BarcelonaWhenever there is a strike, a collective struggle, the same thing happens. The claims of those who complain are impossible, they cannot be enforced. It also happened to the players of the Spanish women’s national team. You can’t make layoffs, you can’t change some positions, you can’t restructure some areas. But they stood firm. And the miracle happened. It seems that it was possible to fire shady people who had been in charge for years, that it was possible to create a commission that would start changing important areas, that it was possible to change positions. It wasn’t a utopia.
This group of women fought for what they believe is just. From documentaries to books like Danae Boronat’s, from journalistic pieces to player statements, we have plenty of documentation to understand why players complain. No, it’s not just Rubiales’ kiss. That’s all they had to endure with Nacho Quereda until 2015: the paternalistic comments and contempt for the people who follow the federation. It is due to the lack of professionalism and the misrepresentation of Jennifer Hermoso’s words within the Federation. It’s a long list of complaints. And as they have always said, in the end they only claim to be top footballers, the way they see the Swedish, English, American or French players. They actually don’t demand the same pay as the men, as the U.S. national team players have done. They demand normality.
But a woman who raises her voice shakes walls, causes panic among the gentlemen who do whatever they want all their lives. What is particularly frightening is the talk of men, some with ties, some with work frogs, who see themselves as threatened. They claim that freedom is coming to an end and that they feel persecuted. Adult, European, white, heterosexual men. And they feel persecuted. And that’s what they say, right? They say they feel persecuted. Does anyone know of a country in the world where a straight man is persecuted and has fewer rights? Because the world is full of countries where women have fewer rights. And homosexuals, of course. People who live with privilege and now believe they are losing it, even though they still have privilege. They just want to take away the privilege of being rude and harassing other people. The gentlemen are suffering because this group of courageous women is speaking out. They claim that it will be very difficult to be like them now. They say they can no longer express their opinions to the media. In other words, they claim that they will be censored if they say it. They feel canceled when they appear on Sunday covers and have a full concert program, like Andrés Calamaro. Strange kind of rejection. They hold on to the cases in which a man has been wrongly tried and give them the same status as the thousands of cases in which men are guilty. They are usually good at stats and numbers, but here they squeak. For them, one case of a battered man is equivalent to 10,000 cases of battered women. They say it at dinners and work meetings between people who run companies, media, football clubs, candidacies or political parties. Meetings where 95% of the people, everyone with some power, are men like her. But they feel persecuted. What a bar
