A front man covers up for another individual.
Testaferro is a term from an Italian concept that can be translated as “iron head” . A front man is an individual who signs a contract or document taking over some responsibility or assuming ownership that, in reality, belongs to another person.
The front man, therefore, acts by covering up another subject . What he does is lend his identity to emulate the social role of the one he represents. This allows the person represented to enjoy certain benefits by avoiding legal obligations.
Examples of front man
Suppose that the law of a country states that a person cannot own more than three media outlets. This measure is due to the need to guarantee the plurality of voices and speeches. A businessman who already has two television channels and a newspaper, however, wants to buy a radio. In order to evade the law , he pays an individual to be his front man . In this way, the person hired lends his or her identity to make the purchase, although the real owner will be the businessman.
A corrupt politician , for his part, may have a front man since he is not in a position to use his name to carry out certain commercial or financial operations. Otherwise, you would have to justify how you accessed the funds you obtained illicitly.
Whoever uses a front man to carry out an operation manages to hide his or her identity.
Execution of crimes
As mentioned in previous paragraphs, it is normal for the front man to lend himself to carrying out activities outside the law. The most recurring example is tax evasion , a practice that in many countries is acquired as part of the family inheritance, as if it were a natural function of the adult human being to be able to survive the injustices of their government.
Similarly, the front man can also be used for a person to make illegal purchases or sales of properties that are not in their name , in cases of family deaths, separations or divorces. As if this were not enough, many use this resource to speculate on the stock market using other people's capital, so that they are not blocked by a legal disqualification.
Figurehead in psychology
The idea of front man is also used in psychology to name subjects who are managed by others or who adopt, for convenience, an attitude or role that is not their own. Needless to say, this is not an acceptable attitude at a social level, and that is why there is the popular saying "Every figurehead has guts and an iron face."
Psychology recognizes certain common traits among individuals who offer themselves as front men. The most common thing is that they are very flexible and versatile people, capable of modifying their behavior and habits while they are on paper, to convince those around them that they are actually the characters they are playing . In fact, a very talented actor would be the ideal candidate for this task; However, for obvious reasons, a low profile is more appropriate.
A Woody Allen movie
In the film " The Figurehead " , by Woody Allen , you can see a clear example of this concept put into practice to overcome a legal imposition. The story takes us back to the well-known "witch hunt" that took place in the United States during World War II , which consisted of investigating various people in the artistic field to discover those who participated in subversive acts against the system .
Among the victims of such persecution were directors, actors and writers, many of whom lost their jobs, not to mention those who took their own lives. In the film, the role of figurehead is assumed by a man with a gray life, who is offered the opportunity by some writers who are prohibited from working to represent them to publish their literary works.