Abstract
In Family Secrets: Stories of Incest and Sexual Violence in Mexico, sociologist Gloria González-López not only recounts the life histories of sexual violence of 60 men and women, through a critical feminist lens, but she also identifies various types of incestuous relationships and analyzes patriarchal norms and values that contribute to generational patterns of abuse in some Mexican families. Religious and cultural norms proscribing obedience and duty for women combined with ideals about heteronormative masculinity resulted in a culture of family violence which subjected women and effeminate young men to sexual exploitation. Father, brother/cousin, and uncle incestuous relationships each demonstrate unique patterns of sexual violence reinforced by societal structures that make young boys and girls especially vulnerable.
Young girls become conjugal daughters as they replace mothers who cannot or will not fulfill caretaking and nurturing roles within the home. Girls’ service roles are extended as their biological fathers who consider women and children personal property and feel entitled to sexual satisfaction, force young girls to become sexual surrogates for their mothers. Marital servitude occurs as young girls, with the knowledge of their mothers, are sexually coerced by a charismatic, religious father or stepfather. Rather than singling out one girl as the surrogate, serial marital servitude arrangements subject siblings to ritualistic abuse. While conjugal daughter respondents reported believing that the incestuous relationship was normal, marital servants were more likely to run away from home to escape the abuse.
An insight into brother–sister incest unfolds through the life histories of 12 women recounted in over 20 pages of text. Even before arriving at the author’s discussion at the end of the section, the reader will discern patterns of abuse. In homes without a domestic servant, sisters under 10 years old were a safe outlet for adolescent boys wanting to explore their sexuality and gain experience. A young sister serves as a sexual surrogate for an older brother who does not want his masculinity challenged in appearing inexperienced or inadequate in his first nonfamilial sexual encounter. The popular Mexican idiom, A la prima se le arrima, which refers to the social acceptability of a close physical or sexual connection to one’s cousin, provides insight into the acceptability of incestuous cousin relationships. The more situational and less frequently occurring cousin–cousin incest highlighted a sexual terrorism in which boy’s sexual harassment was interpreted as play and therefore harmless, demonstrating how sexual aggression toward young girls is trivialized and normalized. Mothers and other caregivers often dismissed sexualized play justifying the behavior as normal male behavior thereby reinforcing a submission in girls.
The most common family pattern of incest that respondents reported was the niece–uncle relationship, whether biological or fictive kinship. Young men who sexually abused sisters and cousins based on a patriarchal notion of the devalued role of women and male gender privilege continued the sexual abuse as adults preying upon young nieces, perpetuating the cycle of family genealogies of incest. Uncle–niece incest was not only the most frequently occurring sexual abuse, the maternal uncle was the most likely perpetrator, further indicating a feminization of incest in which men devalue women within their families and feel that that have a right to the bodies of their female kin. Young girls who told their mothers or caretakers about abuse were more often blamed for provoking the sexual aggression, were dismissed, or silenced thus continuing the cycle.
Through a recount of the life histories of incest of nine men, González-López demonstrates homophobic cultural elements that make effeminate boys, especially vulnerable to sexual violence while also serving as a social control. A continuum ranging from consent to coercion is more prevalent in male testimonies than in female stories. Young boys engaged in sexualized play with young male cousins that turned into consensual pleasurable sexual relationships or kinship sex. Men who engaged in same-sex kinship sex were more likely to self-identify as homosexuals as adults. Other young men experienced sexual violence from male family members. Fathers, who suspected their sons of being homosexual, used sexual violence as a behavior modification tool in hopes of correcting their perceived deviant behavior. Young men used their younger male relatives as a test for their own heterosexuality, while older relatives viewed the boys as hypersexualized and coerced them into submission. Sexually violated men were more likely that their female counterparts to use violence to confront a family member. Male respondents were also more likely to discuss a conversion from their childhood religion of Catholicism to another Christian religion and how the conversion helped them deal with their past experiences of sexual violence as well as current temptations to approach young boys.
In Family Secrets, González-López exposes a generational patriarchal socialization in the home that devalues women and gender bending boys commodifying and objectifying their bodies making them susceptible to sexual violence. While the life histories show disturbing details of the hidden nature of incest in Mexican families, one must question whether 23 continuous pages of personal accounts in one chapter is necessary to make that point. Despite graphic accounts of familial sexual abuse, the author shows that many respondents, with the help of supportive family members, were resilient and able to move beyond childhood incest. Family Secrets attests to the necessity of Mexican penal code reform concerning incest. Furthermore, this book contributes to the fields of family violence, gendered violence, and Latin American studies in providing an empirical analysis of incest in Mexican families and is likely to appeal to academics in those areas as well as to family therapists and counselors.