Why is there misogyny?

February 21, 2012 5:12 AM

Where does misogyny come from, and why does it persist in our society when so many other prejudices seem to be losing steam?

I've been thinking a lot about misogyny in the past week or so, mostly spurred on by the GOP's sudden, almost violent attack on women. I'm kind of baffled by the whole phenomenon.

Here's what confuses me: I was taught (in the context of other prejudices) that knowing someone of the hated minority group helps reduce bigotry. This is usually the explanation for why gay rights have skyrocketed in popularity in the past few decades: more and more gay sons, daughters, nieces, nephews, etc. coming out means fewer homophobes. And it also explains why the black civil rights movement has been taking longer than the gay civil rights movement: segregation, formal and informal, kept/keeps blacks and whites from getting to know one another as people.

There doesn't seem to be a place in the social contact hypothesis for misogyny. Because all of these sexist men presumably have mothers, sisters, aunts, nieces, grandmothers, wives, girlfriends, female colleagues, female friends, etc. How can you hate women and love your mother? How can you disdain women and respect your female teachers? How can you be essentially surrounded by a minority group for your entire life and still be prejudiced against them? How do you "other" someone who lives in your house, who sleeps in your bed? And how, after so much intimate (literally!) contact with women, are so many men still so sexist?

I want to be clear that I'm not questioning the existence of misogyny. Certainly, after the past week, you'd have to have your head in the sand to do that. It's more that... I want it to go away, and I want to be a part of fighting it, but I feel like I have to understand where it comes from before I can do anything useful. And I flat-out do not understand.

Is misogyny just fundamentally different from every other prejudice? And if so, what fuels it? Where does it come from? And how do we fight it?

posted by Anyamatopoeia to Society & Culture (9 answers total)

The more members of a "minority" there are, the easier it is to apply negative stereotypes to all of them, because you've seen plenty examples of the so-called universal behavior. Someone whose mind is wired toward classifying and sorting and judging people by their demographics is going to see whatever they want to see.
posted by gjc at 5:26 AM on February 21, 2012

I think I would reject one premise of your question insofar is it pertains to a social contact hypothesis being inapplicable to misogyny. You are correct that homophobia has declined, racism has declined, as straight/white/etc people (and I assume without checking you are American) in your society have become more exposed to people with different backgrounds or value structures. But this has surely not eliminated homophobia or racism. There are millions of straight people who are exposed to gay people through the workplace or through popular culture who continue to harbour great disgust towards them and what they perceive to be as their 'lifestyle'. There are millions of whites who work with minority groups during the day but who would be horrified if their daughter dated one of them.

So it is unsurprising, then, that that there are millions of men (I assume your question is not suggesting that all men are misogynists) that remain backwards in their views regarding women despite being regularly exposed in the home, school, or workplace to smart, capable, independent women.

So, this doesn't answer your question "where does misogyny come from?" or "how do we fight it?", but it does answer "is misogyny fundamentally different from every other prejudice?" with the answer "probably not". If other forms of discrimination appear to be declining to you but not this one, it may simply be that those forms do not apply to you and therefore you are more attuned to the concerns of women rather than other groups who may be discriminated against (which is only natural).
posted by modernnomad at 5:30 AM on February 21, 2012 [2 favorites]

How can you be essentially surrounded by a minority group for your entire life and still be prejudiced against them? How do you "other" someone who lives in your house, who sleeps in your bed? And how, after so much intimate (literally!) contact with women, are so many men still so sexist?

It is the same as misandry. It isn't akin to racism. Racism is not a fear of the known, it's a fear of the unknown. Women aren't even a minority. They are a demographic majority.

Second, the backward positions The Bishops are taking aren't misogyny. They're wrong from my point of view, but it is a religious doctrine. There's a difference between a power structure that favors men and actual dislike of women.

The actual dislike of women is simple. Human beings hurt one another. And misogyny, like misandry is universalizing a dislike for one or two people to a dislike for everyone who belongs in that class of people. It is part of the human ability/weakness to categorize things.

Also, probably chatfilter
posted by Ironmouth at 5:37 AM on February 21, 2012

Here's what confuses me: I was taught (in the context of other prejudices) that knowing someone of the hated minority group helps reduce bigotry.

