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Hello and welcome back to the 
Tiny Pod. 

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This week I want to talk about 
misogyny. 

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The word misogyny comes from the
Greek words misos meaning hatred

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and gyne meaning woman. 
So literally, the hatred of 

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women. 
The concept is ancient. 

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Fear of women's power is visible
in ancient Greek philosophy, in 

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patriarchal religions, witch 
trials, the establishment of 

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law, and societal obsession with
purity and controlling female 

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sexuality across civilizations. 
Ancient Greek societies depended

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heavily on women as the 
foundation of society and 

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family. 
Yet Greek literature and 

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philosophy also reveals fear and
resistance to women's power, 

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autonomy, and influence. 
This tension between needing 

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women and fearing women is not a
modern phenomenon. 

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It runs through some of the 
oldest texts we have and still 

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today. 
Societies rely profoundly on 

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women while simultaneously 
seeking to control and diminish 

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them. 
The word misogyny came into use 

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in the English language in the 
17th century in response to anti

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women pamphlets, but it was not 
until the 1970s that it became 

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used more widely to discuss the 
entrenched social prejudice, 

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contempt and hostility women 
face. 

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It is not always a conscious 
hatred of women. 

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It can manifest as unexamined 
assumptions about women, 

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femininity, power, emotion, 
worth and status. 

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Men can love their mothers, 
wives, daughters, sisters, 

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support women's rights and still
carry unexamined internalised 

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misogyny, feeling threatened by 
female competence and strength, 

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listening to other men more 
seriously than women, viewing 

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male anger as strength and 
female anger as instability, and

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expecting emotional labour from 
women without even noticing it. 

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Misogyny is often invisible to 
the person carrying it because 

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it feels normal. 
One of the deepest forms of 

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misogyny isn't hatred. 
It is devaluation, the 

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unconscious belief that 
masculine things are somehow 

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more real, more important, 
rational, serious, or valuable, 

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diminishing feminine qualities 
while valuing masculine ones. 

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Misogyny doesn't just hurt 
women, it shrinks men too. 

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When you fundamentally fear, 
resent, or objectify half the 

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human race, intimacy becomes 
almost impossible. 

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You cannot deeply love what you 
secretly despise or fear, 

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because fear and love cannot 
exist simultaneously. 

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Men miss out on connection when 
they are afraid of being 

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vulnerable, being seen and being
known. 

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Unexamined misogyny causes an 
inattention in men. 

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They struggle to relate to women
as people rather than functions.

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Women are reduced to somebody, 
someone, mother, wife, sexual 

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partner, carer instead of a 
complete human being with her 

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own interior life and this leads
to a conflict in men. 

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They want women to be beautiful,
nurturing, emotionally 

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available, supportive, sexual, 
forgiving, easygoing, 

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independent, successful all at 
the same time. 

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And status symbols, sex symbols,
paintings to hang on their arm 

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to be seen and not heard and so 
become frustrated when an actual

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human woman appears instead of 
the fantasy. 

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Misogyny in the workplace often 
appears as scrutiny. 

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Men and women's behaviour, 
accolades and contribution can 

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be identical, but the 
interpretation of them is wildly

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opposite. 
Where a man is considered 

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assertive, a woman is classified
as difficult. 

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Men who are ambitious are 
respected while ambitious. 

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Women are framed as ruthless. 
Men are confident while women 

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are arrogant. 
Misogyny is baked into how we 

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evaluate leadership, credibility
and authority. 

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Research consistently shows 
women are judged on warmth and 

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competence simultaneously, while
men are judged on competence 

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alone. 
A woman who is competent but not

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warm enough gets penalised. 
A man who is competent and cold 

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is just competent. 
Insecure men become defensive 

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when women have more than them, 
whether money, success, status, 

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influence or intelligence, 
because it threatens their own 

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sense of worth. 
Misogyny and insecurity operate 

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together. 
Connection is treated as 

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humiliating. 
Men use words associated with 

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women to ridicule emotionality 
in other men, such as pussy, 

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whipped, emasculated and frame 
women as gold diggers, attention

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seekers and crazy. 
The language used to shame men 

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reveals misogyny as unresolved 
fear of vulnerability. 

