# Misogynistic language and its defenders **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [June 26, 2025, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162 "2025-06-26T16:25:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2025, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/161 "2025-07-20T23:29:32Z")
Where’s that like button? I love seeing systemic oppression of women dismissed as “be any of that as it may.” ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2025, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/162 "2025-07-20T23:46:45Z")
We can’t work on any one problem unless we work on all problems at the same time? What a great way to avoid working on _any_ problems. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/163 "2025-07-21T00:01:30Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > Be any of that as it may, I’m not sure what good it does to make those comparisons. Accuracy? I think it’s good to be accurate. I think it’s also good that we recognize a lot of that bad talk about single men is emblematic of the patriarchy, that very same one women are always complaining about. Men are often the collateral damage of the patriarchy, but we should be clear about who it has in its crosshairs. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/164 "2025-07-21T01:29:39Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > We can’t work on any one problem unless we work on all problems at the same time? I’m suggesting exactly the opposite; we can work on multiple problems at the same time, so we should. > [@crowmanyclouds](#): > > All ~~lives~~ hateful insulting language matters! The difference is that the Black Lives Matter movement requires very specific actions. Individual acts of police brutality need to be identified, investigated, and prosecuted. It takes time and resources to do those things, as well as creating the legal framework for them. When you can’t fix everything, there’s a reason to prioritize the worst abuses. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/165 "2025-07-21T01:47:46Z")
I mean, in the ideal world, there wouldn’t be any anti-male sexism, and all else being equal, any move to decrease the amount of anti-male sexism is a good thing… but anti-male sexism is a small enough problem that, really, even if we don’t do anything to try to fix it, that’s basically OK. > [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > I think it’s also good that we recognize a lot of that bad talk about single men is emblematic of the patriarchy, that very same one women are always complaining about. Men are often the collateral damage of the patriarchy, but we should be clear about who it has in its crosshairs. This is also an important point. The worst parts of anti-male sexism, such as it is, are so tied up with anti-female sexism that the best way to address it is to address anti-female sexism. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/166 "2025-07-21T01:55:35Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > …but anti-male sexism is a small enough problem that, really, even if we don’t do anything to try to fix it, that’s basically OK. That argument goes both ways. If anti-male language is so negligible, you could agree to help stamp it out and you wouldn’t have to actually change anything. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/167 "2025-07-21T02:19:28Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > but anti-male sexism is a small enough problem that, really, even if we don’t do anything to try to fix it, that’s basically OK. Almost 30 years now (so I’m not as sore about it as then, but still…) I came home, not knowing what was waiting for me on the other side of the door (a common apprehension in abusive relationships), and this time it’s to an eight year old girl whose been beaten with the buckle-end of a belt under the bed on her room, and my wife barricaded with a gallon jug of Ernest and Julio in the other bedroom. I scooped the little girl up and off we went to the ER. There I had to deal with a nurse who was sure I’m the abuser, since, as TV assures us, men are bad and women are good. Then I have to talk a summoned white-knighting cop out of handcuffing me. Eventually my daughter, with the preternatural maturity often bestowed on abused kids perforce, gave credible advice to the adults who were so fucking sure they knew what was really going on. The actual abuser was forcefully separated from her beloved Ernest and Julio and spent a weekend in jail (not the first or last time) and sent to a $5K anger management program. I was the source of the $5K, obviously. This story played out again and again. The only difference now is that we get online scolds telling us it’s just “internalized misogyny” that makes mommies beat little children, or that it’s the Patriarchy that men asked for coming back to bite them in the ass. So I guess I have to agree with the sage wisdom of @Chronos. Sexism against men isn’t that big a deal, because men are just those people who are expected to willingly sacrifice everything for their families, and so long as their families get a shot at survivali, Dad’s job is done. I went through Hell when there was nobody there for me; just Ipeople who dismiss or even laugh. ---
**Author:** ![Sylvanz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/fbc32d/32.png) [@Sylvanz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sylvanz)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/168 "2025-07-21T02:21:43Z")
This is something one of my professors in uni. Had us do. Write down or at least think of all the derigatory names used toward women. Then write or think of all the ones used toward men. ---
**Author:** ![FluffyBob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecb155/32.png) [@FluffyBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FluffyBob)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/169 "2025-07-21T05:12:38Z")
Thats a horrific story. I can’t imagine how difficult that must have been. I hope you and your family have found healing. You make your point vividly. Trivializing the significance of a type of violence or injustice as somehow a derivative of another issue is at the very least insensitive. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 6:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/170 "2025-07-21T06:28:14Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > The difference is that the Black Lives Matter movement requires very specific actions. Individual acts of police brutality need to be identified, investigated, and prosecuted. Utter fucking bullshit. Unless the specific action you’re talking about is defunding the po-po’'s (which it clearly wasn’t), actually addressing what BLM is about requires major _systemic_ changes, not piecemeal actions for each individual incident. Because it’s a protest about _systemic_ injustice. Hey, that’s _just like the Patriarchy_. So you picked a good analogy, even though you were in all other ways wrong about it. Good blind squirrel! > [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > When you can’t fix everything Who says you can’t. ‘Will not’ is not the same as ‘cannot’. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 12:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/171 "2025-07-21T12:03:39Z")
