Patriarchal backlash: Representations of sexual violence on Uruguayan TV

Esta boca es mía 2021

In the March 8th, 2021, show of the TV program, the host introduces the news of two femicides that occurred the day before the commemoration of International Women’s Day. She uses the term ‘femicidio’ [femicide] and presents this incident as part of a series of events that produce a negative emotional effect that goes against what is expected for the celebratory day. The examples are marked to highlight the aspects mentioned in the analysis: bold is used to signal representations, underlining marks interpersonal aspects and italics show the discursive strategies.

In this example, we can highlight how there is a construction of the event as part of a series (‘there are two in a row’), and that it is widespread in the country since several locations are mentioned (‘Melo’ and ‘Sauce’). On the other hand, it is important to note that the representation of the event uses several terms as elaborations of the meaning of ‘femicide’ that assume different roles and distributions of responsibility in terms of how the event is constructed. The phrase ‘her death’ presupposes the female victim as the experiencer, but with no attribution of responsibility or causal explanation for the loss of life. The following term used is ‘the murder’ which presupposes a perpetrator and victim. The third term used in the series is ‘the suicide’ which is another type of death in which responsibility for violence is attributed to the same victim who is simultaneously the perpetrator. The use of the word ‘suicide’ without naming the referent makes it hard to distinguish responsibilities. These uses of the terms without explicit marking of responsibilities and roles do not provide an elaboration to understand what the defining features of femicide is in relation to these other ways of dying (i.e. death, murder, and suicide). The choice of a series of these consecutive three main nouns has a negative evaluative effect. The effect is intensified by the interplay of negative emotions associated to the event (‘tristeza’ [sadness]) and the negative moral sanction that these three nouns have in Western culture (death, murder, and suicide).

The framing offered by the panel and the guests provides some variation in this negative framing of femicide as a type of event that taints the celebration of women’s achievements and struggles on March 8th. These voices bring in other tropes and arguments besides emotions to make sense of the femicide’s social meaning. For example, by comparing the panelists’ word choice to represent the event, we can see a variation in terms of their orientation to the social problem. This difference is expressed through diverse ways of representing participants, explaining the causes of the problem, and constructing arguments appealing to different sources of authority.

For instance, Andrea Tuana, a guest who is a Women’s Rights NGO activist, uses the term ‘femicide’. She does not employ it only as a quasi-synonym as the host does (see example 1), because this word is accompanied by an explanation of the meaning of the term.

The guest speaker foregrounds the difference in power as an inequality in the structural organization of society that generates a subordinate place for women. In fact, the explanation the guest offers elaborates on the meaning of the term ‘femicide’ by providing a gradual logical argument to connect the death of a woman because of her gender as a social expression of unequal power. So, there is a circularity in this explanation which resorts to a description of a difference in power that is also expressed in the difference in implied roles in the violence: victim versus perpetrator. The reason that explains why there is that difference is not presented. So, the guest offers in her turn more elaboration on the causes of the violence than that offered by the host’s rephrasing.

As a matter of fact, during her turn the guest she expands on this comment and provides some concrete ideas of cultural changes that everyone in the community can work on to provide solutions to gender-based violence. For example,

Then, she mentions the responsibility of the State to provide policies that promote these cultural changes and put them into practice at the national level. Again, the logical relation between being aware of what toys we give children (i.e. gender socialization) to the State’s policies designed to prevent femicide is not clearly elaborated. As a result, there is a repetition of stereotypes about gender differences and power differences and a leveling of familiar and State responsibilities when addressing the cultural problem that produces femicides.

The next turn is taken by the host, who brings up the topic of changing society through legislation or via micro actions at the personal level. She poses a question ‘What will have more strength?’ and then provides an answer that states it is not relevant to have that debate because both levels are equally important. The person contradicts herself.

The NGO’s activist responds by marking a difference by recognizing the importance of the law to promote cultural changes needed to change the violent situation.

The panelist connects in her argument the Law 19.580 with the way of seeing or interpreting violence against women. That Law states in article 3 that in case of conflict or doubt about the application of the provisions set forth in the norm, the interpretation most favorable to women, in situations of gender-based violence, shall prevail. The law also requires the creation of specialized courts with judges that are specially trained to treat this problem. The problem is the law is not implemented, ‘si nosotros hoy estuviésemos realmente implementando la ley’ [‘if we were actually implementing the law today’]. Here there is a choice of wording that represents responsibility as a shared process. The use of ‘we’ and the subjunctive to represent a hypothetical scenario to foreground the collective responsibility and the nonfactual nature of the law. This type of argument creates a space to focus on the social aspects by overcoming simple frames that present gender-based violence as a binary opposition of men against women.

