Rafa! 🤍

The fact that Penelope is viewed as the "masculine" one in the relationship simply because Odysseus is a sensitive man who cries, feels, and is affected by the things he does only reinforces the stereotype that that women, or anything related to femininity, are "sensitive" and weak. Penelope isn't strong because she's Spartan and "could fight off suitors on her own," she's strong because she endured 20 years with 108 men wanting to do horrible things to her just to stay loyal to her husband that she didn't even know was alive. The association that strength is only "valid" when it is physical and masculine only proves that people cannot see a woman as strong in herself; they need to to create a narrative that makes her "the man" in the relationship and physically strong enough to be respected, Penelope is strong because she is a queen, she is smart, she was the only one who could match Odysseus's intellect, not because she is Spartan or a warrior, because she wasn't.

Changing the stereotypes of a standard heterosexual relationship between the two genders is just as misogynistic as the common stereotypes.

They might even say it's a joke depiction, but it affects their characters just as much as a truthful ones, because the greatest truths are often found in jokes, and only exacerbates a prejudice that is already structural in nature.