Sometimes familiarity really does breed contempt.
posted by fuse theorem at 5:44 AM on February 21, 2012

I think it's really just a question of inertia. There are an immense number of cultural (and, yes, biological) structures surrounding male control and exchange of women's bodies that still have to be overcome. To a large extent we've been trying to rebuild thousands of years of tradition from the ground up all in the last 50 years; the periodic backlashes are manifestations of the resistance of this very old system (and the class of people who are most privileged under it) trying to protect itself.

Of course there's also an extent to which "misogyny," in the sense of "women hatred," is itself a somewhat misleading frame. Someone like Santorum would feel totally comfortable using the David Brent line: "How can I hate women? My wife/mom/daughter is one." From the perspective of these men they're trying to retain the "natural" structures of male-superiority that will make EVERYONE happiest. They view what we call misogyny as love and care for women; many think we're the women-haters.

They're completely wrong, but that's how they understand it to themselves. To that extent misogyny is somewhat different than racism or homophobia, which commonly take a much more hate-filled or eliminationist tone. Women's high "value" -- an exchange value -- in traditional social structures made them something that has to be tightly policed and controlled; contemporary attempts at gender equality frequently come into conflict with very old, deeply engrained ideas about how this policing has to work.
posted by gerryblog at 5:46 AM on February 21, 2012 [4 favorites]

There are more real and obvious differences between women and men than there are between black people and white people, or between straight people and gay people.

For a start, on average women are physically weaker, shorter and have higher voices. All of these things are likely to play directly into people's prejudices - see this paper on how height is correlated with career success even when controlling for gender.

Many folks' positions on racism seem to be along the lines of race-blindness - "I don't see race; I don't perceive differences between races; I treat everyone the same", and while you'll find plenty of commentary on why that is problematic, it's still a popular view that is substantially less racist than "I do see race and I think people of some races are inferior". But you won't catch anyone seriously suggesting the corresponding position that they don't see gender or that they perceive no differences between men and women.
posted by emilyw at 5:47 AM on February 21, 2012

I think misogyny is driven by one of the most powerful forces operating within humanity - male insecurity.

Racism and homophobia have a different animating force - a fear of "the other" and simple irrational hatred. They can be overcome by simply finding out that black, gay John over there is actually a pretty decent dude, he's not really all that different, and he didn't freak out when my dog invaded his backyard and then he lent me his circular saw. In many cases, that's all it takes to dissipate the aura of "otherness."

Women, by dint of being unavoidable, can't really be "other'd". But they have traditionally played a role wherein they are dumber, weaker, and subordinate - which to an insecure and perhaps beaten-down man, allows him to feel like at least he has control over something. He can use the woman to inflate his own ego. And when the woman actually demonstrates that she's tired of subordination, and is actually totally smart and doesn't really need the man - well hell hath no fury...

IMO, its really no coincidence that, in a given society, the degree of misogyny correlates with the quantity of frustrated, directionless, undereducated young men. In the US, its tempting to think that misogynistic tendencies go along with religion, but they go along with poverty as well as religion, and I think povety is by far the more important fo the two.

Of course there's also the weird deeply-planted Christian stuff, not totally dissimilar in viciousness from anti-semitism, but that's a different ramble.
posted by tempythethird at 5:48 AM on February 21, 2012

The radical feminist analysis, if I recall correctly, is that misogyny is a "root" hatred, a sort of paradigm of creating up-downs with the with the/an other, that sort of lays a psychological ground work that supports all other bigotries.

I think you have a couple of unfounded presumptions in your statement: racism and its acceptability has gone down - and so has misogyny/sexism and its acceptability. Which has gone down further? Not so clear to me. Also, people have always been very capable of despising each other from up close as well as from a distance. Look at the examples of rich Southern white families where kids were raised by black slaves from birth and it didn't do a thing to topple the structure. Look at the towns in Eastern Europe that were 30%+ Jewish and suffered through pogroms even before the Nazis successfully wiped them out almost completely.

I think that the analysis that you were taught was probably helpful at the time and may even be mostly true as far as regards homophobia, but won't necessary take you much further. Bigotry can be varied and complex. A third wave feminist analysis pays a lot of attention to the "intersectionality" of bigotries and how they support and reinforce one another. There is some great reading to be done if you're up for it!
posted by Salamandrous at 5:49 AM on February 21, 2012 [1 favorite]

You've got to take religion into account as well. A lot of people are taught that women are inherently more evil because Eve ate the apple and convinced Adam to do the same.
posted by TooFewShoes at 5:53 AM on February 21, 2012