She Knows
It's hard to be shocked by what you know to be true
It’s not often that I read about misogyny through a male lens.
I came across an essay that was less anecdotes of sexism or third-hand stories and more come-to-Jesus recognition, a naming of the invasive rot that eats away from the inside.
Systemic misogyny is a slow, methodical churn. It’s baked into our actions from childhood, the flavor of girl-cootie muffins in an EZ-Bake Oven. It’s reinforced in the way that men bond through the distrust and dislike of women. It’s codified in the language of frat boys and locker rooms.
Anyone who thinks the fluency of vulgarity is limited to locker rooms is full of shit. Vulgar misogyny is the first language of every room where men sit.
To many men, women are nothing more than a commodity. We are fields to plough and soil in which to plant seed and flags, conquests and victories. We are belt notches and bragging rights, no more than the sum of our body parts. We are holes and tits.
To many men.
Too many men.
How much does that extra o change?
I finished reading and typed a comment.
We know.
We know how much men, not individual men, but men, the pulsating mass of masculinity, feel about us.
We know.
Here’s what breaks me. Somewhere, there’s a girl who is reading a story of princesses and ball gowns. A girl who will strive to be beautiful, not too much or too little, but a human bowl of Baby Bear porridge, in the hopes of meeting a Prince Charming. If she grows her hair long and crosses her legs at the ankle when she sits, maybe one day her prince will come. He will pledge his love and protect her from danger. Because that’s what princes do.
It will be a while before she understands that statistically, the guy who calls himself charming is her biggest danger, before she understands the castle is really a tower, and the window is too high to climb down from.
We know what you think of us.
That’s what breaks me—knowing how many women are rooting for men to be the fucking prince anyway. Watching women give men endless chances to write a happy ending, to mount that steed and do something noble. Instead, there are news stories of men who take pictures of strangers and run them through nudify apps, of husbands who make deep-fake AI porn videos, and about groups of men who trade tips about the best way to drug their wives.
We know.
The depth and breadth of misogyny is staggering, the author implies, the way it oozes across borders and runs over banks. It’s everywhere, he says. Not just the far right or the far left. It’s up and down. Left, right, center. Men that he knows, friends.
We know, I screamed inwardly. We know.
How many women are surprised when a man is outed as an abuser, as a harasser, as a rapist?
This one jerked off in a plant before a woman went on stage for her comedy act, and that one demanded a back rub to cast a part. This one groomed a fourteen-year-old and called her a muse. This one drugged his wife and invited the internet to rape her.
These are the men we were told to trust. Husbands and brothers. Teachers, coaches, doctors, and mentors. Artists and authors, activists and athletes. The professors, the police officers, the princes.
We know.
We know because we hear how you talk about us, not just in words you use—bitch, whore, slut—but in the ones you don’t—friend, confidante, equal. We hear it in the silences.
We see it whenever we log online.
The hatred of women is so prevalent, so pervasive, that it’s monetized by grifters and influencers who make their money by commodifying misogyny. We are snake oil.
We know.
We know because we see the way women’s joy is belittled, in the relentless mocking of pumpkin spice or Heated Rivalry. We know because we understand the way language is weaponized into a value pyramid.
Art vs. craft.
Passion vs. hobby.
Humanity vs. woman.
We know because we can hear the contempt that drips like venom, in the way that men speak over us, or through us, or as if we’re not there at all.
We know.
We know it by the way men talk about the women in their lives, or don’t. Too many men don’t seem to have women in their lives, save for a mother who didn’t do enough, a villainous ex, and the sea of women denying them a place to dock their cock.
We know.
The girl outgrows her princess dress and goes on a date with a man who doesn’t ask a single question about her. He doesn’t try to find out what makes her tick or what she’s reading or why she’s studying history. He doesn’t ask about her friends or her family or silly stories from her childhood. He asks if she wants to go home with him.
Even though she doesn’t know she knows, she knows.
Sometimes, women are so hungry for men to understand us that we lap up the crumbs that we’re given. An essay acknowledging what we know in our bones is sweet, but only for a moment. It’s like the first hit of chocolate on your tongue before it makes you feel slightly sick.
Because sometimes, men use empathy as a different way to gain access.
We know.
The author sympathizes with why some women might hate men, and while that’s sometimes true, it’s not the whole story. That too is reductive.
We don’t hate men. We hate the system. The system churns women up and spits us out, but we’ve learned how to survive the worst of its teeth. We’ve learned how to exist in the spaces in between.
What choice have you given us?
No one teaches men how to survive the system. And so the boys who want to bake muffins in an EZ Bake oven are called slurs, and the frat boys who long to have female friends are mocked, and the men who are afraid of feeling anything other than victimhood and rage eat themselves from the inside out, and the system cleans its teeth with their bones.
You think we don’t see, that we don’t understand what the system does to all of us?
We know.
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When women are arrested for miscarriage or choosing to end a pregnancy while child rapists go free.
Because even if you sell your soul for the patriarchy, you’re still the first one to get sold.
We know.
YES. We know. None of this has been surprising to me. But just because we aren't surprised doesn't make the fury and heartbreak any easier.