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Modern democratic societies already recognise an important principle: some forms of discrimination and hate are so harmful that they require legal boundaries, not just social disapproval. That is why racism, religious hatred, antisemitism, and other group-based vilification are regulated under civil and criminal law. Yet one category remains conspicuously absent from that framework — misogyny.

Misogyny is not merely an opinion about women. It is a system of hostility, contempt, and dehumanisation directed at women as a class. It manifests in harassment, threats, incitement to violence, coercive control, and sustained abuse. In its most extreme forms, it escalates into physical violence and murder. Despite this, misogyny is still largely treated as a social issue rather than a legal one.

This gap matters.

We Already Criminalise Discrimination — Just Not Against Women

Most legal systems accept that speech and conduct targeting a protected group can cross a threshold where it causes serious harm to individuals and society. That is why laws exist to address racial vilification, religious hatred, and other protected characteristics. These laws are not about suppressing free speech; they are about preventing real-world harm that predictably follows dehumanisation.

Women, however, are routinely excluded from these protections.

A person can face legal consequences for publicly inciting hatred or violence against a racial or religious group, but similar conduct directed at women is often dismissed as “offensive,” “provocative,” or “part of the internet.” The implication is that harm against women is somehow less serious, less collective, or less deserving of protection.

It is none of those things.

Misogyny Is a Known Precursor to Violence

One of the strongest arguments for criminalising misogyny is evidence-based: misogynistic ideology is a well-documented pathway to violence.

Hostile attitudes toward women underpin domestic violence, sexual violence, coercive control, stalking, and online harassment campaigns. In many cases, perpetrators escalate from verbal degradation to physical harm. Law enforcement and academic research have repeatedly identified misogyny as a risk factor — not an incidental attitude, but a driving force.

We already recognise this pattern in other contexts. Racist ideology is treated seriously because it predicts harm. Extremist ideology is monitored because it escalates. Misogyny follows the same trajectory, yet remains legally invisible.

That inconsistency is not neutral. It has consequences.

Equality Before the Law Cannot Be Selective

If the law protects people from discrimination based on race, religion, sexuality, or disability, but excludes sex, then equality before the law is incomplete.

Women are not a niche group. They are not a minority defined by belief or behaviour. They are half the population. When hatred toward women is normalised, minimised, or left unregulated, it reinforces the idea that women should simply tolerate abuse as a condition of public life.

Criminalising misogyny would not mean policing disagreement or silencing criticism of ideas associated with feminism, gender roles, or policy. Laws already distinguish between lawful opinion and unlawful vilification. The same standards can apply here.

The question is not whether the law can handle misogyny. It already handles analogous forms of harm every day.

The real question is why women have been excluded.

Legal Recognition Changes Cultural Standards

Law is not only punitive; it is symbolic. What the law names as unacceptable shapes cultural norms, institutional responses, and public accountability.

When domestic violence was reframed as a crime rather than a private matter, reporting increased and social tolerance declined. When racial vilification laws were introduced, public discourse shifted. Criminalising misogyny would send a clear message: hostility toward women is not just rude or controversial — it is harmful, and it has limits.

Importantly, such laws would target conduct, not identity. They would focus on behaviour that incites harm, dehumanises, or threatens women as a group, consistent with existing hate-speech frameworks.

This Is Not About Special Treatment — It Is About Equal Protection

Opponents often argue that criminalising misogyny would create “special rights” for women. In reality, it would do the opposite. It would extend the same legal logic already applied to other protected groups.

Equality does not mean pretending harm is evenly distributed. It means responding proportionately where harm is systemic, predictable, and entrenched.

Misogyny meets that standard.

Until the law acknowledges misogyny as a serious form of discrimination — not merely bad behaviour — women will continue to be uniquely exposed to hostility with fewer protections and fewer consequences for perpetrators.

Why is it that feminists so often turn on one another over relatively small differences in view, when the foundation we all stand on is the same? At its core, feminism is built on a simple, shared belief: equality. That belief is the reason feminism exists at all. Yet instead of recognising that common ground, many discussions fracture into accusations, labels, and purity tests, as though disagreement itself is a betrayal rather than a natural consequence of independent thought.

So many feminist conversations online begin or end in attacks, dismissal through labels, or a fixation on differences rather than shared beliefs. Of course, it is often these differences that spark conversation, which is necessary for education and for provoking thought. However, when differences of opinion are shut down through policing and labelling, this becomes damaging and halts any real progression.

Instead of curiosity, there is suspicion, and instead of constructive dialogue, there is offence and defensiveness. Women dismissing other women by using labels — Rad Fem, TERF, misandrist, whatever the term — isn’t the point; I’m referring to the act of labelling itself, not the labels themselves, and how this alone divides and limits understanding. It ensures we see feminism through a very narrow lens, as though there is a single correct way to think, speak, or arrive at conclusions. In doing so, it keeps us focused on peripheral, secondary beliefs rather than the core foundation we ultimately share — the belief in equality, dignity, and autonomy — and it fragments a movement that is strongest when it recognises both its common ground and its diversity of thought.