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Many men are afraid of women. 
Psychologically, they fear 

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rejection, vulnerability or 
feeling inadequate and therefore

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misogyny becomes a defence 
against that fear. 

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If they can dismiss, reduce, and
control women, they can avoid 

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their own vulnerability, fear of
being truly known, and ignore 

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their own insecurities. 
Most misogyny is operating 

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quietly through assumptions 
people inherited, absorbed, and 

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never questioned. 
When we can become curious about

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our assumptions rather than 
defensive and question inherited

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belief systems, change becomes 
possible. 

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Healthy masculinity doesn't need
women to be small in order to 

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feel big, and healthy femininity
doesn't need men to be smaller 

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in order to feel safe. 
Healthy society is not 

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domination in either direction. 
It is being able to stand in the

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presence of another person's 
power without needing to 

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diminish it. 
Misogyny does not always feel 

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like conscious hatred in the 
person carrying it. 

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It is broader and more 
culturally embedded than that, 

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and it is subtle. 
It shows up as distrust of 

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women, dismissing women, 
controlling women, humiliating 

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women, resenting women's power, 
sexual entitlement over women, 

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punishing women when they 
disrupt traditional gender roles

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or challenge male authority, 
devaluing feminine qualities, 

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expecting emotional labour from 
women while despising them, and 

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seeing women primarily as 
bodies, services or validation 

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machines. 
Men can say they love women 

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while simultaneously 
objectifying, silencing, 

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controlling or dehumanising 
them. 

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They often fear rejection and 
dependence because independence 

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is viewed as strength and so 
love for women can feel 

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terrifying, uncomfortable and 
activate feelings of contempt, 

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resentment, entitlement and 
superiority. 

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Misogyny is relational and 
psychological before it is 

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ideological. 
Often it looks like who gets 

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believed, whose future is 
prioritised, whose pain is 

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minimised and whose violence is 
explained away. 

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Law developed when women 
couldn't vote or own property, 

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let alone practise law or sit on
juries. 

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The judicial system was built by
white men for white men and the 

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foundational architecture of 
societal systems, the political,

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financial, or legal is misogyny,
patriarchy, classism, and 

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exclusion. 
Misogyny often stems from trauma

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in childhood as a result of the 
relationship with the mother. 

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Mothers who are absent or who 
shame, idealise, infantilize, 

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engulf, reject, neglect, 
control, humiliate, or are 

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emotionally inconsistent create 
men who fear dependence, 

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vulnerability, and connection. 
They grow up both craving women 

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and resenting them. 
The mother wound leads to men 

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unconsciously associating women 
with danger, inadequacy, 

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powerlessness, criticism, 
abandonment, or emotional chaos.

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Misogyny often intensifies 
around women who refuse 

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compliance, dominance and 
control. 

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Women are idealised when they 
nurture, desired when they 

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submit, praised when they serve,
but attacked the moment they 

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become autonomous, sexual on 
their own terms, powerful, 

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ageing, opinionated, successful 
or emotionally independent. 

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Women internalise misogyny too. 
Women are raised inside 

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patriarchy as well, so misogyny 
can appear as policing other 

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women, competing with women, 
judging female sexuality more 

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harshly, excusing male 
behaviour, distrusting feminine 

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emotion or valuing male approval
above female solidarity. 

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We police each other's ambition,
appearance, sexuality and 

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mothering. 
It is how effective oppression 

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works. 
Oppressive systems don't need 

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external enforcers when those 
being oppressed enforce it 

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themselves. 
Awareness is the beginning of 

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freedom because unconscious bias
cannot be dismantled until it is

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acknowledged. 
The moment we can honestly ask, 

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why do I admire powerful men 
that resent powerful women? 

