Fueled by the media and politics, the official’s macho behavior turns into a general reckoning with football and its misogynist structures
Stefanie Muller from Madrid
In the Wizink Center in the center of Madrid, the atmosphere is at its peak when the Spanish women’s World Cup final is broadcast. There are no stars on stage, just a few lonely cameras filming the raging audience as they stare at the flickering giant screens. Among them are many little boys and girls with Spanish flags who cheer loudly for their heroines.
No excitement at first
In the midst of this jubilation, few see the forced kiss of the head of the Spanish Football Federation, Luis Rubiales, with the player Jenni Hermoso. Nobody suspects that this act will throw the country into an unprecedented excitement about machos and their behavior.
A kiss with consequences
The police are outside the multi-purpose hall, and protests are expected. But when you walk from the cooled stadium to the hot asphalt, it becomes clear that the rest of society has not yet understood what has just happened. It wasn’t about the kiss, but rather about the consequences for Spanish sport and society as a whole.
The macho behavior of a manager was the straw that broke the camel’s back. For many months, Spanish women footballers have been unhappy with their poor pay and unfair treatment compared to men. Some had therefore fallen out with coach Jorge Vilda and had not even started for the World Cup.
power structures and corruption
Several complaints and lawsuits are pending against Rubiales. Now the whole of Spanish football and its controversial power structures are in the limelight and not the acclaimed World Cup victory of an initially underestimated team.
“It’s reminiscent of a typical Spanish soap opera,” says Oscar Villasante. The cameraman, who lives in Madrid, believes that it also has something to do with the news hole of the summer that this kiss draws such media circles, also internationally: “What does the rest of the world think of us?”
Little celebratory mood
When the World Cup women’s victory bus rolls through Madrid on Monday evening after the victory in Australia, only a few Madrilenians stand at the side of the road to congratulate them. The players look at their cell phones. Something seems strange. The war against Rubiales is already raging on social media. Hermoso is being pressured to speak out against him. He, on the other hand, wants her to admit that she wanted the kiss too.
Her Instagram account, where it was heard after the game that she didn’t like Rubiales’ kiss, now has over a million followers.
As early as Friday, some Spanish media reported that Rubiales would resign the next day because of the pressure, but surprisingly the Andalusian did exactly the opposite: “I’m not resigning.” He repeated this sentence four times in front of his confidants from the association. Many applaud, some even stand up.
mother on hunger strike
Various feminist organizations across the country have called for protests in recent days, including in Madrid, where dozens of people gathered in Callao Square this Tuesday to call on Rubiales to finally resign.
government is pushing
Meanwhile, the Spanish government is putting pressure on Fifa. This initially suspended the Spaniard from service and prohibited him from approaching Hermoso’s family – a unique occurrence in football history. The fact that Rubiale’s mother locked herself in a church in his hometown of Mortril this Monday and went on a hunger strike because her son was being crucified unjustly is just as typical of Villasante as anything else: “There is a very progressive women’s policy that is still very far away widespread macho behavior.”
Only right-wing extremists against it
20-year-old Ana Sofie Bernat believes that the fact that many who applauded Rubiales on Saturday are now calling for his resignation is part of a hypocritical culture. For women in Spain, however, the soap opera is a double victory: the women’s union Futpro is suddenly present everywhere and the left-wing Minister of Labor becomes their mouthpiece. This time, according to Bernat, all parties and Spanish society are united. Except for the far-right Vox. Their MEP Hermann Tertsch only points out that Rubiales is a socialist.