Editing Misogyny (section)

==="Good" versus "bad" women===

Many feminists have written that the notions of "good" women and "bad" women are imposed upon women in order to control them. Women who are easy to control, or who advocate for their own oppression, may be told they are good. The categories of bad and good also cause fighting among women; [[Helen Lewis (journalist)|Helen Lewis]] identifies this "long tradition of regulating female behaviour by defining women in opposition to one another" as the architecture of misogyny.<ref name="Lewis 2020">{{cite magazine |last=Lewis |first=Helen |date=16 January 2020 |title=Meghan, Kate, and the Architecture of Misogyny |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2020/01/meghan-markle-kate-middleton-royals-culture-war/604981/ |magazine=The Atlantic |access-date=14 July 2020 |archive-date=20 June 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230620094044/https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2020/01/meghan-markle-kate-middleton-royals-culture-war/604981/ |url-status=live}}</ref>

[[File:ChimamandaAdichie.jpg|thumb|left|[[Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie]]]]
The ''[[Madonna–whore complex|Madonna–whore]] dichotomy'' or ''virgin/whore dichotomy'' is the perception of women as either good and chaste or as bad and promiscuous. Belief in this [[dichotomy]] leads to misogyny, according to the feminist perspective, because the dichotomy appears to justify policing women's behaviour. Misogynists seek to punish "bad" women for their sexuality.<ref name="The Madonna-Whore Dichotomy Is Asso"/> Author [[Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie]] observes that when women describe being harassed or assaulted (as in the [[#MeToo movement]]) they are viewed as deserving sympathy only if they are "good" women: non-sexual, and perhaps helpless.<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Marchese |first=David |date=9 July 2018 |title=Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: The novelist on being a "feminist icon," Philip Roth's humanist misogyny, and the sadness in Melania Trump. |url=https://www.vulture.com/2018/07/chimamanda-ngozi-adichie-in-conversation.html |magazine=Vulture |publisher=Vox Media |access-date=15 July 2020 |archive-date=17 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200717084849/https://www.vulture.com/2018/07/chimamanda-ngozi-adichie-in-conversation.html |url-status=live}}</ref>

In her 1974 book ''[[Woman Hating]]'', [[Andrea Dworkin]] uses traditional [[fairy tales]] to illustrate misogyny. Fairy tales designate certain women as "good", for example [[Sleeping Beauty]] and [[Snow White]], who are inert, passive characters. Dworkin observed that these characters "never think, act, initiate, confront, resist, challenge, feel, care, or question. Sometimes they are forced to do housework." In contrast, the "evil" women who populate fairy tales are queens, witches, and other women with power. Further, men in fairy tales are said to be good kings and good husbands irrespective of their actions. For Dworkin, this illustrates that under misogyny only powerless women are allowed to be seen as good. No similar judgement is applied to men.<ref>{{cite book |last=Dworkin |first=Andria |author-link=Andrea Dworkin |date=1974 |title=Woman Hating |url=https://www.feministes-radicales.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Andrea-DWORKIN-Woman-Hating-A-Radical-Look-at-Sexuality-1974.pdf |location=New York |publisher=Penguin Group |isbn=978-0-525-47423-4 |access-date=14 July 2020 |archive-date=29 July 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230729122949/https://www.feministes-radicales.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Andrea-DWORKIN-Woman-Hating-A-Radical-Look-at-Sexuality-1974.pdf |url-status=dead}}
* For an interpretation, see: {{cite web |url=https://feminisminindia.com/2019/07/12/woman-hating-andrea-dworkin/ |title=Book Review: Woman Hating By Andrea Dworkin |last=Gupta |first=Shivangi |date=12 July 2019 |website=Feminism in India |publisher=FII Media Private Limited |access-date=14 July 2020 |archive-date=24 September 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200924022755/https://feminisminindia.com/2019/07/12/woman-hating-andrea-dworkin/ |url-status=live}}</ref>

[[File:Dworkin_on_After_Dark.JPG|thumb|[[Andrea Dworkin]]]]
In her book ''[[Andrea Dworkin#Right-Wing Women|Right-Wing Women]]'', Dworkin adds that powerful women are tolerated by misogynists provided women use their power to reinforce the power of men and to oppose feminism. Dworkin gives [[Phyllis Schlafly]] and [[Anita Bryant]] as examples of powerful women tolerated by [[Antifeminism|anti-feminists]] only because they advocated for their own oppression. Women may even be worshipped or called superior to men if they are sufficiently "good", meaning obedient or inert.<ref>{{cite book |last=Dworkin |first=Andria |author-link=Andrea Dworkin |date=1983 |title=Right-Wing Women |url=https://archive.org/details/rightwingwomen00dwor/mode/1up?view=theater |location=New York |publisher=Perigee Books |isbn=978-0-399-50671-0 |url-access=registration}}</ref>

Philosopher [[Kate Manne]] argues that the word "misogyny" as used by modern feminists denotes not a generalised hatred of women, but instead the system of distinguishing good from bad women. Misogyny is like a police force, Manne writes, that rewards or punishes women based on these judgements.<ref name="Manne2019" />{{rp|79}}