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Why does female anger make me 
uncomfortable? 

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Why do I instinctively doubt 
women, and why do I mock 

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femininity? 
We can change. 

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Misogyny is not fundamentally 
about hating women because women

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are weak. 
It is usually about fearing 

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women because women are powerful
psychologically, emotionally, 

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biologically, and relationally. 
Women create life, attachment, 

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shape identity, regulate nervous
systems, and awaken longing, 

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desire, and vulnerability. 
Women expose inadequacy with 

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their power to choose to accept 
or reject, and human beings 

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often try to control what they 
fear could emotionally destroy 

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them. 
Women are adored when they make 

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people comfortable and punished 
when they become inconveniently 

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human. 
Misogyny thrives wherever people

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split women into categories. 
Instead of seeing whole humans. 

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Modern misogyny has shape 
shifted. 

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It is less extreme than earlier 
forms of silence, inability to 

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vote or own property. 
Now men can both support women 

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and still have contempt for 
successful women, emotional 

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women, feminist women, sexual 
women, outspoken women, 

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ambitious women, and any woman 
behaving outside of male 

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convenience. 
One of the darkest forms of 

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misogyny is not overt hatred, it
is dehumanised indifference and 

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the inability to fully register 
women as internally real. 

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Women can be status symbols, 
emotional regulator, sex 

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symbols, but not full sovereign 
beings with inner worlds as rich

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and as sacred as men's. 
And that is the root of a lot of

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violence against women and 
girls, because it is 

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psychologically much easier to 
harm someone whose humanity you 

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don't value. 
Healing misogyny begins when 

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people stop relating to women as
symbols, archetypes, projections

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and fantasies and start relating
to them as complex, 

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contradictory, flawed, sacred, 
powerful human people. 

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Men heal misogyny by grieving 
the parts of themselves they 

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denied to perform masculinity, 
grieving tenderness they longed 

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for, their unmet childhood needs
and internalised shame. 

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A lot of misogyny is frozen 
grief, wearing the mask of 

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superiority. 
Misogyny isn't always easily 

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identifiable, obvious, 
cartoonish hatred. 

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It encompasses everything on the
spectrum, from violence against 

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women at one end to you're too 
emotional to lead at the other. 

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It is internalised, 
institutional and often 

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completely unconscious. 
The stigma around naming it is 

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itself a function of it, because
we cannot heal what we refuse to

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see. 
You don't have to hate women 

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consciously to perpetuate 
systems that harm them most. 

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Misogyny isn't malicious, it is 
inherited, unexamined and 

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structural. 
Sexism is the system of 

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structural bias and unequal 
treatment, and misogyny is the 

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enforcement mechanism. 
In her book Down Girl, Kate Mann

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writes sexism and misogyny share
a common purpose to maintain or 

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restore a patriarchal societal 
order. 

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Misogyny feeds a system of 
reward and punishment. 

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It does not only flow in One 
Direction or live in certain 

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places, it is embedded 
culturally. 

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Women take on men's names even 
though all people are birthed 

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through women, and women are 
always somebody someone, but 

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rarely belong to themselves. 
Misogyny and patriarchy do not 

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only hurt women, they also trap 
men inside fear of connection, 

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intimacy, and emotional 
vulnerability. 

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When tenderness is distorted as 
weakness, love feels shameful, 

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receiving care feels 
emasculating, grief feels 

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feminine, softness feels unsafe,
and men become cut off from huge

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parts of being alive. 
Healing misogyny begins with 

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awareness and examining what we 
have absorbed and what beliefs 

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we have never questioned. 
We are all equal, regardless of 

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gender, geography, status, 
ideology, or religion. 

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Anything that contradicts that 
truth is false. 

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Fear is a construct of the ego. 
Love is the truth, and love 

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heals all wounds. 
Thank you so much for your 

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support friends. 
I'll see you next week.