After the incident in Madrid: Students are sorry for the sexist screaming attack

Machos are still at home in Spain, as a video from a student residence in Madrid shows.

After the incident in Madrid: Students are sorry for the sexist screaming attack

Machos are still at home in Spain, as a video from a student residence in Madrid shows. There, young men yell at young women with rude remarks. Which caused outrage - as did the reaction of some of the students.

Spanish students at a dormitory in Madrid have apologized to the students for rough macho sayings and sexist insults. "As students of the Elías Ahuja dormitory, we would like to express our regret for our actions. What was a bad joke has gotten out of hand," the young men wrote in a letter to the students who live in a dormitory across the street.

Both houses, in which only men or women live, are run by the Catholic Order of San Augustín. In a video that was distributed online, a student could be seen looking from his window at night in the direction of the dormitory of his fellow students, among other things, describing them as "nymphomaniac whores" who should "come out of their burrow like rabbits".

Dozens of other students then joined in the noisy action. In the letter of apology, the students promised to improve. "We are committed to changing our behavior," it says. The video caused an outcry in Spain. The scenes are "despicable," said University Minister Joan Subirats. With the exception of the right-wing populist Vox, all major parties condemned the action in the strongest possible terms. The Madrid public prosecutor's office announced investigations into a possible "hate crime".

Meanwhile, the fact that some students at the affected and renowned top university Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM) downplayed the importance of the scandal also caused great dismay. "They had no bad intentions," said a young woman, for example, the television channel RTVE. Others explained that it was a "tradition", a "rite" of the university.

All the worse, judged numerous politicians, spokeswomen for women's associations and media commentators. "This shows how deeply rooted the culture of rape is in our society," lamented Yolanda Besteiro, President of the Progressive Women's Federation (Federación Mujeres Progresistas). "We are intimidated, we are insulted, we are vilified." Violence against women is "normalized and trivialized". One RTVE commentator said: "And these are our elites of the future." The management of the accommodation has meanwhile referred several students to the dormitory, and the university said it was checking whether those involved had to leave the university.