By Yesenia Flores, Staff Writer
Patriarchy is most likely what The Cure’s song, “Boys Don’t Cry,” was inspired by. It is a hierarchy in which the male holds the upmost power and has the final say in all things. In the household, it is he who is seen as the figure of authority because he is praised as the strongest and most brave. In the Hispanic household, we call him el jefe… and we despise him.
As a female in a Hispanic household, being a good hija means being what your father wants you to be: innocent, study-driven, and desexualized. We have to stay focused in school to get further in life than our fathers did, but never actually be who they are. They’re always right, have multiple female friends and are free to say whatever their little machista heart desires.
Machismo reinforces the idea that women are inferior and undermined in their own households.
Males, on the other hand, typically show their masculine pride by tattooing their family name on their arms, watching TV on Sunday mornings while their sisters and mothers fix breakfast, and drinking cold ones with their fathers.
One of the clear memories of my dad’s patriarchal attitude that I can remember is being reminded over and over that I should not be focused on boys because my studies were more important. So when he’d ask if I had a boyfriend, I’d say no.
But, when he’d ask again on a different day and I’d give the same answer, he’d tell me I better not “salir con esas cosas” referring to having a girlfriend instead. In other words, I was told not to have a boyfriend, but at the same time had my sexuality questioned because I, indeed, had no boyfriend. Makes total sense, I know.
Patriarchal fathers look down upon females who do not meet their standards of the ideal heterosexual woman that is always properly groomed and pure.
Although females are most inferior under the Hispanic patriarchal household, they are not the only ones affected. Men who do not align with patriarchal standards are criticized for not being a real man.
“I clearly remember my dad walking into the living room while I was watching Totally Spies or My Little Pony and he immediately started yelling at me to change the channel and watch something for boys,” Saul Rocha, a junior majoring in Chicana/Chicano studies said. “Now if you look at me now, I’m flipping tortillas, doing the dishes, and teaching my dad that gender inequality is wrong.”
Now as a grown college student with the experience and knowledge he has acquired from his major, Rocha says he is more certain than ever that he is doing the right thing by breaking the patriarchal pattern in his household by not following the norms set by his father in hopes to influence other men to do the same.
Many people who grow up in patriarchal households do not realize all the things wrong with it until they are no longer in that living situation, which is something I can vouch for.
