Once I was rising up in Mexico, I used to learn La pequeña Lulú, the Little Lulú sketch. Lulú’s buddy Tobi had a tree home known as “El Club de Tobi” the place ladies weren’t allowed. In Mexico, we use the phrase “el Membership de Tobi” to refer to each male-dominated subject that excludes ladies.
El Membership de Tobi could be very a lot alive and nicely, each in Latino international locations and within the US. I’ve skilled its biases within the tech world, within the promoting world, and it’s true of many professions.
However within the political subject, issues get attention-grabbing.
Presently, Latin America boasts two democratically elected feminine presidents: Mexico’s Claudia Sheinbaum (who can also be Jewish), and Xiomara Castro from Honduras. Michelle Bachelet of Chile, Dilma Rousseff of Brasil, and Cristina Fernández de Kirchner of Argentina, amongst others, have been the heads of state of their mucho macho Latin American international locations.
In the meantime, in the US, ladies ran for president twice, and so they misplaced to the identical candidate whose abuse of a number of ladies has landed him in courtroom.
That is particularly perplexing, provided that Latin American tradition is so androcentric that we needed to invent the time period “machismo” to explain our penchant for the extraordinarily patriarchal. In our tradition, which has but to succeed in the twenty first century on this respect, rancid jokes about wives and mothers-in-law from hell nonetheless abound. Have you ever ever heard any jokes about el suegro, the father-in-law? I relaxation my case.
WARNING: Whether or not you consider that males are from Mars and girls are from Venus or vice versa, please keep in mind this column was conceived to be dealt with with a severe dose of humor.
In the event you had been raised as a girl in any Spanish-speaking nation, you’ll have thought that being ogled and showered with catcalls as you walked down the road was as pure because the air we breathe. I didn’t take into account these objectifying behaviors harassment till I heard them described as such in the US. Many Latinos nonetheless shrug them off as “boys will probably be boys.” For a few of our machos, ladies’s sole objective on Earth is to fulfill their needs, give them kids, and cook dinner their meals. Nevertheless, a lot of them haven’t any downside with electing a feminine president.
Our tradition is filled with devotion to feminine figures just like the Virgin of Guadalupe and the archetypal Mom (any mom—the worst you are able to do to a Latino is to insult our mamacita). Despite alarming feminicide and domestic violence statistics in addition to patronizing attitudes towards ladies, Latinos have democratically elected ladies as their heads of state a number of instances.
That is in stark distinction to the US, which is meant to be extra egalitarian however the place succesful ladies working for president confront absurd obstacles merely due to their gender. I don’t assume anybody in Mexico ponders whether or not Dr. Sheinbaum is worthy of the presidency due to her standing as a mom, whereas Kamala Harris was deemed unfit by some conservatives for not having youngsters of her personal.
At the least seventy-nine international locations have had an elected or appointed feminine head of state or of presidency, in accordance with data from the World Economic Forum. None of them is the US.
However why? My wholly unscientific idea is that the tradition within the US is fiercely aggressive and individualistic. Ladies current way more of a menace to male hegemony than in international locations the place household and group are the important social items. Nations (that’s, the remainder of the world) that don’t consider within the fantasy of the person hero who saves the planet all by himself discover it simpler to just accept {that a} girl can lead the best workplace within the land in addition to any man.
After centuries of egregious feminine oppression, a lot of Latin America has opened up doorways for girls by way of quotas that give them entry to political connections. Many of those feminine heads of state have been protégés of get together leaders like López Obrador, Kirchner, or Lula da Silva, which tracks with our predilection for protecting all the things within the household. Argentina has had two feminine presidents, Evita and Isabelita (aww, the lovable diminutives), each married at totally different instances to the identical caudillo, Juan Perón.
Is it doable that we’ve no downside electing feminine heads of state so long as they’re anointed by highly effective males? No matter works.
Latin American democracies are tormented by patronage, nepotism, and corruption, however not less than they offer alternative to feminine presidential candidates. Though People pay lip service to feminism and equal rights, a robust, unstated, and well-organized concern of ladies on the prime persists. American males defend their turf zealously. That’s, they belong to El Membership de Tobi.
I don’t know what it’s going to lastly take for the US to have a feminine president, however one factor is evident: Tobi must open his membership to ladies.
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Yehudit Mam is one in every of our latest Hisplainers, entering into the sneakers of Laura Martínez, who’s presently on hiatus. Keep tuned for the following Hisplaining column, which is able to deal with different key biz phrases and jargon and assist leaders all over the place easily navigate the multicultural enterprise world. Within the meantime, send us tips and ideas for different phrases and jargon that you simply’d wish to see us characteristic. And keep in mind: don’t panic . . . it’s simply his-PANIC!
