Dismantling the Patriarchy within The Latinx Community
Undoing these toxic messages begins in the home
By Shirley Limongi (she/her)
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Living in a patriarchal society wasn’t so obvious to me until my son was born.
Before then, I lived a pretty average life, newly married, kicking ass at work, and just maintaining my relationships and my home. I was aware of some of the injustices that women faced throughout society, fighting for equal pay, having to manage their roles in relation to men, but it wasn’t something that occupied my mind or something that I felt I was compelled to change. How could I really contribute? Plus, women who were trying to destroy the patriarchy were feisty and fierce. I just wasn’t them.
All of that changed during my pregnancy. I will never forget when my cousin, who had just given birth, said, “Sure you have your partner, but rest assured that most of the caretaking and responsibility will fall on you.” Her words have forever remained imprinted in me.
Postpartum was especially tough on me, mentally, physically and emotionally: the searing pain from the third degree cut to my vagina; bulging hemorrhoids that made me cringe to even sit on a soft pillow; hormones that made me cry at a drop of a hat and hair falling out in clumps; and unexpected brain chemical changes that, unbeknownst to me at the time, were the beginning of my postpartum depression. Yet I had to have my shit together because women have been giving birth for thousands of years, so what did I have to complain about?
As I worked through this suffering with no acknowledgment or recognition, my husband was rewarded with a raise.
Yes, you heard that right. He was given a raise because he became a father.
While at the time I felt that was great because it meant my family could afford more, I couldn’t help but feel a bit resentful and at times, angry. I sacrificed my body: organs shifting and moving as the baby grew, sleepless nights, month after month of my growing belly and baby pressing on my hips and spine, dealing with the sleep deprivation between pumping and feeding my son every two hours. All the while his father was able to get a good night’s rest because he had to go to work the next day and needed to be in tip-top shape.
Why did he get rewarded and I got the short end of the stick?
Little did I know what I experienced was called the ‘Motherhood Penalty.’ According to the American Association of University Women (AAUW), men do not suffer a penalty when they become dads and instead get a ‘fatherhood bonus’ in which their earnings actually increase. This was a clear indication that the patriarchy is alive, well and kicking — and slapping me in the face. So I wasn’t crazy.
This actually does happen to women. I wasn’t alone.
If that wasn’t bad enough, because I was on maternity leave, I was passed over for a promotion at work for a position that was created while I was away, a position I didn’t know existed and didn’t have the opportunity to apply for. I was beyond furious at my then husband, my job and perhaps at the Universe.
While I was stewing in my anger, I also felt helpless. I didn’t know what to do because I felt that this is just how things were and I should just accept it. Like every damned thing in my life. Like my mom used to tell me, ‘Deal with the hand you’re dealt . Don’t fight it. Don’t be difficult.’ For better or for worse, this message has been ingrained, groomed and blossomed my entire life.
Why I cringe at Hispanic Heritage Month
I have a love/hate relationship with Hispanic Heritage Month. Every year in early September, things geared to highlight the Latinx community become more apparent, whether it’s the car commercial featuring the happy Latinx family jumping into the minivan or a mention of a prominent Latinx figure who isn’t a beauty queen. After October 15th, Latinx folks are once again an afterthought until the next election, heritage month, or something else to check the patriarchal box. Don’t get me wrong; I love my Ecuadorian heritage and culture and how it’s brought so much color and flavor to this country, but I can’t help but feel that Latinx people continue to hit this ceiling of progress because the patriarchy wants to ensure that they keep us small and hidden — even sticking with calling it Hispanic Heritage Month instead of adopting gender-neutral language.
Even coming to this county my parents had to assume a different identity, as they couldn’t use their real birth names. My parents immigrated to NYC from Ecuador in the early 70s. They were in their late teens and early 20s. They had at most a grade school education. While they were in awe of the exceptionalism and opportunities that America offered, it was also a place where their stringent culture and values were the complete opposite of the more ‘loose’ and ‘free’ and ‘outspoken’ lifestyle they viewed America as. While I’m sure my parents were grateful to now be part of the land of opportunity, they made it a point they were not going to lose the essence of the Latinx culture: family, obedience and servitude.
