My approach was simple. I did a series of 6 searches for specific words and phrases and took note of how old the last post on the first page was. There are always 15 entries on the front page. Thus, the age of the last entry gives you a concept of how often the word is used. If the last entry is 3 hours old, that means the word or phrase is used about 15 times in 3 hours. Simple enough. Lets begin.

Search for “misogyny” : 15th result was 21 hours old.

Search for “misandry” : 15th result was 25 days old.

Search for “I hate women” : 15th result was 3 days old.

Search for “I hate men” : 15th result was 1 day old.

Search for “women suck” : 15th result was 5 days old.

Search for “men suck“: 15th result was 1 day old.

Note: Love Added 4/14/09 for reflection:

Search for “I love women” : 15th result was 5 days old.

Search for “I love men“: 15th result was 1 day old.

So the spread between the use of “misogyny” and “misandry” is huge. The term “misogyny” is used considerably more frequently. However, open expressions of hatred towards men were significantly more frequent than expressions of hatred towards women. There definitely seems to be some kind of imbalance here.

Conclusion: While there is a significantly higher use of the term related to woman-hating, there’s more evidence supporting the occurrence of man-hating.

Why I Did This

My introduction to the term Misogyny came from an interaction with a girl. We were having a conversation on dating etiquette. I brought up a common question I often ask during that type of discussion.

“If a woman is seeking a relationship and a man is seeking a sexual experience, assuming the women has not expressed her intentions, and assuming she never explicitly asks, is the man responsible for expressing his intentions before a sexual act happens?”

I know, asking a question like that is asking for trouble. However, it also exposes a lot of important personality information you may want to know before dating someone.

Her response was that the man has the responsibility of expressing his intention because, when it came to what the woman wanted, “he should know better.” I thought this was unbalanced. I felt the woman should be responsible for verifying that the man’s intentions matched hers before choosing to sleep with him. That was about the time she called me a Misogynist. I had to go look the word up. That was years ago. It set a bit of a negative connotation to the term for me.

Now, I keep seeing the word used. I just ran into the word again, on Discover Magazine of all places. The author brought the word up while citing unwanted compliments. It kicked up a few emotions in me. I’ve heard that word so much lately, and I find it a bit frustrating to see it used, so often, in a context that I believe is unwarranted. The spark of frustration motivated me a bit. Hence, this post.

Random Footnote

While composing this post, I noticed that the term “misogyny” was in my spell check while “misandry” was not.

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