Different day, same misogyny…

I recently posted this quote:

“The test of misogyny is not whether you love your wife and daughters and care about their opportunities and welfare.

The test is whether you care about the opportunities and welfare of women who don’t give you love, attention, and affection.”

The replies were predictable…

Why is it that whenever a woman says something grounded in lived experience, it can’t just be heard? Why does it so often have to be challenged, reframed, or turned into something else entirely?

Because what’s usually happening isn’t disagreement, it’s an attempt to dismiss or shut women down.

A woman says something, and some men feel an almost automatic need to derail it, reframe it, demand a counter example, centre themselves, or turn it into a “gotcha”.

Not because the point isn’t clear, but because actually taking it in would mean sitting with some discomfort.

For a lot of men, especially online, a woman speaking clearly seems to trigger something like, ‘If this is true, what does that say about me, or the system I benefit from?’ And instead of sitting with that, the instinct is to neutralise it by turning it into a debate, calling it misandry, demanding a forced comparison, or dragging the conversation somewhere else entirely.

It’s not really about logic.

It’s about control.

There’s also a bigger cultural piece here. Many men are socialised to see themselves as the default human. So when women speak about women as a group, it’s suddenly seen as exclusionary or threatening, even when it’s simply naming reality.

And the thing is, women aren’t asking for permission. We’re not asking for approval or a debate. We’re stating something true.

And for people who are uncomfortable with women having that authority, the instinct is almost always the same, discredit first, understand never.

It’s not lost on me that here I am again posting about misogyny. But it’s also not lost on me the way in which misogyny is playing out. It seems to be acceptable 😕.