The following speaker is a male panelist, José Sena, who distinguishes different types of masculine identities to explain the causes of violence against women and the slow nature of cultural changes in this domain. He uses different phrases to construct a taxonomy that distinguishes men in relation to diverse explanations for their violence. On the one hand, there is an ‘hombre machista’ [macho man] which he equates to a ‘hombre inseguro’ [insecure man] or ‘con poca autoestima’ [with low self -esteem] that is different from men like himself who feel secure ‘hombres que nos sentimos seguros’ [us men who feel secure]. These various male identities are distinguished by their use of violence. These male identities coexist and represent tensions in how society constructs gender roles. These gender identities are not only self-ascribed but are also revealed in values women uphold which deposit power on men.

The other male panelist, Pablo Casas, who replies that the term ‘machista’ [macho] is archaic. In example 5, the speaker elaborates on the explanation for this type of violence.

The example highlights the fact that the problem is framed as a social issue, as well as an individual issue without gender differentiation in terms of responsibility or power differences. There is a tension between the victim frame, which presents the problem as a moral issue: hypocrisy; and the social science frame, which constructs the social structure as offering the possibility and evidence of transformation and evolution.

However, these frames make invisible differences in power in terms of responsibility, by presenting the individual and the State as sharing equally in the blame. Although, ‘patriarchal society’ is named and presented as the main explanation for violence, it is not clear how violence is reproduced and how it derives from gender inequality (symbolized by the phrase ‘hablar mal de las mujeres públicamente’ [speaking ill of women publicly]).

The final panelist provides a very direct representation and distribution of responsibilities. He resorts to terms that name the violence in terms of who is the perpetrator ‘violencia machista’ [macho violence] and who is the victim ‘violencia de género’ [gender-based violence].

In example 6, we observe a clear differentiation of gender roles and attribution of responsibility in relation to violence: males are perpetrators and women are victims. Males’ behavior is evaluated as socially reprehensible, and women are objectified. The appeal to traditional stereotypes makes the argument direct and clear, but it simplifies the situation. It is presented as a generalization that explains how this complex social structure of hierarchical power differences operates in terms of myths and presuppositions about differences in roles and values of people depending on their gender. However, the speaker hedges his statement by modifying the declarative statement, mitigating the scope of the evaluation modifying the noun that names the social actor from ‘Men’ to ‘many men’. So, there is a difference in graduation of the evaluation in terms of force (men vs many men) and focus (men vs women; Martin and White, 2005). This difference in number expresses a difference in power between gendered roles. The speaker presents a new argument that provides a call to action to ‘fix the problem’: a moral imperative. According to Rodríguez Puppo, this current violence against women expressed in feminicides must be corrected. But he does not elaborate on who is going to do it, nor how it is going to be done. This argument foregrounds the importance of symbolic and representational aspects as potential triggers for a cultural change. The panelist states that how we name the problem is central to its resolution. However, the speaker provides two wording alternatives which presuppose different points of view on the representation of responsibility and social roles. On the one hand, ‘Male violence’, which points to the male as perpetrator and his behavior as the center of action. And on the other hand, the phrase ‘gender violence’, highlights the point of view of the victim’s perspective as targeted because of gender. These differences in wording subtly direct attention to distinct solutions in terms of policies and actions to address gender violence.

These examples show certain cultural transformations on the threshold of moral sensibility that defines what is acceptable or not. These transformations are not abrupt and that is why meanings coexist sometimes (Rostagnol and Fontela, 2018), producing different readings of a situation, which is considered violence for some, while not for others. The panel and the host, as well as the guest in this episode of the program, reveal social tensions and contradictions in terms of how sexual and gendered violence are interpreted in Uruguayan culture.

This violence is reproduced through representations, practices, and institutions. These practices are directed toward subjects, who are in subordinated positions in the gender hierarchy. In this episode of the program, we can identify several frames that provide a narrative base to interpret and explain sexual violence in terms of what Bing and Lombardo (1997) call the judicial frame, the victim frame, and the social science frame. These narratives construct women as passive and victims and foreground cultural and social responsibilities, while identifying the judicial space as a site of moral disputes.

