondered ‘Am I punishing him?’ He then explained that these are things he was learning in training. Later, I realized it also helped to simplify my work.” In 2010, MenEngage Uganda began with the aim of working with men and boys to be part of the solution for gender equality. The organization held its first training on the importance of writing wills, a topic driven by the effects of HIV/AIDS in Uganda where, by 2010, an estimated 67,000 people had succumbed to AIDS-related deaths. 282 Men were trained in making wills, encouraged to test for HIV and adhere to their drugs if they were already positive. Since then, the organization has trained nearly 60,000 men. “In the beginning, it was just a feminist approach of including men and boys but now it is an intersectional feminist approach,” says Hassan Sekajoolo, the country director. MenEngage Uganda conducts 12-week training sessions; targeting men in relationships, men in positions such as Local Council leaders, men who work in garages, and fathers. Sekajoolo explains the ideology: when men are involved in their home affairs, such as raising children and housework, it helps eradicate harmful norms they internalized which will consequently reduce Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (SGBV). According to studies, parents reproduce inequitable gender relationships through the intergenerational transmission of domestic violence: boys who witness domestic violence are far more likely to abuse their partners, and girls to tolerate intimate partner violence. In South Africa for example, males experiencing abuse or neglect in childhood is an important risk factor for committing rape as an adolescent or adult. ‘‘The highlight for us here is [that] we have been able to change the men’s perceptions towards women; it is now one of respect and equality. They now look at women as supportive partners,” Sekajoolo explains.