'Nice guy misogynists' are everywhere

by Emma Barnett

All women know at least one. Usually they are pretty decent to their female colleagues and acquaintances; smiling when they speak and nodding furiously in agreement. Except they aren't listening. Not really. And never will.

Handily there's a neat label for these chaps: Nice Guy Misogynists (NGM).

There's a surprising number of them around. Lurking. You can't see, touch, or ever really get a purchase on their bias - but it influences their every interaction. Indeed, a woman can even enjoy a very healthy relationship with a NGM because, unlike old-school full-fat sexists, these men do actually like women (they may even think we are better at doing certain things - think sewing or baking); in private, though, they hold rather outdated views about what our role in life should be.

Certain men privately hold very outdated views about the roles women should play

This wouldn't be a problem if those views didn't negatively affect women in the real world. But they do.

Take the case of those Muslim women who claim to have been systematically blocked from seeking office by male Muslim Labour councillors. Earlier this week, the Muslim Women's Network UK outed this behaviour, citing the example of a woman who was discouraged in her political pursuits by councillors who suspected she hadn't received her father's consent. Another activist revealed how different councillors had sabotaged her bid with a smear campaign in which she was accused of having an extra-marital affair - the selection deals, she claimed, were stitched up in a boys' club behind closed doors.

Bizarrely, Jeremy Corbyn has yet to officially comment but the Muslim Women's Network say it's not only a Labour issue and I can well believe it. Watch this space, Mr Cameron.

Because although these cases may seem extreme, isolated examples of discrimination as a result of religious conditioning, they're not. Nice guy misogyny is happening across the board, religion or no religion, and often without women realising it. It's worth noting that although the councillors' misogyny now seems overt, it was so subtle that it took these ambitious women nearly 10 years to realise what was going on.

A 2012 study by American social scientists best explains the problem; researchers set out to determine whether a man's domestic set-up affected his professional conduct. It did. A lot. They found men with traditional arrangements, in which the wife remained at home with the children, were routinely less likely to promote capable women at work and believed that companies with a preponderance of females ran less efficiently.

Overt discrimination of any kind is illegal. But the creeping kind is harder to identify and address, especially when it's not borne of malice.

My approach is to sniff it out and where possible confront the offender. As I discovered with a former colleague, he had no idea how differently he treated me from the 'boys', until I highlighted it while he was mid back-slap with one male compadre. Luckily for me, he took it well and we now joke about his NGM status (he more nervously than I).

But not everyone is so fortunate. Hopefully though, knowledge is power. If more women can recognise when men are holding them back for reasons beyond their control, they will plot another route.

And it would help if those men who should know better would at the very least rap the necessary knuckles. Misogyny isn't a good look for anyone.

-Telegraph UK