Bogota, Colombia —
It is a rare spectacle in Bogota.
Three women in fluorescent exercise gear stop in their tracks and gawp in surprise. A young mother pushing her newborn in a buggy pulls out her phone and snaps a picture. An elderly man with a bushy mustache pauses to wipe his glasses.
What has grabbed their attention is the sight of a dozen men huddled next to a van in the bright morning sun attempting, with varying degrees of success, to put diapers onto baby dolls. Most are middle-aged adults, but there are a few retirees and one teenager giving it a try.
“That’s not bad for your first try,” says Omar Jimenez, a teacher and trained psychologist, as he inspects a doll presented to him by one of the men in training. “But you could have wrapped the diaper a bit tighter. And it’s a bit wonky. You don’t want the fluids getting out!”
The trainee, Sergio Rivera, nods with a tinge of disappointment. But much like the other men attending this pop-up session in southern Bogota, the 26-year-old is himself a work in progress.
“It’s like a breath of fresh air to learn this,” says Rivera, who has autism and is cared for by his mother. His parents divorced when he was still very young, leaving his mother to raise him and his older brother alone. “I was never taught how to do it as a boy.”
On this warm December day, the men have just 30-minute “taster” slots to learn the basics like using toys to play with children and how to braid the hair of a partner, but the session is part of the wider Escuela de Hombres al Cuidado program, or “care school for men.”
Since 2021, the radical, city-run project has been teaching men across Colombia’s sprawling capital how to be better husbands, fathers, brothers, sons, and any other societally-defined masculine role.
Teacher Omar Jimenez Vega observes a man try to change a diaper at a pop-up session run by the Care school for men
The city’s authorities believe the initiative will go some way to tackling the country’s entrenched machismo culture, or male chauvinism, and by extension encourage men to contribute their fair share of caregiving and domestic work, which they say is at the root of much of the country’s gender inequality.
“My mother worked so hard bringing me up and providing for me,” says Rivera, who came across the event by chance walking along the street. “But it shouldn’t just be left for women to do. Us men have to play our part.”
Research by the Colombia’s Ministry of Culture, Sport and Recreation, shared exclusively with CNN, shows that the initiative may already be having some impact. A survey from late 2023 suggests more men and women in Bogota say that they distribute household work equally than in 2021. There have also been changes in beliefs around gender roles and masculinity, aided by men like Jimenez.
Making more caring kinds of masculinities the norm
After another round of changing diapers, the group moves swiftly onto a different lesson in caring: hair braiding. The idea is that the activity, simple as it is, will catalyze men to be more supportive of and attentive to their partners.
Four mannequin heads in dark brown wigs are set up under a canopy beside Jimenez’s van, which travels around the city running introductory sessions like these at a number of sites each week.
The men gather around the models somewhat hesitantly.
“What’s the most important thing when braiding a woman’s hair?” asks Jimenez, wearing a bright turquoise apron as he leads the class.
“Oh oh, wash your hands!” exclaims one attendee with glee.
“Should we put on gloves?” offers another with less certainty.
“Those are nice suggestions,” replies Jimenez. “But my answer is: do it with tenderness.”
The men let out enthusiastic gasps as if a great secret of the universe was just revealed to them and soon get to work at the unorthodox hair salon.
Among them is Luis Martinez, a former construction worker who struggles to braid the mannequin’s hair neatly. His intensive job meant the 67 year old rarely had time at home with his wife and three sons, but now his schedule has freed up and Martinez says the session has opened his eyes to how to be a better husband.
“I’ll do it for my partner,” says Martinez, entwining the long brown locks of the mannequin with his well-worn palms. “She deserves it. I neglected her before.”
A man learning how to braid hair at the mobile van session in Bogota
The morning’s event intends to make more caring kinds of masculinities the norm and, in turn, rebalancing extensive gender inequalities in relation to unpaid care work.
The gender care gap in Colombia’s capital is particularly stark. About 30% of Bogota’s female population – 1.2 million women – provide unpaid care full-time, averaging 10 hours a day. Women as a whole – including those also in paid work – dedicate an average of five hours and 32 minutes to care work each day compared to two hours and 19 minutes for men, amounting to more than 13 hours spent working each day, according to the 2017 national time use survey. If these hours by women were paid, they would represent 13% of the city’s gross domestic product (GDP).
In 2018, there were 647 million working age, full-time, unpaid caregivers worldwide, according to a report by the International Labor Organization (ILO), providing everything from child and elderly care, to cleaning, cooking and emotional support. About 94% of them (606 million) were women.
More broadly, according to data from 88 countries and territories gathered by UN Women between 2001 and 2017, women on average devote 18% of their day to unpaid care and domestic work, compared with the 7% spent by men. But one region, North Africa and Western Asia, the data shows women do six times more unpaid care work than men.
“The world couldn’t function without these women,” says Clara Alemann, director of programs at Equimundo, an international nonprofit fighting for gender equality. “They do the only job required for all other jobs to exist. But care work is still not properly recognized.”
Equimundo’s 2023 State of the World’s Fathers report stated the need for governments across the world to “promote men’s involvement in care work, prevent gender-based violence, teach the value of care, and promote equitable, nonviolent, caring relationships.”
This is exactly what the Bogota City Hall team is doing, propelled by the city’s first woman and g*y elected mayor, Claudia López, when she was in the role, making it one of few cities worldwide spearheading a revolution in the care economy.
‘Women weren't born with DNA of knowing how to care’
In 2020, the city of Bogota opened its first-ever “Manzanas del Cuidado,” or “Care Block.” These neighborhood centers offer numerous free services to caregivers in one space, including laundry, legal aid, daycare, psychological support, language lessons, STD testing, and yoga and dance classes.
In short, they provide care and support for caregivers, like Rivera’s mother, on a scale and scope never seen before.
“A third of the women in Bogota devote their lives to caregiving, but until now there was nothing for them,” says Diana Rodríguez who developed the initiative as the then women’s affairs secretary under Lopez.
The city of 7.5 million people (with the population reaching 10 million when Greater Bogota is included) now has 22 Care Blocks, funded through a public budget of $800,000 annually, and, according to the team, the aim is to have 45 Care Blocks in action by 2035,
Between March 2021 and December 2023, almost 250,000 caregivers benefited from the services, of which 83% (205,000) were women, including 37,000 people who received education for their high school diplomas and training in computer skills and English. An estimated 38,000 women and their families received entrepreneurship support to improve their employability.
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