To stick one's fingers to feminism

1. Last summer, 2,763 Catalan adults answered an online survey for twenty minutes. The questions posed by the research firm Soluciones Netquest were the same in both Catalan and Spanish. Commissioned by the Catalan International Institute for Peace (ICIP), the study aimed to quantify a reality we all perceive: that young people, including young Catalans, are turning towards right-wing ideologies, both politically and socially. And you only have to listen—on the street, in bars, or in the locker rooms of a sports club—to realize that young men are becoming more radicalized, and at a faster rate, than young women. The study's data, of course, confirms the initial hypothesis. No surprise there.

2. All media outlets (ARA, TV3, RAC1...) They agreed to highlight three headlines out of the many that could be extracted From this extensive survey, which aimed to gauge perceptions of coexistence and security in Catalonia in 2025: "25% of young people reject the idea that democracy is the best form of government." "30% of young people believe that gender violence is a feminist invention." "60% of young people consider feminism a problem." Bang, slap, bang. Regarding the chilling effect of these results, The ARA already published an editorial. –published last Thursday– which I wholeheartedly endorse. We still have a lot of educational work to do, and we need to keep our fingers crossed because everything Francesc-Marc Álvaro describes in his new book, Francoism in the time of TrumpLet it not become a scourge that marks several generations of people. But looking closely at the interesting ICIP study, an idea has occurred to me. Why do we reflect so much on the answers to this study and pay so little attention to the questions?

3. Should we ask about feminism? Consider the statements made in the survey to gauge public agreement. "Gender violence is an invention of feminism." Would they think to ask if "Racism is an invention of Black people" or "Homophobia is an invention of homosexuals"? Another statement from the study: "Feminism is harming normal relationships between people of different genders." What does "normal" mean? Was "normal" the prevailing machismo of centuries? Another question framed as a statement: "It is being observed that some women file false reports for their own benefit." Some? How many? Can we ask people to take a stance on false reports when, according to experts and legal data, the claim that this percentage of reports is significant is false?

4. Feminism, according to the DIEC (District Institute of Economics and Culture), is "the social movement that defends women's rights and denounces their traditional subjugation to men." To seize upon this term and conflate the path toward equality with a driver of conflict is to fall into the trap set by all the textbook reactionaries who, from positions of power, have an interest in perpetuating male privileges from another era. There are those nostalgic for Franco, and some who believe that life was better when women stayed at home, cooking and caring for the children. Stereotyping feminism with these kinds of questions only serves to legitimize the narrative of the dominant group and, at the same time, trivializes a historical oppression of women. We are too far from equality to be consulting on feminism while casting it under suspicion. This sociological study, like so many others, is conducted in good faith, with scientific pretensions, and with the intention of capturing a snapshot of society at a particular moment. But framing feminism as an option to be "measured" only fuels hate speech towards 50% of the population.