Yup, that’s an excellent example of anti-male sexism that’s fundamentally tied up with anti-female sexism. The sexism you faced was that society assumed that in an abusive relationship, it’s the man who’s abusive. And the reason why society assumes that is that it’s usually (not always, but usually) true. The easiest way to get society to stop assuming that is to stop the men who are actually abusing their families. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/172 "2025-07-21T16:33:40Z")
Mothers are more likely to commit non-sexual child abuse than fathers. Beyond that, group punishment and collective guilt don’t exactly serve the greater good. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/173 "2025-07-21T16:46:12Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#): > > Mothers are more likely to commit non-sexual child abuse than fathers. Depends on how you define things. If we’re counting neglect as a form of abuse, there are a lot of fathers who commit absolute and total neglect of their children. Which is probably a large factor in recorded abuse being disproportionately the mothers. In other words, if both parents neglect a child, the father is likely to be called a deadbeat and other insulting terms, but not something criminal. But the mother is likely to be charged with criminal neglect. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/174 "2025-07-21T16:58:18Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > And the reason why society assumes that is that it’s usually (not always, but usually) true. The easiest way to get society to stop assuming that is to stop the men who are actually abusing their families. I think to me the solution looks a lot like rejecting patriarchal gender norms that conclude men must always be violent and women must always be helpless victims. My mother was physically and emotionally abusive, not just to me but her husband was well. And she was very good at victim posturing. When I was in college they had an altercation - I wasn’t there - in which he apparently shoved her, she tripped over a box and ended up permanently disabled. I don’t know what happened. I do know that as far as I know that’s the only time he ever was the perpetrator of violence against her. From that point forward she was a “survivor of domestic violence.” She got to add that to the story of how he abused me for maximum sympathy effect. The only time she ever acknowledges anyone else’s pain is if it serves her story of victimhood. The reason that tactic gets so much traction is because of patriarchal gender norms. The reason people blew off her behavior was because of patriarchal gender norms. The reason nobody ever looked closer at what was going down in that house was because of patriarchal gender norms. They hurt people of every gender. So I’m not saying we shouldn’t care about what happens to men. Far from it. I’m saying that caring about what happens to men requires dismantling the patriarchy. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/175 "2025-07-21T17:06:40Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#): > > Mothers are more likely to commit non-sexual child abuse than fathers. Is there a cite for that fact? ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/176 "2025-07-21T17:16:43Z")
“Of the 192,321 unique perpetrators in the data set, 89,028 (46%) were male and 103,293 (54%) were female.” [Cite](https://aspe.hhs.gov/reports/male-perpetrators-child-maltreatment-findings-ncands-1#:~:text=Some%20research%20shows%20that%20when,and%20classifications%20of%20male%20perpetrators.) ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/177 "2025-07-21T17:20:39Z")
_That report is from Dec 31, 2004, over 20 years ago._ ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/178 "2025-07-21T17:25:03Z")
Should child abuse statistics be held the same as combat deaths in Iraq? BTW 2004 was coincidentally when my encounter occurred ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/179 "2025-07-21T17:29:00Z")
Do you or do you not have stats that are not more than two decades old? If you start a “Combat Deaths In Iraq” thread elsewhere, I might participate. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2025, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162/180 "2025-07-21T17:32:44Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#): > > There I had to deal with a nurse who was sure I’m the abuser, since, as TV assures us, men are bad and women are good. In my own story, I don’t see it as a bad/good binary, but that women are seen as having less agency and therefore less accountability. For my Mom there was a certain “of course she’s crazy, she’s a woman” strain of thinking that expects women to be more emotional, less rational, and therefore less subject to accountability for their actions - I think there are a few famous court cases where this argument had come into play. And since you mention TV, my Mom related strongly to the character Hellen on _Wings,_ who once drove her car into a hangar in a fit of rage (my Mom also drove her car into my adopted father’s office in a fit of rage, so when I say they related…) Of course when Hellen did it, it was the height of hilarity. This is parodied beautifully in [Crazy Ex-Girlfriend.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMHz6FiRzS8) (For context, and I didn’t even realize it until later, this was a reference to the character’s backstory, a legal defense her mother used in court after Rebecca set a man’s house on fire after he ended their relationship.) They even doubled down by creating a male character who exhibited the same characteristics as Rebecca and she had to experience how inappropriate and creepy he was. For those who need even MORE context, _Crazy Ex-Girlfriend_ is about a woman with borderline personality disorder hitting rock bottom, receiving a diagnosis, relapsing, and then finally getting her shit together. It’s also a hilarious musical. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/misogynistic-language-and-its-defenders/1020162.md?page=10)