Growing up, my mom was a stay at home mom and maintained the household, while my father worked. She cooked, cleaned, made sure we were fed, had dinner ready for my dad when he got home. What you would call at the time a ‘typical’ family. I don’t ever recall my mother being encouraged to work or find a job while my sister and I were in school. I also didn’t really see my father doing much of the household chores, but I know that my sister and I were always told to help my mother maintain the home and anything that may have to do with cooking and cleaning. We would pick up my father’s plate if he was done and wash/dry the dishes after dinner. I always remember my mother just saying that my father ‘works really hard’ and that we should help around the house. Even when we used to have my parents’ friends over, I was always the one to be the host because I was the oldest and I should serve and take care of my elders (especially the men).
When I was in 8th grade, I remember that choosing a high school was a big deal, especially coming from a parochial school. I really wanted to go to a co-ed school, but my father didn’t want me around boys. I didn’t have much of a choice since he worked and he had the money and he was going to pay for it, so I ended up going to an all-girls private school. In high school, I was really excited when I was able to get my working papers to finally earn some money (YAY!). Unfortunately, my father also shut that down, telling me that a teenage girl shouldn’t be working and should just focus on getting her education. “Girls who work will not want to go to college but will want to continue working,” he said. I couldn’t say or do anything. He was paying for my all-girls private school education. How could I argue with that?
And while it was great to have had that education in one of NYC’s more respected all-girl schools, they don’t teach you about male dominance in society. The only men I really had interactions with in the real world were my father and my uncles, and I’ve always been taught to respect and honor them, don’t challenge or question them, otherwise you’ll be seen as difficult and annoying. Men to me were seen as the authority, and since they earned more money, they had more say and more power.
For centuries, in a traditional Latinx household, there has been a deep-seated cultural belief in the male being the provider and breadwinner, while the female is responsible for the domestic roles and defers any decision-making authority to the male. In Latin America, Catholicism and the Catholic Church have had a very strong and deep influence in molding the role of family where women are socially and economically dependent on men. To this day, only men are allowed to be ordained in the Catholic Church and lead the institution, while the only role women are given in the Catholic Church is that of them being seen and not heard (i.e nuns, sisters, church community). While their service is laudable, they are in the background and seen as meek and humble. My newly immigrated parents saw the church as the caring father and guiding star to their survival in their new world, so they were going to make sure to follow it.
Little did I know how much of this unfortunate and toxic message manifested in my life until a couple of years ago with two of my most significant relationships: my ex husband and my rebound.
The Patriarchy Was a Warm Blanket
I was married to my ex husband for four years. I married him because he had a very good education and he also made good money and I knew that if there was a chance to have a family, he would provide and take care of everything. And he did. He took care of the majority of the finances (I did pay part of the bills as well, but he was more on top of what needed to be taken care of financially) and made most of the decisions that involved money. Same thing happened when our son was born.
On paper that was great: on an emotional and spiritual level, it was everything, but I was in so much pain and agony I stayed because my conditioning told me that in the Catholic church, you keep the family together and divorce doesn’t exist. Catholic guilt wore me like a heavy papal cloak. I realized that the message of being a ‘good woman’ was not mine but my parents, and that message was a product of their patriarchal upbringing and of my Latinx background.
Right after my divorce, I got into a relationship with someone who (I thought) at the time was the total opposite of my ex husband: empathetic, caring and thoughtful. He also made sure I was taken care of financially (not letting me pay for meals, getting me gifts, etc) because he believed that’s what a ‘man’ does. I didn’t argue with this because it’s a message that resonated with me. It was comfortable and something that I didn’t see the need to challenge. That was love, right?
Unfortunately, over time, the financial aspect began to mask the real problem: for two years I’ve endured the verbal and psychological abuse. I didn’t fight any of it because he provided for me and my son. I was a single mother not getting any financial assistance from my ex husband, but with the rebound helping me financially, I couldn’t complain (or shouldn’t) and I didn’t want to seem ungrateful or difficult. Even when I was taking care of my son, being a remote teacher, cooking 3 meals a day, cleaning, maintaining the household, physically carrying loads of laundry, working from home, and fitting in some semblance of exercise, I was told I wasn’t ‘hustling’ enough to show for it. Money is power, and the man who was financially assisting me reminded me over and over that I should just be happy and take what I was offered because he was the only man in my life who ‘cared’ enough to.
