The word escrache It is appropriate to refer to the demonstrations that are convened in front of the home or workplace of public figures to reprove their behavior in certain political or social matters. According to the Dictionary of Americanisms , escrache refers to the "popular demonstration of denunciation against a public person who is accused of having committed serious crimes or acts of corruption and that generally takes place in front of his home or in some other public place where the person must attend denounced".
The term was popularized in the 1990s in Argentina to refer to the demonstrations organized in front of the homes of those prosecuted for crimes committed during the dictatorship who had later been released. Subsequently, its use has been extended to other countries and contexts. The verb escrachar also appears in the Dictionary of Americanisms with various meanings, including "exposing someone" and "hitting someone hard". The RAE, which does not include the noun escrache, does include the verb escrachar as an Argentine and Uruguayan colloquialism with the meanings of "break, destroy, crush" and "photograph a person".
If anything characterized the 3rd century B.C. were the clashes between the two great powers of the Mediterranean:Rome and Carthage , in the so-called Punic Wars (divided into three periods:264-241, 218-201 and already in the second century BC from 149-146). In 215 BC, with Rome in a state of war with the Carthaginians and after suffering a severe defeat in Gaul -with the loss of two legions and the death of the consul Lucius Postumius Albinus- , the Lex Oppia was enacted (Opian Law). This law, presented by the tribune of the plebs Cayo Oppio in the year that Quinto Fabio Máximo and Tiberio Sempronio were consuls, it established that «no woman would possess more than half an ounce of gold, nor would she wear colorful dresses, nor would she travel in a carriage through the cities or within the radius of one mile except for public religious reasons «.
In times of crisis and/or war, citizens are willing to accept some limitations on our rights and "swallow" with certain restrictions on our freedoms. And that is what happened in Rome. Those were years of hardship and hardship, and it seemed logical to think that displays of public ostentation were out of place in a society impoverished by the war... And that is how the women understood it. Likewise, it seems logical to think that, in times of fat cows and almost erased from the map your staunch enemy, these limitations and restrictions could be relaxed and even repeal the law that established them (Lex Oppia ). And that is what the women of Rome requested in 195 BC
The Consul Marcus Porcius Cato the Elder and the tribunes of the plebs Marcus Junius Brutus and Publius Junius Brutus They defended the Opia law and proclaimed that they would not accept its repeal, but the women took to the streets. Every day the women gathered in ever larger groups to demand their rights, they occupied the entrances to the Forum, they thronged before the gates of the Brutes and they did not leave until the tribunes gave up their veto - right with who could stop and impede orders, decrees, Senate decisions or bills - they even "dare" to approach the consuls, praetors and magistrates to put pressure on them or present their demands... [a full-fledged escrache]. In Cato's words…
Citizens, if each of us had started out by upholding the rights and authority of a husband, now we wouldn't have to meet all the women together. After our authority has been defeated at home by the arrogance of women, now it is mistreated and trampled on here in the Forum. We were not able to control our women, one by one, and now they terrorize us all together […] I have blushed when, recently, I have managed to reach the forum in the midst of groups of women. And if I had not restrained myself out of respect for the dignity and modesty of each one of them, rather than in the confrontation with them considered collectively, so that it would not come to be said later that they were harshly reproached by the consul, I would have said to them:What custom is this of rushing to the public highway blocking it? [...] Today they address the husbands of others in public and ask for votes to repeal a law, and they get some from some. You allow yourself to be convinced to your detriment, that of your heritage and that of your children. As soon as the law leaves your wife free to spend, you won't be able to impose a limit on her.
The reality is that although some women who participated in the escrache justified the derogation by purely superfluous reasons, such as the fact that women from the provinces of Rome and towns could wear their jewels and they could not, the majority, who had "swallowed" with that law in times of war, believed that maintaining it in times of prosperity and relative peace the only thing that was pursued was to continue with the limitations in the field of action of women. The wars had left many widows who, in this way, had achieved a certain independence and control of their resources, by limiting their disposition, they had less room for action and, therefore, greater state control. Be that as it may, the truth is that the pressure was effective and the vote for the repeal, without the veto right of the tribunes of the plebs, went ahead in 195 BC
In addition, among all those who comment or share this article we are going to give away a copy of “Swords of the end of the world ”, a comic that narrates a historic clash of steels between Castilian soldiers and Japanese pirates in 1582, north of the Philippine Islands. A spectacular drawing, historical rigor, naval combat, action at the point of a sword and a plot that navigates through the darkest side of that battle. With illustrations by Juan Aguilera Galán and screenplay by Ángel Miranda Vicente .
Sources:Corrupt Rome – Pedro Ángel Fernández Vega, Power over women