Why Do We Hate Famous Women So Much Harder Than Famous Men?
Celebrity ladies have long inspired a special brand of intense and irrational loathing.
In 1972, John Lennon released a single called “Woman Is the N****r of the World.” It was an unfortunate title for a song written by an ex-Beatle whose well-documented abusive tendencies toward the women in his life made him a huge part of the problem.
Sadly, so are the rest of us. In recent years, discussions of the subjugation of women have focused largely on sexual harassment and assault as well as sexism in the workplace, but the general public is more guilty of misogyny than we like to admit. I’ve covered celebrities and pop culture for decades, and I’ve noticed a glaring double standard in the way we critique famous women vs. how we critique famous men.
A famous man has to be branded a sex offender to get the complete pariah treatment (see Harvey Weinstein, Bill Cosby, R. Kelly, Matt Lauer, and Woody Allen). Famous women just have to rub us the wrong way.
The double standard goes way back. In 1936, when Britain’s King Edward VIII abdicated the throne, his future wife, Wallis Simpson, was cast as the primary villain of the royal scandal, a role she continues to play posthumously. While she was being blamed for cheapening…
