Almost everything about Bogart is put on, from his name—taken from the Hollywood movie star Humphrey Bogart—to his gangster persona. Bogart thinks that by spinning the other men who live on Miguel Street tall tales about his time as a 1940s-era gangster, he will be thought of as an uber-masculine male as traditionally defined.

In this part of the world, the dominant notion of masculinity is synonymous with machismo. Men in Miguel Street are expected to display certain standards of behavior consistent with traditionally defined gender roles. As well as being physically tough, they’re expected to keep women firmly in their place, to treat them as subordinates. That accounts for why Bogart impregnates a woman who isn't his wife. The prevailing notion of masculinity dictates that women are nothing but sex objects, to be used and abused as men see fit.

And this notion accounts for why Bogart commits the crime of bigamy, getting married to a woman while he’s already married to another. Though most men in this neck of the woods almost certainly wouldn’t contemplate bigamy, this crime does nonetheless have its roots in the warped vision of masculinity to which Bogart, and so many men in Miguel Street, unthinkingly adhere.