Mansplaining: another underground form of cultural machismo?

Although it is very likely that it is not basically due to biological differences, it is clear that, today, the behavior of men and women is different in many aspects. Some of these differences, in addition, allow one of the two sexes to dominate the other and have it easier to impose their points of view and their purposes.

Mansplaining, as a psychological phenomenon of domination, is an example of how men, statistically, tend to try to take the reins of dialogues with women, regardless of the topic that is discussed.

Let's see what it consists of and what relationship does he have with sexism and cultural machismo.

What is mansplaining?

The term "mansplaining" is a neologism from English that in its native language is composed of the words "man" and "explain". It is normally used to refer to the statistical trend (and the action through which that trend is expressed) of men to explaining things to women in a patronizing and condescending way, as if his interlocutors were people who were especially bad at understanding, even if what is being talked about is a subject that the woman knows more about than the man.

For example, a man without a university education who explains to a biologist what the hybridization between dog breeds without even letting her speak is a relatively clear case of mansplaining.

What would characterize mansplaining is not that a man talks about certain issues related to femininity or feminism (after all, a specific man may know more than a specific woman about any subject, and vice versa), if not what, systematically, it is assumed that the role of women is to shut up and learn.

• You may be interested: "Men are not comfortable with ambitious women"

The hypothesis based on machismo

The concept of mansplaining has started to be used relatively recently, and it is believed that not a decade has passed since it appeared, although its origin is little known.

It has been enthusiastically welcomed by associations and organizations linked to feminism and gender studies for obvious reasons: it can be interpreted as a micromachismo, a subtle form of expression of patriarchy and cultural machismo that from this perspective it would reproduce a system of domination of men over women.

Ultimately, in practice, mansplaining has a clear effect when it comes to relationship relationships. power: it makes women's points of view invisible and nullified and this is assumed as something normal. In other words, "mansplaining" is a word that many women needed to refer to a problem that until recently no one knew what to call, despite the fact that numerous scientific investigations have noticed its existence over the last few years years.

• Related article: "Patriarchy: 7 keys to understanding cultural machismo"

Mansplaining towards other men

The above is the interpretation of mansplaining based on the idea that this is one of the consequences of a system of male domination. However, there is also another possible interpretation about this phenomenon. An interpretation based on a fact that may surprise considering what we have seen before: men they also mansplaining when interacting with other men.

This is the conclusion that allows us to reach an investigation hosted by Elizabeth Aries. After analyzing more than 40 hours of conversations, Aries found that men and women adopted very different styles when interacting with other people.

Males tended to compete more for dominating conversations regardless of who was in front of them, while women showed a greater willingness to connect with others through symmetrical relationships and did not try to control the course of the conversation.

For them, conversations about the most trivial topics were also an arena in which power can be gained. and influence, and they tried to scale little by little through their interventions, struggling to gain the attention of the the rest.

Thus, in groups composed solely of men there were also a number of individuals who, after a while had passed, they were made invisible before a minority that ended up capitalizing on the conversations, something that happened much less in women's groups.

A much more aggressive style of interaction

These conclusions fit very well with the findings found through other research in psychology that does not focus primarily on dialogue: men tend to be more competitive in many more types of interactions, even though there is apparently no specific or recognizable reward that can be accessed by doing this.

Thus, mansplaining would not be so much a way in which men try to annul women, but rather a reflection of her style when it comes to interacting with everyone.

Of course, these results always focus on statistical trends. A man doesn't have to constantly mansplaining, and a woman doesn't have to always be submissive or avoid struggling to extend her power in conversation. Simply put, mansplaining is much more pervasive in one of the two sexes and stands out more and more frequently when the people talking to each other are of the opposite sex.