The family structure characteristic of Mexico and Spain—absent father and indulgent mother—predisposes male children to homosexuality. The Don Juan tradition and aspects of Catholicism are seen as compromise formations arising from the conflict between homosexual drives and countering defenses. The bullfight, in which the fancily clad matador, passive and defensive at the outset, becomes aggressive and penetrating, enacts the triumph of masculinity over femininity in the bullfighter and those who identify with him.