How does the differential status of gender produce unequal relations between men and women at different scales in this episode? Violence operates as a moralizing act that reduces and imprisons those who do not belong to the status quo. There is a type of gendered violence that is performed in this show that resorts to symbolic means to reproduce and challenge the patriarchal system. Moral violence (Segato, 2003) is the one that produces an emotional aggression by ridiculing, coercing, and devaluing females in their daily activities and in their moral value. The speakers do not attack one another, but construct a straw man, who is the target of the symbolic violence. This then allows them to displace all the negative values to Others and position themselves as morally superior and ‘evolved’ citizens, who do not engage in deviant and negative behavior.

Esta boca es mía 2022 ³

In the March 8th, 2022 TV program, the host questions the panelists about a case that was in the media at the time: the accusations in social media of sexual harassment by a representative of an opposition party.

The first time the topic of sexual violence is introduced in the program, the event is represented as a ‘complaint’, distinguishing it from different types of sexual harassment accusations (whether official or on social media).

The emphasis is on the fact that the ‘complaint of sexual abuse’ was published in the account Uruguayan males two on Instagram. There is no focus on the fact that there was sexual abuse, but on how the accusation was done. There is an implicit judgment of social sanction that point to the inappropriate way of denouncing the abuse.

In the next turn of the program, the host elaborates on the differentiation between complaints on social networks and formal complaints in Justice. This approach presents a dichotomy between different forms of reporting crimes, which may have implications for the rights of the different parties. The focus of the argument is that this type of complaint puts the defendant’s due process guarantees at risk (‘they leave a person pointed out’, ‘it leads to a public shaming’). The strategy used is to contrast two possible explanations for the choices made by the victims’ denouncing the violence, however the comparison leads to the conclusion that it is not appropriate to denounce the accused via anonymous social network postings.

The representation of the person who is making the accusation is generic. There is a representation as a nominalization ‘the complaints’ that does not mention the accuser. This is justified to protect the identity of the person. It is represented as a quality: ‘anonymity’. The condition of anonymity allows for the release of responsibility. But the woman also appears represented as ‘the person who accused’, which constructs an indefinite agent, who performs a specific action for which she must take responsibility. The victim framing is foregrounding the effects on the male who is being accused not on the woman who experienced gendered-based violence.

The panelists take up the judicial framing and representation of the event, distinguishing between legitimate and illegitimate types of complaints (‘anonymous complaints on social networks, in a certain blog or whatever’).

In example 9, once again, the effect of the complaint on the defendant is the focus of the message. The discussion centers on how the accused male is affected because his public image is tainted by the complaint, which he has no right to respond to and is coming from an unidentified source. The participant positions himself through evaluations with a high charge of affect: ‘I sincerely hate them’. This emotional reaction to the complaints of sexual harassment made on social media is justified by appealing to the same argument introduced by the host of the program: the risk of affecting due process. ‘The only thing that these types of complaints do is create a doubt about a certain individual who has no possibility of defending himself because what is created is generally a suspicion’. Likewise, the force of the certainty and existence of the accusation is mitigated, using modalization, to lower the probability of the responsibility of the accused and to diffuse the kind of behavior socially sanctioned: ‘he could have committed a certain type of abuse’. Afterward, the validity of the accusation is ruled out again, saying ‘there is absolutely nothing here, there is no complaint in the Prosecutor’s Office’. The complaint in the Justice system is then established as the only legitimate space for the accusation. In addition, the only right acknowledged is that of the accused, resulting in an indirect questioning of the credibility of the word of the accuser. Another important word choice that contributes to questioning the veracity and legitimacy of the accusation of gendered based violence is the use of hypothetical constructions (‘could have committed a certain type of abuse’). The lack of certainty and the representation as a potential, not a fact, serves to undermine the word of the accuser.

The next panelist focuses his response on the Gender Violence Law, as the basis of the problem, saying that it is ‘the factory of false complaints’. This representation of the law shifts the argument toward the illegitimacy of complaints for gender violence in general, and not only in the context of social networks or outside the judicial system.

