EA video that has been circulating on social networks has sparked a debate in Spain about violence against women. It shows how dozens of young men from the windows of a multi-storey student residence in Madrid shout sexist abuse and threaten their fellow students in the building across the street.
The scenes were “despicable,” said University Minister Joan Subirats on Friday. With the exception of the right-wing populist Vox, all major parties immediately condemned the action in the strongest possible terms. The Madrid public prosecutor’s office announced investigations into a possible “hate crime”.
Meanwhile, the fact that some students at the affected and renowned Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM) downplayed the importance of the scandal also caused great dismay. “They had no bad intentions,” said a young woman, for example, the television channel RTVE. It is a “tradition”, a “rite” of the university, others explained. All the worse, judged numerous politicians, spokeswomen for women’s associations and media commentators.
“This shows how deeply rooted the culture of rape is in our society,” lamented Yolanda Besteiro, President of the Women’s Progressive Federation (Federación Mujeres Progresistas). “We are intimidated, we are insulted, we are denigrated.” Violence against women is “normalized and trivialized”. One RTVE commentator said, “And these are our elites of the future.”
The UCM has since announced that the first identified students have been expelled from the university. There will be further disciplinary measures and consequences, it said.
As the daily newspaper La Vanguardia reports, it is not the first time that students at the university have made sexist comments.
Spain only tightened its sex crimes law in August. The new law criminalizes “intimidating” compliments and the distribution of sex videos, among other things. With its initiative, the left-wing government had reacted to several sensational cases of gang rape in which the perpetrators had gotten away with light sentences in recent years. Equal Opportunities Minister Irene Montero said at the time that the “culture of rape” and “sexual terror” would come to an end.