In both instances, I believed this is what love was, even though my intuition nudged at me that something wasn’t right.
What I’ve come to realize was that I was carrying years of generational pain and struggle. My mother’s pain and struggle. My grandmother’s. I normalized the patriarchy. I embraced it, coddled it, and enabled it. Every time I tried to fight against it by speaking my mind or challenging a misogynistic statement, I was always told to stay in my lane because good girls don’t cause ‘drama’.
The power dynamic of these patriarchal messages kept me small.
I now find myself as a 45-year old finally developing the courage to speak up and not base my worth (whether financial, or societal) on others, and particularly men. I look back at so many opportunities in my life that could’ve been different if I was empowered and encouraged by the very people who tried their best to protect me. I could forever blame my parents for planting these seeds of the patriarchy in me, but I know that would be futile because they were also operating with the tools they had for their survival. I’m looking at this now as an opportunity to turn that around with my son.
Chipping Away the Patriarchal Walls
My son is now seven. I’m more conscious of the messages that come across in his interaction with me, other kids, and adults. Since the pandemic, I’ve been working from home. I do my best to communicate with him about what I’m doing and when I will be busy with work. He may be too young to understand when I need to respond to a media request. Just having him see that women can work and can be the breadwinners is something I want to normalize for him. I know the memory of my working from home will hopefully imprint a different perspective of women as equal partners in the evolution of our society and not just an accessory to benefit men.
I’m also starting to teach my son that household chores are not just relegated to women, but are part of his contribution to the home and the family dynamic. I have taught him to sweep, which he thinks is fun (thank God!) and have also made it a habit for him to pick up his plate and put it in the sink when he is done eating. There is probably more he can do, barring anything that has to do with sharp knives and turning on the stove, but baby steps. He is curious about cooking and baking, which is the next thing I plan to teach him.
We as a society are inundated with patriarchal messages, but we can’t just leave it to women to fight it. We should be teaching our boys to become allies with women and destroy the patriarchy from within. The patriarchy is a game that I will not let my son participate in.
Reflecting on the Patriarchy
I’ve always maintained that my goal is to make sure that when I leave this earth, I have armed my son with the right tools to be the best human being around. I know it’s a long road and an ongoing process, but it’s my way to contribute to help dismantle the patriarchy and fight for a more equitable world for women, and I invite you to join me by starting in a couple of ways:
- Challenge the rhetoric. Sometimes our friends and the people closest to us make divisive and antiquated comments about women or disenfranchised groups. Get curious. Ask them why they think that way and then remind them that type of thinking only suppresses the progress we want to make and see in our community. You may be called ‘difficult’ but I can guarantee you will have made a small crack.
- Teach them young. Kids don’t know power dynamics and their reality is shaped by what they see. Show them that women can take up space in a male dominated world (i.e. science, law, government, home) by setting examples at home to include them in cooking or cleaning and reading books where girls dominate in fields that are not normally women friendly (i.e Rosie Revere, Engineer, Aida Twist, Scientist or Sofia Valdez, Future Prez).
- Demand more. What happens then you grow too big for the patriarchal box they made for you? Start smashing that box. Set standards. Don’t play small. Start betting on yourself and demand what you’re worth…plus tax.
About the author: Shirley Limongi (she/her)
Hells Kitchen girl living in a Queens world for the past 8 years. She’s a coffee snob, astrology aficionado, Peloton nut (#SunShynQueen528) and a hopeful romantic trying to find her dance partner in life. Known for her big hair she will remind you it’s because it’s her Leo rising/Mars and her Gemini stellium is responsible for her enthusiastic nature and love of learning anything new that can make her smarter. Mom to 7-year-old Nacho, who always keeps her on her toes and grounded is her reason for trying to make the world a better place. Follow her on Twitter @slimongi where she’s vaxxed and totally relaxed.
