Do Women Really Believe We Are Not Worthy of Full Human Rights?
It's By Design As Defenders of the Patriarchy And Perpetrators of Sexism Target Women's Sense of Self
UN Women reported on March 6, 2025, that one in four countries report backlash on women’s rights in 2024. The human rights of women in America have been under attack both related to reproductive rights and the potential for voter suppression. Most people maintaining awareness of the current political situation believe there is more to come. With many women standing together and protesting, many more are acquiescing their rights without a peep of resistance.
Even with the known threat to women’s human rights, 53% of white women voted for Trump in the 2024 election. How can this be? Do women really feel unworthy of basic human rights? Is this the impact of the oppression of women over many millennia? Do women buy into an oppressive patriarchy? Apparently so, because as a collective, more women than not voted in a way that was not in our best interest.
I suggest this is by design and courtesy of patriarchy and its harmful norms. The research supports my thoughts on this matter.
Perpetrators of sexism, misogyny, and gender-based harassment are targeting women’s sense of self. For patriarchy to persist, feminist women, women willing to stand up and speak up must be kept in their place. Supporters of the patriarchy, supporters that include women, do not think that place is in the White House.
When we think of oppression, we need to remember the goal is keeping the oppressed group in a subordinate position. Distorting the self-regard of the target lessens the likelihood that the oppressed feel worthy enough to fight back and hold appropriate boundaries. After all, why would a woman stand up for herself and other women if the underlying, maybe even unconscious, belief is, “Maybe I deserve to be treated this way,” or, “Women are here to serve others and my needs don’t count.” We learn by watching that women who stand up for the rights of women are harassed, threatened, and pathologized.
Across the world, men tend to report higher self-esteem than women. Even when a woman does feel good about herself, she does not have societal permission to name it or brag. That would make her stuck up. We don’t like stuck-up women and that is a self-esteem problem. Social approval, how others view you, and as a result treat you, including treatment that includes sexist and gendered discrimination, has an effect on self-esteem.
One study about the gender differences in self-esteem tied these differences to the tendency for men to agree with positive self-statements and women being more likely to agree with negative self-statements. This difference is perhaps tied to what the study calls “an unconscious disposition” to self-enhance, in the case of men, or self-derogate, in the case of women. We did not need a study to know that men tend to feel more qualified than they are, while for women, it is the opposite. We have all seen the aspirational call to women, perhaps on a t-shirt or coffee cup, for women to “carry yourself with the confidence of a mediocre white man.”
Self-esteem researchers Mark Leary and Geoff MacDonald point to the harm of sexism in their chapter Individual differences in self-esteem: A review and theoretical integration in the Handbook of Self and Identity. They also report that how others view and treat you has an effect on self-esteem. They define the intended harm as targeting the “deep sense of unconditional worth and wellbeing that sexism works to erode.”
Researchers have found that the cumulative trauma of gender discrimination does impact self-esteem. The research of Kira and associates classifies gender discrimination as a type III trauma, one that is potentially the most severe form of trauma. Gender-based trauma is pervasive, insidious, chronic, and ongoing trauma with accumulative effects. It may not stop, at least not in our lifetimes.
Unless of course, we wake up, stand up, and speak up.