It surprises me sometimes of how many faces male sexism can take. One usually expects it to be in the clear form of misogyny, which would make it easy to point out and counter but more often than not it appears in many other insidious methods which make it difficult to discern.

Such was the case when I stumbled onto a link from the /r/funny subreddit, pointing to a story about a man winning a women’s-only poker tournament. Now that title, or story, by itself is not really sexist (or especially funny for that matter) but what really got on my tits was the OP comment:

Sheesh, feminists: They complain about the world being man dominated, then a man puts himself in a female dominated environment, still wins and suddenly it’s ‘why is he ruining it’.

lame, so very lame.

Not only was the OP displaying his misogyny as what made him find the post funny but he’s spinning the quotes he mined from the article to make it sound as if the women are simply complaining about losing to a man (instead of complaining that he ruined a women’s only tournament which is the truth.) and as if this is some kind of proof of the inherent superiority of males which makes them suitable to dominate the world.

It thus clearly shows that this was pure shadenfreude of a misogynist enjoying a women’s event be spoiled and taking opportunity to make pot shots at caricatures of feminists he has in his small reptile brain. It adequately helps point out how sexist mentality can crop up without being a clear women-hating comment.

As was only natural, when I pointed out the implications of the OP comment, apologetics and alternative interpretations of it were quick to come and I was quick to be buried while trying to set the record straight. People were unbelievably eager to believe that all women were annoyed about was simply that a man won. They were also quick to use a man’s victory as some kind of proof of superiority of the whole genre in poker.

Even worse was the OP who continued to press the issue, even when his misogyny became glaringly obvious. It just goes to show how blind sexists are to their own trait even as they spew out the lowest forms of bile against women and feminists.

Through the whole of this exchange, I was dismayed not only by the popularity of the OP but also by the number of people who in this day and age eagerly jump in to defend him. Fortunately even though I was  downvoted out of sight, there were other voices of reason who managed to give the correct context.

All of this just points even more to how widespread patriarchy remains in this day and age and how this mentality spreads itself even without having to be glaringly obvious. We still have a lot of work in front of us.