The problem isn’t disagreement within feminism; it’s the habit of isolating one aspect of a shared belief system, naming it, and then treating that name as if it represents a separate or superior feminism. When a single lens — whether it’s class, race, sex, sexuality, or any other dimension of lived experience — is elevated and branded, feminism stops being a broad movement grounded in equality and becomes a collection of factions policing one another. What should be internal diversity turns into ideological sorting, where women are judged not on their commitment to equality but on whether they use the “correct” language or adopt the “correct” label. Feminism already contains difference. Fragmenting it into named sub-feminisms doesn’t create clarity; it creates division.

When feminists attack each other for those differences, it doesn’t weaken patriarchy — it strengthens it. A system that has always relied on dividing women doesn’t need to work very hard when women do that work themselves. Every time energy is spent policing other women instead of challenging structural inequality, momentum is lost and progress stalls. The focus shifts away from power, systems, and material conditions, and onto individual sub belief's when ultimately we are all on the same side.

Disagreement isn’t the problem. Feminism has always contained debate, tension, and evolution — that’s how ideas sharpen and movements grow. The problem is when disagreement turns into character assassination, when discussion becomes a performance of moral superiority rather than a search for truth, and when labels are used to silence rather than understand. If feminism cannot hold space for difference while remaining anchored to its core belief in equality, it risks becoming fragmented, stagnant, and inward-facing.

Can Feminism be a religion?

Religion has existed for centuries with entirely male-led hierarchy, no one questions whether that counts as a religion. No one demands a rationale for why only men may lead. No one interrogates the power imbalance at the core. We simply accept it as tradition.

“Can feminism be a religion?”

The Bias: Male Power Is “Normal,” Female Power Is “Radical”All major religions across the world have been designed, structured, written, interpreted, and governed by men, mostly exclusively. This is widely accepted. Even respected. Entire global belief systems rest on the assumption that leadership and spiritual authority naturally belong to men.

But suggest an equivalent structure led by women — not excluding men from participation, only reserving leadership — and suddenly it becomes “controversial,” “divisive,” or “dangerous.” Why?

Because patriarchy has taught us that male leadership is neutral and female leadership is political.

If religions that bar women from leadership roles are still considered legitimate:

…then logic demands that a female-led religious structure must also be legitimate.

You cannot argue both:

One is accepted without question. The other is interrogated relentlessly.

This reveals a cultural double standard, not a theological one.

Feminism as a Religion Is Not About Worship — It’s About Structure

When I ask if feminism “can be” a religion, what I'm really asking is whether it can meet the same criteria that current religions do:

a shared belief system, a moral or ethical framework, a community. organised leadership. rituals, practices, or gatherings, a sense of meaning, purpose, or higher values

Feminism already contains many of these elements. What it lacks is the permission to claim sacred space and that permission has historically been controlled by men.

So when people say, “Feminism can’t be a religion,” what they often mean is: “Women shouldn’t hold that level of power.”

Why Is a Female-Led Religious Community Treated as a Threat?Because it challenges the patriarchal system that has traditionally used religion to suppress women.

Men create the doctrine, Men interpret the doctrine, Men enforce the doctrine.

Women comply.

When a women-led movement mirrors the organisational structure of existing religions — except with women at the top — people call it “radical,” even though it is simply equal but opposite.

It is the inversion that scares people, not the structure itself.

The Real Question Is Not About Legitimacy — It Is About Comfort

If people are comfortable with:

then why are they uncomfortable with a religion led by women?

Why is male exclusivity “tradition,” but female leadership “extremism”?

Why do women have to justify themselves when men never have to?

These questions expose a deeper truth: We aren’t debating theology. We’re debating power.

Feminism Can Be Many Things — A Movement, a Philosophy, a Community… and Yes, Even a Religion

The moment you look at how religions are defined, and how patriarchal structures have shaped them, one thing becomes unmistakably clear: There is nothing about feminism that prevents it from being a religion. The only barrier is the discomfort people feel when women create authority rather than submit to it.

That reaction isn’t accidental, and it isn’t personal.

Conversations about inequality don’t just describe unfair systems, they challenge them. For some people, hearing about gendered disadvantage feels like an accusation, even when no individual blame is being assigned. Rather than engaging with the issue itself, it can feel safer to attack the messenger.

There’s also discomfort in being asked to look at unearned advantage. When a system has quietly worked in your favour, acknowledging inequality can feel like a threat to identity, status, or fairness narratives people have been taught to believe.

Another reason is that women speaking publicly and confidently about structural problems still disrupts expectations. We’re often expected to soften the message, apologise for it, or make it more “palatable.” When we don’t, the backlash comes.

What’s telling is this: discussions about inequality are rarely attacked for being factually wrong. They’re attacked for being uncomfortable.

The pushback doesn’t mean the conversation is wrong. It usually means it’s necessary.

If talking about inequality provokes anger instead of curiosity, that reaction is worth examining — not silencing.