President Javier Milei slammed feminism on the international stage on Wednesday, describing abortion as “a tragedy” before a gathering of the world’s business and political elite in Davos, Switzerland.
During his address at the World Economic Forum, Argentina’s libertarian leader coupled feminist campaigners with progressive movements in general, arguing that they had upended libertarianism, particularly in Western countries with capitalist economies.
Defending the free market and outing himself internationally as a climate change sceptic,” Milei attacked the “radical feminist agenda” and criticised his predecessor’s creation of a Women, Gender & Diversity Ministry in Argentina, a portfolio he removed upon taking office.
The president centred his speech around the defence of capitalism and against socialism, to which he attributes for imposing a discourse toward the detriment of individual prosperity.
Milei said he considers that both feminism and the environmental discussion have aided socialist ideologies that “have taken strong hold in society” and “have managed to co-opt the common sense of the Western world.”
“All that this radical feminism agenda has led to is greater state intervention to hinder the economic process, giving a job to bureaucrats, who have not contributed anything to society,“ Milei said.
Socialists “claim that we human beings harm the planet, which must be protected at all costs, even advocating population control mechanisms or the tragedy of abortion.”
The La Libertad Avanza leader claimed that liberalism already provides for gender equality, and that a more progressive ideology will only lead to more regulation and, ultimately, poverty.
Milei is a known opponent of abortion and his administration has not ruled out an attempt to repeal the Voluntary Interruption of Pregnancy Law passed by Congress in December 2020.
At the end of his speech, Milei championed businessmen and entrepreneurs, thanking them for being “social benefactors” and “heroes.”
He also advised the world’s top political and economic figures to not be intimidated by “parasites of the state,” and to “let no one tell you that your ambition is immoral.”
– TIMES/NA
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