Research Group
in Analytic Philosophy

Abstract

I defend the apparently trivial claim that misogyny is the hatred of women. Kate Manne has recently argued against this view, which she calls “naïve”. She argues that it faces an epistemic and an explanatory challenge and proposes to ameliorate what the term means. In this talk, I argue, first, that the challenges that Manne raises to the naïve view are not compelling to motivate a meaning revision. Second, insofar as the psychology of emotions can offer resources to account for long standing dispositional sentiments, it can offer the resources to account for the mistreatment of women and in accordance with the standard understanding of the meaning of the word. I conclude that this is a psychologically plausible explanation of misogyny and of its social function.