Within this understanding, someone who loves their wife can absolutely be part of the larger misogynistic world order, because misogyny isn’t always about direct action, but reaction — and the way women internalize or anticipate that reaction ahead of time. It shapes a world in which women are conceived of as “givers,” admirers, supporters, and self-sacrificing, and when they fail to serve that role, there are consequences. “She is not allowed to be in the same ways as he is,” Manne writes. “She will tend to be in trouble when she does not give enough, or to the right people, in the right way, or in the right spirit.”
Misogyny is outward hostility, then, but it also the feeling of shame, the fear of social shunning and loss of status, and the threat of desolation. You can see how women themselves — particularly white, straight, able-bodied women who are interested in maintaining their relative power within the status quo — both passively and actively participate in misogyny.
As Manne points out, “the misogyny of the most powerful white men — who are least subject to moral and legal sanctions and, indeed, may inflict harm with impunity — clearly harms vulnerable women disproportionately. But it is we, as white women, who tend to enable it, in ways that may be more or less connected with the aim of self-preservation.” Ivanka and Melania Trump, then, but also…
