--- title: Obama Says Men Are Getting on His Nerves, Encourages Women description: Barack Obama is calling on men to do better — and thinks the solution is to for women to be involved in social movements. canonical: https://time.com/5342196/obama-on-men-south-africa/ author: Cady Lang article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-07-18T19:28:38.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-12T09:34:50.614Z og:title: Barack Obama Says Men Have Been Getting On 'His Nerves' og:description: During a speech at a school in South Africa og:url: https://time.com/5342196/obama-on-men-south-africa/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3244f7776ddae2c3/698935a586f68ea13f6e9acc/obama-men-are-getting-on-mynerves-encourages-empowering-women.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2000 og:image:height: 1125 og:image:alt: KENYA-US-POLITICS-OBAMA og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Barack Obama Says Men Have Been Getting On 'His Nerves' twitter:description: During a speech at a school in South Africa twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3244f7776ddae2c3/698935a586f68ea13f6e9acc/obama-men-are-getting-on-mynerves-encourages-empowering-women.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Obama Says Men Are Getting On His 'Nerves Recently' and That 'Empowering More Women' Will Help > Sponsored content. 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It curates the day's top headlines with TIME's reporting and analysis across politics, world affairs, business, health and culture. It is free to join at time.com/newsletters. #### How do I sign up for The Brief? The Brief is available free at time.com/newsletters, where readers can select it along with any of TIME's other six newsletters. There is no subscription required to receive it. #### Is The Brief free? Yes. The Brief is a free daily email newsletter from TIME. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes The Brief? The Brief is led by editor Richard Hall and draws on reporting from TIME's newsroom. Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-brief-2026q3/newsletters?i=f549486a-18a2-4451-be09-83aeed61ba17&cr=time-nl-brief-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Obama Says That "Men Have Been Getting On My Nerves Lately" [Watch (HLS stream): Obama Says That "Men Have Been Getting On My Nerves Lately"](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/HXYq6RfA.m3u8) (0:32)  _Published 2018-07-18. Obama Says That "Men Have Been Getting On My Nerves Lately"_  by [Cady Lang](https://time.com/author/cady-lang/)  ## Cady Lang Jul 18, 2018 7:28 PM UTC  by [Cady Lang](https://time.com/author/cady-lang/)  ## Cady Lang Jul 18, 2018 7:28 PM UTC [Barack Obama](http://time.com/5340801/barack-obama-speech-trump-mandela/) thinks that more [female leadership](http://time.com/collection/firsts/) when it comes to social movements and governance will improve policies. The former president of the United States said that “men have been getting on my nerves lately” and suggested that the solution might be to empower women, in a speech during a town hall meeting with young African leaders at the African Leadership Academy in Johannesburg, South Africa. “Everyday I read the newspaper and just think like ‘Brothers, what’s wrong with you guys? What’s wrong with us? We’re violent, we’re bullying. Just not handling our business,'” Obama said. “I think empowering more women on the continent, that… is going to lead to some better policies.” Obama’s South Africa appearance follows his stop in Kenya, where [he shared a dance with his step-grandmother Sarah.](http://time.com/5341833/barack-obama-dancing-kenya/) Watch Obama’s speech above. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5342196/obama-on-men-south-africa/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5342196/obama-on-men-south-africa/"},"headline":"Obama Says Men Are Getting On His 'Nerves Recently' and That 'Empowering More Women' Will Help","datePublished":"2018-07-18T19:28:38.000Z","dateModified":"2026-10-12T09:34:50.614Z","description":"During a speech at a school in South Africa","url":"https://time.com/5342196/obama-on-men-south-africa/","keywords":["Newsfeed","viral"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3244f7776ddae2c3/698935a586f68ea13f6e9acc/obama-men-are-getting-on-mynerves-encourages-empowering-women.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Cady Lang","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/cady-lang/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3244f7776ddae2c3/698935a586f68ea13f6e9acc/obama-men-are-getting-on-mynerves-encourages-empowering-women.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"KENYA-US-POLITICS-OBAMA","caption":"KENYA-US-POLITICS-OBAMA","creditText":"TONY KARUMBA—AFP/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5342196/obama-on-men-south-africa/","name":"Obama Says Men Are Getting On His 'Nerves Recently' and That 'Empowering More Women' Will Help"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Obama Says That \"Men Have Been Getting On My Nerves Lately\"","description":"Obama Says That \"Men Have Been Getting On My Nerves Lately\"","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/HXYq6RfA/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2018-07-18T18:46:46.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/HXYq6RfA.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/5342196/obama-on-men-south-africa/","duration":"PT32S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/5342196/obama-on-men-south-africa/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```