Draft:Femicide in Argentina

Femicide in Argentina:

- What is femicide? Women have rights, but in some cases these rights are not protected to the same extent as the rights of men One of the most extreme, but most common forms of violence against women is femicide. This is when a woman is killed because of her gender. In fact, the murder of women at the hands of an intimate partner is the most common form of femicide. (Un Women, 2023). People choose to use the term femicide instead of homicide because homicide is a gender-neutral word that leaves the oppression, inequality and violence against women unnoticed.

- Argentina Argentina, for example, is a very open-minded country, with a good foundation in human rights. Unfortunately, it has a very big problem with gender violence, which in worst cases leads to femicide. According to the Washington Post (2021) in the year 2020 more then 250 women were murdered by men, one every 35 hours.

History and Background

Argentina has a very strong patriarchal society which means their socio-cultural structure gives men dominance, authority and advantages over women, who are left in a position of subordination and dependence in worst cases.

- Machismo culture: the Traditional mindset about the gender roles and cultural attitudes often perpetuate the idea of the superiority of male over female giving male dominance and control over women, making this environment conducive to violence and discrimination.

Since 2015 Argentina has register more then 100 cases of femicide per year, 2019 being the highest with 327 femicides that year. An average of 235 women are victims of gender violence in Argentina per year. 26 have reported violence on previous occasions, 149 were aggressed by their partners, and 30 were victims of a family member. In 44 cases the victims knew the aggressor, but in the other 13 cases the victim did not know the aggressor. In 2019, 327 women suffered femicide.

Response and Activism

- Ni Una Menos movement. In 2015, after the murder of a 14-year-old girl in the hands of her 16-year-old boyfriend, the women of Argentina had enough and started protesting, with around 200.000 women just in Buenos Aires alone. This movement was the start of the fight in Argentina with the only purpose of ending violence against women; to end femicide. The name Ni Una Menos means: We do not want any more women to pass away as a result of femicide. It can be translated in English as Not One Less. This movement had also a big impact online, with the hashtag NIUNAMENOS

Conclusion A way to understand the deep roots of feminicide could be by understanding the different roles assigned to each gender in societies where femicide is a big issue: it is understood that the public sphere should be controlled by men, and women are only in charge of the household. These patriarchal structures are the reason why women are more likely to get abused: to assume the full responsibility of caring for the home and children, to be portrayed with low accuracy in the media and in popular culture, to be paid less than men for the same work, and to have their sexuality viewed negatively. They also tend to be underrepresented in areas of power and decision-making. In the patriarchal environment of the society in Argentina the understanding of women as inferior to men makes the social significance of these murders less negative. By this it could be deduced that there is a greater probability of gender violence and therefore femicide if the law and culture do not penalize them.