Example 10 also introduces a new point to delegitimize accusations of sexual abuse, questioning the concept of ‘consent of the victim’, since ‘it enables anything, enables a complaint even within marriage, enables a complaint even in an occasional relationship, in a touch and go, it enables anything, then the problem is still in the law’. This comment questions the law, which was the socially accepted space to make and legitimize a complaint, according to the other participants. In this case, the law opens the possibility of generating complaints in situations such as a sexual relationship within ‘marriage’ or ‘occasional relationships’ (casual flings). In other words, the panelist locates the problem in the law and questions not only the credibility of the complaint (‘there may be a true one’), but also the value assigned to the victim’s interpretation of the fact (‘enables anything’). In this case, it is also stated that gender violence is not possible in certain types of relationships that imply different degrees of commitment and involvement at a legal, social, and affective level. This argument leaves us with the question: in what kind of relationships would it then be possible to consider a complaint legitimate?

Alcoff (2009) says that the concept of consent is used at the level of Western cultures (Global North) as a way of determining whether sexual violence occurred. In her work, she shows how in a global context, when putting this concept together with that of the victim, those terms have limitations. In particular, the discussion at a theoretical level refers to situations of prostitution and trafficking, and in contexts of global migration, sexual relations between people with different ages, status, and power. In this TV debate, what is highlighted is that the term consent has to do with traditions of liberal politics where people are imagined as free agents to make decisions.

What happens when this freedom does not exist or when culturally, there are traditions and beliefs that restrict those freedoms? That is, there are social structures that condition the possibility of consent. According to Alcoff (2009), it is also important to consider what kind of dignity and epistemic credibility is conferred on women by the concept of consent. This notion also erases the intersubjective and relational aspects of sexual-affective relationships that, due to their phenomenological nature, do not conform to contractual notions such as consent. From this contractual perspective emerges the idea that sexual violence is related to unwanted sexual contact, against the will of a party or without consent. However, the feminist perspective on rape and sexual violence shows that this experience affects the identity of the person beyond the instance itself and it is constructed in relation to the actions of others.

In the last turn, panelist 2 refers to a feminist position that demands that all complaints be legitimized: ‘I do believe you’. This statement implies that there are others who do not believe and that there is always a framework of questioning the complainant/victim, which makes it difficult to expose oneself to publicly denounce this type of violence.

The panelist uses a legitimation strategy that appeals to an author from the River Plate (Mariana Carbajal) who intertextually evokes a feminist position and interpretation to frame the case: ‘I do believe you’. He identifies the position he is questioning with feminism but uses it to validate his argument in favor of investigating the accusation. In other words, there is a transformation of the production of a disposition and moral obligation to believe the accusation, that gives the complainant epistemic validity and supports her credibility. That transformation of this argument makes the reference to ‘believing’ into a justification to review and examine the factual bases of the complaint. In his closing, the panelist uses a saying: ‘the invention is killing the inventor’. In other words, the critique is now displaced to the law that sought to protect or give more rights to women. This law is challenged because it does not allow situations of gender violence to be clearly identified and opens men to unwarranted accusations that limit their right to be considered innocent until proven guilty.

The representation of the complaint in this episode of En esta boca es mía, on International Women’s Day, shows that women have an unequal status and credibility in discourses relating to gender-based violence. At the level of the production of discourses on gender relations that circulate in the public sphere, there is still less space for women’s words to be heard than that of men. On the other hand, at the level of the voices and representations that circulate in a television program, it is noteworthy that in Uruguayan society, discourses that question the claims for rights and recognition of the violations suffered by women still are naturalized.

This episode shows the appeal to frames that had already been identified by Bing and Lombardo (1997) such as the judicial frame. The judicial frame is used to question the regulations that guarantee protections against gender violence and judicial spaces, constructing the male participant as an unjustly accused man or victim. In addition, the traditional representation of gendered roles constructs women who denounce as actors who cannot be believed. These women cannot be treated as subjects of law, since they do not behave according to what is socially sanctioned. In our analysis, we identified a new frame, the feminist frame, that considers sexual abuse as a type of violence that manifests a power embodied in masculinized bodies over feminized bodies and responds to a social structure (Rostagnol and Fontela, 2018; Telles Ribeiro and Cabral Basto, 2020). The coexistence of these different frames in the same public sphere led to different conclusions about the same situation. Regarding existing laws and institutions created to promote and defend women’s rights, the competing interpretations of their meaning and significance result in concrete material consequences for women.