Opinion | Women can never seem to win

As a woman, you can have a perfect record in terms of medaling at the Olympics — an international competition limited to the best athletic talent our planet has to offer — and your gold medal victory can still be overshadowed when the men’s team wins a gold medal themselves for the first time in 46 years. Despite medaling eight times in eight appearances compared to the 12 times in 20 appearances of the U.S. men’s hockey team, the U.S. women’s hockey team was reduced to the butt of a joke by the convicted felon who runs our country.

Believe it or not, I don’t feel that the majority of the U.S. men’s hockey team is to blame for the controversy — though there might be something to be said about the individuals who attended the State of the Union. Regardless, this team just played an incredibly physically demanding game for over 60 minutes. The director of the FBI had somehow gotten into their locker room and was celebrating with them while he dialed the President of the United States. The team was in between a rock and a hard place — with a metaphorical blade to their necks, they laughed at a distasteful joke.

Talk about being in the right place at the wrong time. 

However, this isn’t about how Kash Patel used taxpayers’ money to go to Milan, or how Donald Trump made light of impeachment as though he’s immune to it. It’s about how he was joking about being burdened with inviting the women’s team to the White House. Oh, the horror. 

This act naturally caused many, myself included, to consider just how deeply entrenched misogyny is in our society. For the first time, however, I caught myself wondering — do we even stand a chance against it? Can women ever win? 

Even now, the phone call has been seemingly swept beneath the rug of pop culture. NBC’s Saturday Night Live wrapped the controversy up and put a bow on it by bringing the teams together, allowing Hilary Knight and the U.S. women’s team to quip that the men’s team deserves their own moment to shine, seeming to cite their invitation to the show as an afterthought of sorts. I don’t think it’s enough. 

I don’t understand how we’re already moving on to the next controversy, awards show or pop album. How do we reckon with the centuries of violence against women — an attitude that transcends cultural, geographic and political divides? How do we blithely ignore the ways in which this violence and prejudice have become institutionalized in our society? 

We’ve participated in the protests, lobbied for our rights and presented scientific evidence about why we deserve the right to make decisions about our pregnancies, and yet our efforts fall short. With misogyny at the helm of our societal values, it often feels like we’re Sisyphus pushing our boulder up the hill — for each modicum of achievement, there’s an endless uphill path ahead of us. 

I think that rather than pushing for radical change to the system and screaming into the void for centuries to come, our best bet at defeating this prejudice against women is to confront it and encourage others to do the same. 

Realize when you’ve assumed a doctor to be male, when someone calls a woman “sweetheart” or when you start talking over women. Make a conscious effort to stop these behaviors in yourself and others. Consider how you can challenge those who perpetrate or exhibit misogynistic attitudes instead of staying complacent. If you don’t stand up in the moment, send a message condemning it after the fact. Listen to other women’s experiences and support them while doing so. Educate yourself on your own biases. Lead by example. 

Acknowledging misogyny’s prevalence is just the start. However, the simple act of doing so can open the doors to different gendered narratives in the media we consume, greater acceptance of women in leadership positions and improved behavior towards women as a whole. While prejudice against women might be ingrained in our society, it doesn’t always have to be. When misogyny rears its ugly head — whether it’s in a classroom, during a conversation with friends or even in the locker room after a gold medal game, it’s all we can do to condemn and confront it. 

Tessa Powers is tired. Feel free to email her at tep49@pitt.edu.