Gender activism aims to eliminate machismo.
Machismo is the attitude of arrogance of men towards women , according to the Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) . It is a set of practices, behaviors and sayings that are offensive against the female gender.
Machismo is a type of violence that discriminates against women or even homosexual men. One can also speak of machismo against the so-called metrosexuals or any man whose behavior exhibits some characteristic that is usually associated with femininity.
Throughout history , machismo has been reflected in various aspects of social life, sometimes directly and, on other occasions, in a subtle way. For many years, women were denied the right to vote, for example. In some countries, on the other hand, adultery by women is still punishable by the death penalty, although men do not receive the same penalty.
Machismo in everyday life
A woman's submission to her husband is still often seen as a positive value. There are those who maintain that a woman reaches her full potential when she marries and becomes a housewife to take care of her husband and children. Another reflection of the machismo established in society appears in phrases such as "María is Facundo's wife" , since the inverse sentence is not common ( "Facundo is María's man" ). Women are still seen as property of men.
Sexist advertisements (with scantily clad women to encourage the sale of products) are another example of machismo. This can be seen even in advertising campaigns for products suitable for all audiences, meaning it is not even a provocation for adults. Many of the ice cream and chocolate advertisements are two clear examples of machismo, since they show women consuming them in suggestive ways, reflecting the objectification of women.
Street harassment through inappropriate comments and the use of sexist language are other behaviors that reveal everyday machismo. Feminism , meanwhile, speaks of micromachismos to name those actions or subtle strategies of male power that continue to threaten female development.
Machismo can be observed in the salary inequality between men and women.
Apprehended behavior
In everyday life, machismo seeps into all aspects of life without us realizing it. Perhaps the most worrying aspect of this series of toxic ideas is that they sneak into everyone, even those who reject them. This is because during our upbringing we are instilled with these twisted values as if they were normal, as if they were the natural way of perceiving the balance of living beings, and we absorb them without asking questions, because we are too small and we do not have a second opinion.
In this way machismo infiltrates among us, as part of fundamental education. Adolescence arrives, a time in which sexuality awakens, and then many women begin to experience the limitations that their destiny holds for them: they will no longer be free spirits with their entire lives ahead of them, with the right to say whatever they please to call the shots. attention of their parents and teachers (if they ever enjoyed such freedom ), but wives, housewives and mothers. They must love and respect those who barely do it, clean their house, make their food, wash their clothes and raise their children.
Training in gender equality is the way to banish machismo.
How to banish machismo
Machismo is injected into children and intoxicates them with unfair ideas, but it is not impossible to combat. As we get older, we access better and more equitable ways of treating others, and that is when we can finally contrast the concepts that were instilled in us as children and replace them with new ones.
In other words, machismo is overthrown with justice, with compassion, with principles of equality , never with violence. And in this way it is possible to educate the women and men of the future to prevent them from falling into its trap.
Various crimes
Various crimes are associated with the development of sexist behavior. Sexual assault , sexual exploitation , and sex trafficking often have men as perpetrators and women as victims.
Just as it is common to find news about trafficking in women , trafficking in men is much less frequent. Gender violence , on the other hand, is generally sexist violence .
Although this does not mean that an individual with sexist attitudes is potentially a criminal, the fact that men are responsible for these aberrations is another example of the consequences of the system imposed by patriarchy and the sexism present in all social areas.
Machismo and feminism
Feminist activists seek to banish machismo, confronting gender stereotypes and fighting to eliminate the gender gap . The NiUnaMenos movement , for example, emphasizes the need to find an urgent response to the high rate of femicides.
Just as there are problems that require immediate resolution, the invisibility of women and misogyny require extensive cultural work. Leaving sexist education behind and promoting the gender perspective are tasks whose results will only be seen in a long time.
It is important to indicate, in this framework, that feminism is not machismo in reverse. While machismo is arrogance towards women, feminism pursues equal rights. The neologism hembrism , on the other hand, does refer to discrimination against men by women.