'If we gave dolls to boys, maybe we would have more responsible parenting today'

In his latest book, Macho Menos: Ideas para Desconstruirte (Less Macho: Ideas to Deconstruct Yourself), Mexican journalist Nacho Lozano asks his readers a tricky question: "Is it possible to learn not to be macho?"

Lozano himself responds with complete certainty: "Yes, and no one should die trying. It's not about suffering, nor about sacrificing oneself, but about not making other people suffer, nor sacrificing them."

Nacho Lozano was born in Mexico City in 1985. He is the author of the book Marihuana a la Mexicana ("Marijuana Mexican Style").

He is also one of the authors of El Priista que Todos Llevamos Dentro ("The Priista We All Carry Within Us"). In this context, a priista is a member of the Mexican Institutional Revolutionary Party.

In Macho Menos , the journalist speaks with several women: writers, politicians, scientists, an astronaut, and even a Miss Universe. He searches for clues that will help him reduce the number of males in the world, in his own feminist crusade.

In the sixth chapter, the author surprises us by proposing a dramatization: "Man, imagine yourself being a woman." He then explains, incisively:

"To stop being a man, you will need to imagine what it is like to live, in your own flesh, hearing that, if you keep quiet, you are more beautiful... That, today, when you get into the truck, someone will touch your buttocks... That your father makes you wash everything, that no one lets you decide what to do with the money at home..."

Lozano states in her book that "the self-confessed feminist is bombarded with criticism, aggression, and glances to the sky. 'You behave like a woman, don't lower yourself.'"

BBC News Mundo — the BBC's Spanish-language service — spoke with Nacho Lozano during the Hay Festival Querétaro, held in Mexico from September 4 to 7, 2025.

Check out the main excerpts from the interview below.

BBC News Mundo: What does being a man mean to you?

Nacho Lozano: He is a man who assumes gender superiority, takes advantage of it and develops his masculinity by imposing himself.

And the way this is done can be violent in many ways, particularly against people who identify as female.

They consider themselves to have physical, intellectual and economic superiority, which is how a group of males is conventionally preserved: "the income is ours."

A man is made of money. He cannot be observed, understood, or explained without wealth. He must be protected and cultivated among other men so that no one can threaten him.

A macho is someone who promotes impunity, who maintains a pact of silence among his fellow males to protect himself from crimes committed.

BBC: Have you ever been a man?

Lozano: Living in a macho society, we become macho.

At some point in my childhood, I adopted machismo attitudes towards other companions.

If you ask me, 'Have you hit a woman?' or 'Have you raped a woman?' the answer will be no. But if you ask, 'Have you practiced the codes of machismo?', from the moment I was born, there were gender roles in my home, as in all families.

Boys were allowed to wear pants to PE class, but girls weren't. And you don't realize it until you start to question it, until a classmate comes along and says, "Look, this is being cruel to me."

Your use of language, your mannerisms, what you believed it was to be a man becomes violent to them.

BBC: And when did you start to examine the situation and look at sexism in a different way?

Lozano: When I was growing up in my family, where there are many women, they started to educate me, making me understand that it is possible to leave aside these impositions and create an identity that is not violent, that you can explore options of respect for your masculinity.

I've been a journalist for 23 years, and I report six or seven times a week, once a day, on cases of violence against women. And I see Mexico numb: until it happens to me, there's nothing to worry about.

This can turn into complicity. That's why we need to tell these stories, monitor the reports, and analyze our private lives.

And when we make mistakes, say, 'Look, I made a mistake,' try to fix it, and keep learning.

BBC: Man, imagine being a woman , you propose in your book . Have you done this exercise with other men?

Lozano: Yes, I did, and it is a miserable, degrading exercise, as it brings out the worst in those men.

This chapter is difficult, but not as difficult as experiencing in one's own flesh what we invite you to imagine.

They respond by saying: "What? This happens to women! How can we tighten our buttocks? With women, it's justifiable, because they wear very tight clothing."

Other colleagues confronted the men on camera, imagining they were going through what women face, not once a week, but seven times a day.

Imagine not only biological and physiological issues, but also social and political ones, that make being a woman a reason for disapproval.

Men react with compassion: "Yes, poor things," isn't that right? And what else? Are you going to stay there or are you going to accept that we are responsible for this?

