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Current issue

Átomo N.2

Feminismo

All the articles

Editorial

2018 will be viewed as a big year in the history of global feminism. That year, a number of social movements, #MeToo, #Niunamenos, and some pro-abortionists (among others) lifted their voices against what they consider to be the restrictions and abuses women face in western societies.   Historically, both men and women have had to […]

Átomo

Bad Reputation

Almost two years ago in August 2017 I wrote an article that I titled “Antifeminism”. It was triggered by a case that, as far as I know, caused the cup of the cause to overflow. A candidate of the Frente Amplio Party confronted a contender for having treated her badly, which was “more” serious considering […]

Marcela Fuentealba

Chauvinism by the Numbers

Is it a man’s job is to earn money and a woman’s job is to look after her home and her family? So reads one of the questions asked of Chileans (and citizens of 40 other countries as well) by ISSP pollsters, working, in the former’s case, with the Centro de Estudios Públicos (CEP). The […]

Loreto Cox

Biology is not destiny

From the Enlightenment to Simone de Beauvoir, from Stuart Mill to the current feminist manifestations: the underlying idea that transcends time is that no biological condition can justify the hegemony of one collective over another in the network of social life.   Just as with other waves of thought, feminism can be defined in different […]

Valentina Verbal Stockmeyer

Deirdre McCloskey

Between her impressive and passionate intellectual work and her unique personal history, Deirdre McCloskey (b. 1942) makes an impression on everyone. After earning a master’s degree in economics from Harvard, she went on to teach at the University of Chicago, where many students remember her as the best profesor they ever had—though they remember her […]

Axel Kaiser

Unconscious biases, general rules

The differences in salaries and the career expectations between men and women can’t be explained with just one variable. There are many factors –cultural, psychological– in the nucleus of the economic life of societies, an evident inequality. In the following text the detail of the conditions of this reality are revised.   Women’s salaries are […]

Francisca Dussaillant

Neither pleasure not reproduction

Very recent scientific studies have taken the clitoris away from the haze of indifference that impeded its visibility and understanding. With no apparent function other than pleasure, it traditionally didn’t have the scientific relevance of the penis. According to the author of this text this cultural phenomenon projects social practices that are profoundly rooted in […]

Virginia Gutiérrez

Irene, Lina, and Svetlana

The twentieth century, with its two world wars, the Cold War, its revolutions, and its struggles, was an age of unimaginable technological advances during which the world saw totalitarianisms of various stripes come to be, leading to the suffering and exile of millions of human beings. What follows are the stories of three women who […]

Monika Zgustova

Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Somali activist and writer Ayaan Hirsi Ali is both respected and despised, it just depends on who is doing the judging. Classical liberals make note of her audacity and intellectual rigor while the Islamic world accuses her of spreading hate and intolerance. Having personally suffered the wages of fundamentalism, she is quite willing to take […]

Sofía García-Huidobro

Memoirs of a Proto-Feminist

In the practically colonial Santiago of 1872, Diego Barros Arana’s niece decided to translate John Stuart Mill’s The Subjection of Women, and in a bout of insolence, changed “subjection” to “enslavement”. She was repudiated by nearly all of Santiago’s high-society, but she carried on and lived to witness the first time women got to vote […]

Elena Irarrázabal

Liberum sex, clausum sex

The case for freedom of the seas is fairly analogous to the case for sexual freedom, they are both about eliminating restrictions. But as Grocio, the seventeenth century Dutch jurist stated, the seas belong to no one and their commercial use should be unlimited, whereas in prostitution, the human body clearly belongs to someone and […]

María Blanco

The Death of the Patriarchy

With the intent of fighting misandry, the academics who put together this book review the last two thousand years—without very many intermissions—of human history. From the point of view of man, and the social utility of his body, they try to carve out a place for men in the complicated world of gender equality.   […]

Carmen Gloria López

Thoughts on African Feminism

The novels and essays of Adichie, the famous Nigerian writer, showcase a distinct feminist worldview. Her African experience and her noncomformist tendency to reflect produce a feminism characterized by how it values diversity, humor, and tolerance. With an international readership that’s steadily rising, Adichie fights not just Western stereotypes about African life, but also against […]

Isabel Aninat

Eugénie Bastié and Feminism’s Blind Spots

With two incisive and clearly written books published in the last few years, Eugénie Bastié, a young journalist, has earned herself a permanent place in France’s media landscape as the country’s foremost critic of the contemporary feminist movement and its underlying principles.     Until not long ago, Eugénie Bastié spent her time writing articles […]

Patricio Domínguez

The Social Liberalism and Feminism of John Stuart Mill

For John Stuart Mill, the most radical of England’s 19th century thinkers, individual liberty was the highest ideal. And that liberty stood athwart oppression not only from state power in general, or any specific government in particular, but from society as a whole. In this schema, Mill found women to be doubly oppressed.     […]

Benjamín Ugalde

My Stance on Accusations and the Rule of Law

Drawing from Mexican author Marta Lamas’ book, attorney Paula Vial reflects on the puritanical, moralistic, and victimizing rhetoric used to discuss women’s issues. She goes on to analyze how this rhetoric negatively impacts the right of the accused to respond to accusations made against them—and even defend their own dignity, the right of due process, […]

Paula Vial Reynal

Sol Serrano: The Hands-on Historian

Sol Serrano, Chile’s 2018 National History Award winner, has dedicated her life to her chosen field—history—by way of exemplar teaching and thorough original research. In her pedagogy and in her writing, she has shown both personal focus and an inarguable talent for teamwork. Her most recent book, El liceo (“High School”), analyzes the role said […]

Macarena Ponce de León

Werner Herzog in Chile

Possibly among all the writers, artists, filmmakers and thinkers that have come to Chile in recent years, no one has generated such interest and expectation as Werner Herzog last January. The author of Aguirre, the Wrath of God and Fitzcarraldo, two of his most famous works, is more than an important filmmaker. He is also […]

Héctor Soto

William Styron and Arthur Miller in Chile

Towards the middle of 1988, after 15 years of military dictatorship …

Jorge Edwards

Alfredo Jocelyn-Holt, historian

In the late 1990s I casually bumped into Alfredo Jocelyn-Holt on the platform …

Juan Manuel Vial

The tyranny of good manners

The sphere of political debate is currently under the threat of being kidnapped …

Sylvia Eyzaguirre

John Stuart Mill and the politically correct

For those that believe in an open society, there’s nothing more important …

David Gallagher

The aftermath of a caricature

The book, The tyranny of silence, by Flemming Rose,1 is a story in first person …

Cristóbal Bellolio

Cult and weakness

“What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” wrote Friedrich Nietzsche …

Axel Kaiser

Politically correct cinema

The great star of the last prize awarded in the Oscars was precisely the least invited …

Rafael Gumucio

Observing official literature

Some years ago I participated in a lunch that was not very memorable …

Juan Manuel Vial

Indian, old and black

To not call old people old they make up delirious expressions like tercera edad …

Marcelo Rozas

Jonathan Haidt

His trajectory has been long and started in Yale where he read philosophy …

Axel Kaiser

Decalogue of Political Correctness

Immerse yourself daily into the baptismal waters of your sound consciousness …

Enrique Krauze

To laugh or not to laugh

Not laughing or laughing at a joke a person can pass for empathic or an idiot …

Tamy Palma