Inés Hernand: "What has happened with the BenidormFest is a kind of collective hysteria"

Just before the pandemic broke out, Inés Hernand (Madrid, 29 years old) was a mileurista lawyer in a law firm and at the same time an emerging star on social networks.

Then she came to PlayZ, the youth channel of RTVE, where the mass public could verify that she is a born communicator.

Now she has just been the presenter of the BenidormFest, that

that has turned Eurovision into a subject worthy of parliamentary debates.

She, who also has a podcast (

), a

satirical

) and an Instagram channel in which she editorializes about the hypermodern world with a radically

can not believe the commotion that has been mounted.

"I haven't dared to look at my mobile for a whole day," she says, sitting in a cafeteria next to Gran Vía. But let's start at the beginning...

Ask.

He started Art History but didn't finish it.

What is his favorite work of art?

Answer.

, by Van der Weyden,

, by Hieronymus Bosch, the

, by Caravaggio, but above all the

, by Camillo Torreggiani.

It makes me cry.

Q.

And do you collect art?

A.

No, no, I do share a flat!

With my best friend since I was 13, Andrea Compton, who saved my life, and her sister, Julia.

The three of us live today in a small apartment in Tetouan and we don't have room for more works of art than the three of us.

P.

Would you say then that you are part of the famous "precarious youth"?

A.

One hundred percent.

I started working when I was 16, in 2008, when everything collapsed and I left home at 18 because I don't have a good relationship with my parents.

I can tell you about endless misfortunes, from extremely strange rental contracts that I could only access by falsifying ridiculous pay slips with Photoshop to temporary contracts that when the time comes to become indefinite, they vanish and become agreed dismissals.

P.

At what point did you feel that you had stopped being precarious?

A.

Until September 2020 I was in a

for a financial institution and when they caught me at Playz it was when I was able to leave my job 1,080 euros per month, which I complemented with monologuist bowling in which I got 50 euros clean or advertising actions on Instagram .

There I stopped having the account always in the red at the end of the month.

Due to the pandemic, due to the pace of life we ​​lead, due to hypermodern life, which leads to derangement, we are looking for any excuse to vent our indignation

P.

And what lightbulb lit up for you to stop studying art history and start law?

R.

Like the hysterics of the Salpetriere hospital that Lacan spoke of, I tried to make an approach to my parents, who have always been absent from my life.

It was my way of asking forgiveness for my rebellion because they did not understand that I did not follow the family trail of the world of law.

It was a career that paid me with my work.

I have cleaned buckets in a Kentucky Fried Chicken here on Gran Vía, I have delivered pizzas from Telepizza, I have been a domestic cleaner in a house on Narváez street...

Q.

What is the workplace that you have found to be the most sexist?

R.

The judicial.

You only need to examine the large firms and see that among the partners less than 10% are women.

The first thing they do when you enter a law firm is to insinuate you, violating article 18 of the Spanish Constitution, that if you are going to be a mother... It seems that the jobs are qualified, as the intellectual demands are different, they are going to be more egalitarian, but my experience is that it is not.

Q.

And in comedy has a lot of machismo been found?

R.

I have been lucky enough to create my own audience from scratch, but when I was going to do open microphones, I did notice that a man came out, farted and everything was laughter, while it seems that we have to have a script of the level by Robert Mackee to make someone laugh.

We cannot be mediocre.

P.

You are representative of a very young generation and with a profile very attached to the networks of each moment.

You have been a youtuber, an

... Are you afraid of not knowing how to adapt?

A.

As you grow, the audience grows with you.

If I dedicated myself to making other types of content, for example eating Korean sweets, I would take more risks.

But it is true that you go out of fashion and then what you have to do is forge a position within the

to be able to continue your profession and exercise it in the most dignified and honest way possible.

Q.

Is entering Eurovision as a presenter part of that strategy?

R.

Sometimes you go to work in places where you limit your editorial line to certain limits by accepting other benefits for yourself.

P.

And is it cutting a lot with Eurovision?

R.

I'm cutting myself, yes.

I don't want to pass judgment because my role there was as a presenter.

And I also don't like to keep fueling discord on something that goes nowhere.

This syntactic civil war that has been reached, in which the lyrics of a song are almost analyzed word by word... I understand the feeling of popular injustice and the only thing I wish is that I wish people mobilized so much in the face of abuses of pedophilia of the Church or the universal basic income.

P.

Have you been afraid of being canceled?

R.

I have been at the center of the project, I have been a very visible face and obviously I am an easy target.

I'm getting emails from mothers telling me that their daughters were my fans and that I'm sold for not taking a stand on this, but I'm very calm.

I have done the role that I had to.

It would seem quite unfair to me if they canceled me, but if they did, I would continue looking for my own spaces because the audience I am addressing is coherent and upright.

Q.

Given how analytical the youth who participate in your program are, is it not easy for you to understand why this has become politicized?

R.

I understand perfectly, but what seems horrible to me here is that the illusion is politicized.

People here had a feeling of power, of being able to choose, of feeling represented by a reality with which they identified, by a message that also represents you.

I can understand that mother has left.

What I don't understand is the hatred that has been generated against Chanel [winner of the Festival].

I can give you a string of names that have used words of hate and discredit to an artist that I think she is quite worthy.

We are talking about artistic quality.

P.

When national identities came into play, didn't you smell that there could be controversy?

R.

Well, curiously, it was the topic of [Rigoberta Bandini's] boobs that turned people on the most.

I came out with a Galician pro-independence flag in photos and videos with the Tanxungueiras, in the midst of euphoria, and that does not mean that it represents my political sentiment.

Due to the pandemic, due to the pace of life we ​​lead, due to hypermodern life, which leads to derangement, we are looking for any excuse to unleash our indignation.

Socially we are sick and what has happened here is a kind of mass hysteria.

In Spain we are quite experts in turning nonsense into a

.

It is what is happening now.

I can understand that mother has left.

What I don't understand is the hatred that has been generated against Chanel

Q.

Do you think your generation is very dramatic?

R.

I am a

and my generation has participated in demonstrations for housing, has spent 15-M in the street, all of this has led us to believe in the community.

I prefer to call on the phone and settle conflicts face to face.

However, Generation Z is more prone to social media activism.

They have a very high social commitment but a different ability to manage conflict.

Q.

Confess, how long can you go without looking at your mobile even once?

R.

I try to have mental hygiene with the networks and inform myself only of what interests me specifically but the time that more… one day [laughs].

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