It seems we're all too comfortable while women take on the role of the Mexican state as seeking mothers, or become victims of sexual exploitation due to hypocrisy toward sex workers. We'll get over this, right?

BBC: Writer Brenda Navarro claims that Mexican men only cry when they're drunk or listening to Mexican singer José José. The bar, which was off-limits to women, was the only place where they could share their pain with a drink.

Navarro: The example of bars brings up several points.

That was the place where men could be themselves, suffer for what it means to be a man, poor things. You can only cry, open up, get depressed, and be honest through alcohol.

The exposure, vulnerability and raw emotions are left to women, because we men only have one place where we show our wounds and heal them among ourselves.

But not everywhere in Mexico were women banned from bars. In some, they were allowed, but, of course, as sex workers, waitresses, or employees, not as someone with the money and power to pay for a drink.

I asked Patricia Mercado, a lawmaker and former Mexican presidential candidate, "Do women earn well?"

She replied, "No, we continue to feel unwell, we don't know what power is, because men don't release it."

"Because, when we have professional qualifications and money to be self-employed, we can go to the bar, the hotel, wherever we want, and you don't like that."

BBC: You also criticize other reactions from men when you talk to them about change...

Lozano: Ah! I've been asked, "Why doesn't the law specifically classify the murder of men [as opposed to femicide]?"

It has happened in lectures, on the radio, on television, these are comments that sometimes arrive.

I asked several women and many of them, very patiently, told me that it was necessary to explain it to them.

It turns out that neither the victims, nor the activists, nor the journalists, nor the women would have to take on the responsibility of educating the men who think this way.

These are the traps they want to set to reduce the severity of femicide, when the motivation for femicide is not comparable to homicide.

These men believe that things should not be changed and generate a kind of violence for which they must be held accountable.

Today, they speak freely in forums, on social media, and in their homes. But if someone accuses them of hate, they will face justice and will have to explain to the judge what they think: that it's necessary to create the institution of men and the homicide of men, but what they've been doing is violence.

BBC: And now that we're talking about new masculinities, what would you say they are?

Navarro: I have no idea.

I've seen social media accounts, books, and spoken to colleagues who promote this. They have good intentions: to stop being violent and transform ourselves into a respectful society.

Feminine or masculine, for me, may be different for you. We, humans, are authentic and exceptional beings.

I don't believe that masculinity or femininity should be exercised in a certain way, with certain rules or parameters, manners, labels, and prices. It's important to be who we want to be, the intimate right to freely develop our personality.

[French writer] Annie Ernaux has a sensational book, Look at the Lights, My Love [Ed. Fósforo, 2024]. In it, she reflects on what happens in the toy aisles of stores, where much of the origin of gender roles lies.

Let's think about a boy who is 6 or 7 years old. If he chooses a toy kitchen, his father will say, "What's going on? You're not cool, you're not effeminate, go to the boys' aisle."

And if a girl chooses a rocket, she hears, "Are you a lesbian? Go to the girls' aisle."

And what do you find in the boys' hallway? Construction and destruction.

There, there is space, engineering, architecture, castles, the dominance of other species, pistols that begin to impress upon you the desire to decide when a person should live or not, control, speed, cars, trains.

In the other corridor, the girls', are the care, beauty, kitchen, attention.

What would have happened to the boy if he had been given the kitchen? We would certainly have more defenders of the gastronomic heritage of regional communities.

What if they had said "yes, let's buy it" to the boy who wanted a doll? At best, we would have more responsible parenting, trained from childhood.

How many female astronomers and engineers would we have if girls had rockets? I discuss this with Mexican astronaut Katya Echazarreta, who studied in classrooms where she was often the only woman.

BBC: How do you deconstruct a male? How did you do it?

Lozano: I started with psychoanalysis to analyze myself and observe my use of words. The meanings I used had a sexist bias.

I analyze the words "mother" and "father" and their usage in my culture. I understand that these words are links in a chain that can end in femicide. You then begin to eliminate them.

You deconstruct yourself by studying feminism, listening to women.

[Mexican writer] Cristina Rivera Garza argues that we need to listen to them and observe them even more. This begins to change everything, awakening creativity and freeing the imagination to sculpt a masculinity that is not aggressive.

From there, address reality: whatever you encounter, the mistakes you make, what you read, what you talk about. Whatever makes you cry and feel deeply, without guilt or hypocrisy, so you can do what you want, without trampling on anyone.