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When I was growing up in Mexico, I used to read La pequeña Lulú, the Little Lulú comic strip. Lulú’s friend Tobi had a tree house called “El Club de Tobi” where women were not allowed. In Mexico, we use the phrase “el Club de Tobi” to refer to every male-dominated field that excludes women.
El Club de Tobi is very much alive and well, both in Latino countries and in the US. I have experienced its biases in the tech world, in the advertising world, and it is true of many professions.
But in the political field, things get interesting.
Currently, Latin America boasts two democratically elected female presidents: Mexico’s Claudia Sheinbaum (who is also Jewish), and Xiomara Castro from Honduras. Michelle Bachelet of Chile, Dilma Rousseff of Brasil, and Cristina Fernández de Kirchner of Argentina, among others, have been the heads of state of their mucho macho Latin American countries.
Meanwhile, in the United States, women ran for president twice, and they lost to the same candidate whose abuse of multiple women has landed him in court.
This is especially perplexing, given that Latin American culture is so androcentric that we had to invent the term “machismo” to describe our penchant for the extremely patriarchal. In our culture, which has yet to reach the 21st century in this respect, rancid jokes about wives and mothers-in-law from hell still abound. Have you ever heard any jokes about el suegro, the father-in-law? I rest my case.
WARNING: Whether you believe that men are from Mars and women are from Venus or vice versa, please remember this column was conceived to be handled with a serious dose of humor.
If you were raised as a woman in any Spanish-speaking country, you may have thought that being ogled and showered with catcalls as you walked down the street was as natural as the air we breathe. I didn’t consider these objectifying behaviors harassment until I heard them described as such in the United States. Many Latinos still shrug them off as “boys will be boys.” For some of our machos, women’s sole purpose on Earth is to satisfy their desires, give them children, and cook their meals. However, many of them have no problem with electing a female president.
Our culture is full of devotion to female figures like the Virgin of Guadalupe and the archetypal Mother (any mother—the worst you can do to a Latino is to insult our mamacita). Despite alarming feminicide and domestic violence statistics as well as patronizing attitudes toward women, Latinos have democratically elected women as their heads of state several times.
This is in stark contrast to the US, which is supposed to be more egalitarian but where capable women running for president confront absurd obstacles simply because of their gender. I don’t think anyone in Mexico ponders whether Dr. Sheinbaum is worthy of the presidency because of her status as a mother, while Kamala Harris was deemed unfit by some conservatives for not having kids of her own.
At least seventy-nine countries have had an elected or appointed female head of state or of government, according to data from the World Economic Forum. None of them is the US.
But why? My wholly unscientific theory is that the culture in the US is fiercely competitive and individualistic. Women present much more of a threat to male hegemony than in countries where family and community are the essential social units. Countries (that is, the rest of the world) that don’t believe in the myth of the individual hero who saves the planet all by himself find it easier to accept that a woman can lead the highest office in the land as well as any man.
After centuries of egregious female oppression, much of Latin America has opened up doors for women through quotas that give them access to political connections. Many of these female heads of state have been protégés of party leaders like López Obrador, Kirchner, or Lula da Silva, which tracks with our predilection for keeping everything in the family. Argentina has had two female presidents, Evita and Isabelita (aww, the cute diminutives), both married at different times to the same caudillo, Juan Perón.
Is it possible that we have no problem electing female heads of state as long as they are anointed by powerful men? Whatever works.
Latin American democracies are plagued by patronage, nepotism, and corruption, but at least they give opportunity to female presidential candidates. Even though Americans pay lip service to feminism and equal rights, a powerful, unspoken, and well-organized fear of women at the top persists. American men defend their turf zealously. That is, they belong to El Club de Tobi.
I don’t know what it will finally take for the US to have a female president, but one thing is clear: Tobi needs to open his club to women.
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Yehudit Mam is one of our newest Hisplainers, stepping into the shoes of Laura Martínez, who is currently on hiatus. Stay tuned for the next Hisplaining column, which will tackle other key biz terms and jargon and help leaders everywhere smoothly navigate the multicultural business world. In the meantime, send us tips and ideas for other terms and jargon that you’d like to see us feature. And remember: don’t panic . . . it’s just his-PANIC!
