Shock jock rails against Mexico's modern women
Woman," broadcast daily from this industrial northern city, husbands are
invited to enroll their wives in the contest if they: sleep until 9 a.m.,
serve only packaged foods, watch TV all day, and rarely shave their legs.
If Muzquiz sounds like Howard Stern in a sombrero, that's because, in part,
he is. In addition to targeting the lazy housewife, Muzquiz crusades
against "shameless" women who live independently, marry late, and work
outside the home.
Social and economic changes in Mexico over the past three decades - from
the increasing number of working women to the explosion of supermarkets,
which cater to a rushed lifestyle - have transformed family culture here
and left many men struggling to redefine their roles. Muzquiz's radio show
is just one example of a country twitching as it witnesses a shift - some
say the "Americanization" - of its family values.
"Men across Mexico are violently resisting this change," says Lourdes Plata Toledo, a well-known psychologist who counsels couples in a column in the Monterrey newspaper El Norte. "More women are saying, 'I don't need a man to support me. I don't need a man to fulfill me,' and men are thrown by this."...